UK Top 20 rankings: Complete University Guide 2025

We maintained our place among the UK’s most highly regarded departments for the subjects of Social Work, Marketing, Social Policy and Business and Management Studies. 

The School ranked:

• 3rd in the UK for Social Work
• 6th in the UK for Marketing
• 13th in the UK for Social Policy
• 18th in the UK for Business and Management Studies

Professor Bob Doherty, Dean of the School for Business and Society said “ Fantastic to see all our Departments in the UK top 20 and Marketing and Social Work in the top 10 in the UK. This demonstrates the commitment to high quality work from all our staff.”

York also ranked highly in the subjects of Sociology (11th) and Politics (18th), highlighting the quality of our joint degrees with the Department of Politics and International Relations and the Department of Sociology

York’s overall position

The University of York ranked joint 17th overall in the Complete University Guide 2025. The guide ranks 130 institutions across the UK.

In total, 14 subjects at York were ranked in the UK top 10:

• Archaeology (7th)
• Biological Sciences (7th)
• Chemistry (7th)
• Drama, Dance and Cinematics (3rd)
• English (8th)
• French (4th)
• History (9th)
• History of Art, Architecture and Design (6th)
• Iberian Languages (Spanish) (6th)
• Linguistics (10th)
• Marketing (6th)
• Philosophy (10th)
• Psychology (9th)
• Social Work (3rd)

A further 10 subjects appeared in the UK top 20.

About the Complete University Guide

Published annually, The Complete University Guide league tables rank the best universities in the UK. It covers 74 separate subject areas, as well as an overall institutional ranking. Universities and subjects are ranked on entry standards, student satisfaction, research quality, graduate prospects, completion rates, student-staff ratio and spend on academic services and facilities.

The rankings are based on public domain data collected by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), the National Student Survey and the Research Excellence Framework 2021.