Best universities for law degrees 2024

Find the best universities for law degrees using Times Higher Education’s World University Rankings data

October 28 2020

A law degree is the first step on a number of work paths – including a career as a solicitor, barrister or judge. Many universities around the world provide law degrees, so it can be difficult to know which is the best one for you.

Times Higher Education has ranked the top universities for law degrees. Stanford University in the US takes first place, followed by the University of Cambridge. Nearly a third of the universities in the law ranking are located in the US.

The University of Cambridge, the University of Oxford, UCL and the London School of Economics and Political Science are the only UK universities in the top 10. There are 41 UK universities in the ranking in total.

The University of Toronto is the highest ranked Canadian university at number 14. Thirteen other Canadian universities feature in the ranking.

Best universities worldwide

Best universities in Europe
Best universities in the world
Best universities in the UK
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Times Higher Education’s subject rankings are based on the same 13 performance indicators used in the overall World University Rankings 2021. However, the methodology is carefully recalibrated for each subject, with the weightings changed to suit the individual fields. The full methodology for law can be found here.

Scroll down for a more comprehensive guide to what you can do with a law degree and the top universities.

What can you do with a law degree?

Top 5 universities for law degrees

1. Stanford University

Stanford Law School is known for having one of the lowest student-to-staff ratios in the country at 7.3:1.

The law courses are varied and diverse, beginning with an overview in the first year covering criminal law, contracts, tort, and legal research and writing. After the first year, students can choose from 280 different course titles to specialise in the area that interests them.

The Robert Crown Law Library at Stanford holds about 500,000 books.

Stanford law students run more than 50 student organisations, including the Stanford law and wine society, Stanford law students against gendered violence, women in politics and the black law students association. There are also 12 legal journals affiliated with the law school.

2. University of Cambridge

The Squire Law Library at the University of Cambridge is one of the three largest legal collections in the UK, with almost 180,000 volumes. The collection is strongest in British law, but contains collections on legal systems across the world including the US, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. There are also smaller collections relating to other countries.

The Faculty of Law offers six different degrees as well as an MPhil in criminology, an MPhil in criminological research, a diploma in legal studies and the diploma in international law.

Student experience studying law

My experience as an international student at the University of Geneva
Are you sure you want to study law?
‘I make it a point to not be influenced by the naysayers’
How to become a lawyer
How do I decide between doing a master’s or joining the workforce?

3. University of Oxford

The faculty of law at the University of Oxford is one of the largest in the UK. It is made up of 30 law schools within the colleges of the university. The student-to-staff ratio is approximately 7:1.

There are a number of centres and institutes within the faculty of law, such as the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, the Institute of European Comparative Law, the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, Oxford Intellectual Property Research Centre and the Centre for Criminology.

4. The University of Chicago

The University of Chicago Law School opened its doors in 1902, 12 years after the university was founded.

Faculty members at the law school employ the Socratic method of teaching. This means that they do not lecture students but instead engage them in a dialogue asking them to consider some of the most complex legal and social problems. This method aims to prepare students to think on their feet while under pressure.

5. Yale University

The admissions process for Yale Law School is one of the most selective in the US, with less than 10 per cent of applicants accepted each year.

The school hosts a number of clinics that allow students to represent clients in real cases. Up to 80 per cent of Yale law students take part in these clinics before they graduate. The clinics cover a wide range of legal areas and new ones are added all the time.

Alumni of the law school include former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and former US presidents Bill Clinton and Gerald Ford.

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Top universities for law degrees 2021

