By Stephen Oladele
With 69.4 per cent score, the University of Ilorin has been ranked as Nigeria’s number one university in the realm of Research Quality.
The score conatained in the just released Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings is described as the highest by any Nigerian university ranked this year.
The latest ranking result, according to a statement by Mr Kunle Akogun, the university of Ilorin’s Director of Cooperate Affairs, was released last Wednesday (September 30, 2026) at the World Academic Summit hosted by the University of Cape Town, South Africa.
The statement said that the ranking assesses universities on five pillars such as teaching, research environment, research quality, international outlook and industry.
It quoted the university Ranking Implementation Project Manager, Prof. Suleiman Folorunso Ambali, as saying that “research quality is UNILORIN’s strongest turf, and that the University aims to convert it into wider international recognition and work towards the 801–1000 band in the next edition.”
The statement says an analysis of the results shows that the university has been “lifted from the 1201–1500 band in 2026 into the 1001–1200 world band”.
“Our University is now one of the seven Nigerian universities in the global top 1,200.
‘The UNILORIN is ahead of the University of Lagos, Bayero University, Kano and the University of Ibadan on quality research, which carries 30% of the overall score and measures how widely a university’s research is cited by scholars worldwide,” the statement reads
The Vice Chancellor of the university, Prof. Wahab Olasupo Egbewole, SAN, while reacting to the development, said that “this outcome is not accidental but a reflection of years of patient, disciplined scholarship by colleagues who publish work that the world reads and cites.
Egbewole thanked every lecturer, researcher, postgraduate supervisor and student whose work contributed to the positive rankings of the University.
