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Athletics Arts & Culture Campus & Community People Research
Athletics Arts & Culture Campus & Community People Research

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UMD Earns High Marks in Global Academic Subject Rankings

The University of Maryland earned strong global and national recognition across multiple disciplines in the latest ShanghaiRanking Global Ranking of Academic Subjects, reflecting the university’s broad research strength and world-class faculty. 

UMD placed 14 academic subjects in the top 50 globally in 2025, led by atmospheric science at No. 14. Economics followed closely at No. 19, and remote sensing ranked No. 21.

Additional UMD disciplines in the global top 50 include:

  • Environmental science and engineering (No.  25)
  • Library and information sciences (No. 26)
  • Aerospace engineering (No. 31)
  • Sociology (No. 31)
  • Earth sciences (No. 33)
  • Mathematics (No. 33)
  • Physics (No. 34)
  • Education (No. 36)
  • Biotechnology (No. 36)
  • Psychology (No. 45)
  • Management (No. 46)

Eleven UMD programs also ranked among the top 25 in the United States, led by:

  • Remote Sensing (No. 2)
  • Environmental Science and Engineering (No. 6)
  • Atmospheric Science (No. 10)

Other programs placing within the top 25 nationwide included economics (No. 14), aerospace engineering (No. 13), earth sciences (No. 13), biotechnology (No. 13), physics (No. 16), mathematics (No. 17), library and information sciences (No. 17) and education (No. 25).

The ShanghaiRanking’s Global Ranking of Academic Subjects evaluates universities across 57 disciplines, using objective indicators such as research output, citation impact, international collaboration and faculty distinction. The 2025 edition assessed nearly 2,000 universities from 92 countries and regions.

UMD also ranks in the top 2% of more than 2,500 universities around the globe in ShanghaiRanking’s 2025 Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), and is listed among the top 0.5% of universities in the world in the 2025 edition of the Global 2000 list released by the Center for World University Rankings (CWUR). The university also ranked No. 29 in the nation in U.S. News & World Report’s list of 2025-26 Best Global Universities, and No. 11 among U.S. public institutions.