Click each institution to view its World University Rankings 2021 profile

Law Rank 2021	Law Rank 2020	University	Country/region
1	1	Stanford University	United States
2	2	University of Cambridge	United Kingdom
3	4	University of Oxford	United Kingdom
4	5	The University of Chicago	United States
5	3	Yale University	United States
6	=6	Duke University	United States
7	9	New York University	United States
8	14	UCL	United Kingdom
9	13	Harvard University	United States
10	8	London School of Economics and Political Science	United Kingdom
11	12	University of Melbourne	Australia
12	15	National University of Singapore	Singapore
13	=6	University of California, Berkeley	United States
14	10	University of Toronto	Canada
15	=18	University of Edinburgh	United Kingdom
16	20	McGill University	Canada
17	28	University of Michigan-Ann Arbor	United States
18	=21	Cornell University	United States
19	=18	UNSW Sydney	Australia
20	16	Columbia University	United States
21	17	University of Hong Kong	Hong Kong
22	11	University of California, Los Angeles	United States
23	=23	King’s College London	United Kingdom
24	27	Leiden University	Netherlands
=25	NR	Humboldt University of Berlin	Germany
=25	31	KU Leuven	Belgium
27	=21	University of Pennsylvania	United States
28	52	Tilburg University	Netherlands
29	29	University of Amsterdam	Netherlands
30	=25	Georgetown University	United States
31	=25	City University of Hong Kong	Hong Kong
32	=34	Northwestern University	United States
33	=34	University of British Columbia	Canada
34	40	Maastricht University	Netherlands
=35	32	University of California, Irvine	United States
=35	33	Durham University	United Kingdom
37	38	University of Sydney	Australia
38	30	Shanghai Jiao Tong University	China
39	64	University of Warwick	United Kingdom
40	41	University of Glasgow	United Kingdom
41	NR	Tsinghua University	China
42	=80	Vanderbilt University	United States
43	66	York University	Canada
44	NR	University of Navarra	Spain
45	51	University of Kent	United Kingdom
46	42	Australian National University	Australia
47	37	Hebrew University of Jerusalem	Israel
=48	45	University of Manchester	United Kingdom
=48	36	Queen Mary University of London	United Kingdom
50	=55	Florida State University	United States
51	=76	University of Essex	United Kingdom
52	39	Utrecht University	Netherlands
53	=55	University of Virginia (Main campus)	United States
54	49	Tel Aviv University	Israel
55	=47	University of Bristol	United Kingdom
56	58	The University of Queensland	Australia
57	=73	University of Nottingham	United Kingdom
58	=47	University of Copenhagen	Denmark
59	=76	University of Oslo	Norway
60	43	Goethe University Frankfurt	Germany
61	44	George Mason University	United States
=62	46	Erasmus University Rotterdam	Netherlands
=62	NR	LMU Munich	Germany
64	53	Monash University	Australia
65	50	Lund University	Sweden
66	=96	University of Sheffield	United Kingdom
67	59	Penn State (Main campus)	United States
=68	54	Panthéon-Sorbonne University – Paris 1	France
=68	=23	University of Washington	United States
=70	67	University of Geneva	Switzerland
=70	70	University of Texas at Austin	United States
=72	NR	Pompeu Fabra University	Spain
=72	60	University of Technology Sydney	Australia
=74	=80	Temple University	United States
=74	78	University of Wollongong	Australia
=76	63	George Washington University	United States
=76	=100	Ghent University	Belgium
78	65	Boston University	United States
79	91	Chinese University of Hong Kong	Hong Kong
80	=55	University of Groningen	Netherlands
81	NR	University of Aberdeen	United Kingdom
82	126–150	Lancaster University	United Kingdom
83	=83	University of Helsinki	Finland
84	NR	University College Dublin	Republic of Ireland
=85	NR	National University of Ireland, Galway	Republic of Ireland
=85	68	University of Vienna	Austria
87	69	American University	United States
88	75	The University of Western Australia	Australia
89	86	University of Leeds	United Kingdom
90	88	University of Lausanne	Switzerland
=91	101–125	University of Colorado Boulder	United States
=91	NR	University of Macau	Macao
=93	99	University of Montreal	Canada
=93	=83	Northeastern University	United States
=93	101–125	University of South Carolina-Columbia	United States
96	101–125	Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam	Netherlands
97	101–125	University of Antwerp	Belgium
98	101–125	University of Florida	United States
99	101–125	Paris Sciences et Lettres – PSL Research University Paris	France
100	101–125	University of Tasmania	Australia
101–125	79	University of Bologna	Italy
101–125	126–150	Boston College	United States
101–125	101–125	Cardiff University	United Kingdom
101–125	101–125	University of Cincinnati	United States
101–125	NR	City, University of London	United Kingdom
101–125	87	Complutense University of Madrid	Spain
101–125	NR	Dalhousie University	Canada
101–125	72	Griffith University	Australia
101–125	71	University of Hamburg	Germany
101–125	=96	University of Liverpool	United Kingdom
101–125	NR	Middlesex University	United Kingdom
101–125	101–125	Newcastle University	United Kingdom
101–125	126–150	Ohio State University (Main campus)	United States
101–125	90	University of Pretoria	South Africa
101–125	85	Queen’s University Belfast	United Kingdom
101–125	=73	University of São Paulo	Brazil
101–125	101–125	Sapienza University of Rome	Italy
101–125	=100	University of South Australia	Australia
101–125	82	University of Southern California	United States
101–125	151+	University of Surrey	United Kingdom
101–125	=94	University of Sussex	United Kingdom
101–125	NR	Swinburne University of Technology	Australia
101–125	NR	University of Trento	Italy
101–125	NR	Trinity College Dublin	Republic of Ireland
101–125	126–150	Vrije Universiteit Brussel	Belgium
101–125	98	University of Zurich	Switzerland
126–150	101–125	University of Auckland	New Zealand
126–150	126–150	University of Birmingham	United Kingdom
126–150	101–125	University of Cape Town	South Africa
126–150	126–150	Curtin University	Australia
126–150	89	University of Exeter	United Kingdom
126–150	151+	HSE University	Russian Federation
126–150	151+	Indiana University	United States
126–150	101–125	Laval University	Canada
126–150	126–150	University of Lisbon	Portugal
126–150	126–150	University of Miami	United States
126–150	101–125	University of Minnesota	United States
126–150	101–125	University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill	United States
126–150	126–150	University of Notre Dame	United States
126–150	NR	University of Otago	New Zealand
126–150	92	University of Ottawa	Canada
126–150	126–150	Queen’s University	Canada
126–150	61	Queensland University of Technology	Australia
126–150	126–150	University of Southampton	United Kingdom
126–150	101–125	Stockholm University	Sweden
126–150	126–150	University of Strathclyde	United Kingdom
126–150	101–125	Victoria University of Wellington	New Zealand
126–150	NR	Western University	Canada
126–150	101–125	University of Wisconsin-Madison	United States
126–150	126–150	University of the Witwatersrand	South Africa