UK university social media league table 2017

Social media is an easy way to keep in touch with your university but which universities in the UK have the highest social media followings?

November 21 2017

By Seeta Bhardwa

Email: seeta.bhardwa@timeshighereducation.com

The University of Oxford has the highest social media following of any university in the UK according to an analysis by student video production company Uni Shoots.

The university has more than 3,000,000 followers across Instagram, Facebook and Youtube. The University of Cambridge came in second with just over 2,000,000 followers, followed by the London School of Economics and Politics with 522,121 followers.

The video production company, set up by graduates, cross-referenced the social media ranking with the Guardian's 2018 University League Table to see whether a high rank correlated with the number of followers on social media.

It turned out to be quite a varied correlation, with the universities of Oxford and Cambridge occupying the first and second places in both rankings. However, London Metropolitan University took the fourth place position in the social media ranking but was 117th in the Guardian University League Table.

Facebook was the platform that people were most engaged in, with the highest number of followers across all universities.

Ross Lindgren, the founder of Uni Shoots, said: "We decided to focus on Facebook, Instagram and Youtube in our initial research as conversations we’ve had with students indicated these were the most used platforms in recent years." He added that that in the future they would would be planning research on Twitter and Snapchat usage.

The Uni Shoots team concluded that universities that were the most active on social media also had higher followers across all of the platforms. This trend was particularly noticeable on Youtube.

The University Social Media League Table 2017

Rank	University	Total social media following	Web page visits (in millions past 6 months)	Facebook followers	Instagram followers	Youtube subscribers
		Collected on 1/11/2017	Collected on 8/11/2017 from SimilarWeb	Collected on 1/11/2017	Collected on 1/11/2017	Collected on 1/11/2017
1	University of Oxford	3,748,279	16.02	3,407,489	249,000	91,790
2	University of Cambridge	2,228,775	16.9	1,904,924	226,000	97,851
3	London School of Economics and Political Science	522,121	6.55	374,488	52,600	95,033
4	London Metropolitan University	378,867	0.62	373,877	3175	1815
5	University of Birmingham	256,120	1.84	210,020	32,100	14,000
6	University of Edinburgh	248,664	9.35	196,299	25,400	26,965
7	University of Glasgow	239,600	5.62	196,803	35,600	7,197
8	231,416	4.24	214,155	5214	12,047
9	Imperial College London	231,410	6.27	156,581	30,300	44,529
10	University of Salford	220,471	1.32	213,324	5136	2011
11	UCL	217,048	9.84	172,689	39,300	5059
12	Coventry University	211,972	2.57	202,109	9863	0
13	University of Manchester	193,249	7.02	160,214	23,100	9935
14	University of Nottingham	181,218	5.04	130,301	27,600	23,317
15	London South Bank University	168,158	1.04	160,462	6071	1625
16	University of Kent	164,577	4.61	154,613	6049	3915
17	University of Sheffield	158,328	4.06	125,701	26,400	6227
18	Oxford Brookes University	148,638	0.96	138,474	5062	5102
19	City, University of London	142,024	2.17	133,424	4,832	3768
20	University of the West of England	139,062	2.41	129,748	5744	3570
21	University of Leeds	130,326	5.63	97,595	28,900	3,831
22	University of Westminster	126,911	2	109,815	8399	8697
23	University of Surrey	126,393	3.77	101,114	15,000	10,279
24	University of Newcastle	124,661	4.15	99,148	21,100	4413
25	University of Southampton	122,860	1.84	105,754	12,400	4706
26	Queen Mary University of London	122,075	4.23	111,498	7,779	2798
27	University of Warwick	115,738	5.27	91,821	19,700	4,217
28	University of Greenwich	115,499	1.43	107,356	8143	0
29	Middlesex University	113,615	1.27	104,138	6533	2944
30	University of Roehampton	110,565	0.93	104,515	5193	857
31	University of York	110,156	2.73	95,501	11,200	3455
32	Lancaster University	108,725	1.95	92,583	12,900	3,242
33	Cardiff University	108,658	3.01	93,658	15,000	0
34	University of Bristol	108,009	1.85	78,807	20,400	8802
35	University of East Anglia	103,447	1.42	88,702	11,800	2945
36	University of the Arts London	103,426	1.56	70,783	25400	7243
37	De Montfort University	98,720	2.41	81,436	14600	2684
38	University of Exeter	95,846	3.25	76,179	15,500	4167
39	Goldsmiths, University of London	94,705	1.38	83,316	8821	2568
40	University of Derby	94,233	1.06	81,506	6579	6148
41	Birmingham City University	93,355	1.98	85,659	3867	3829
42	Royal Holloway, University of London	89,589	1.61	79,379	9072	1138
43	Nottingham Trent University	87,604	1.82	70,465	13,600	3539
44	University of Sussex	85,580	2.76	67,745	15,200	2635
45	Bangor University	85,055	1.32	76,567	5517	2971
46	University of Essex	84,458	2.53	68,331	8071	8056
47	University of the West of Scotland	83,200	0.48	80,697	1788	715
48	Brunel University London	82,656	1.47	72,134	7019	3503
49	University of Sunderland	81,551	0.81	74,606	5550	1395
50	Edinburgh Napier University	80,870	0.83	77,294	2408	1168
51	University of South Wales	80,465	1.64	43,342	6423	30700
52	Anglia Ruskin University	79,117	1.06	73,056	4246	1815
53	University of Aberdeen	77,745	1.93	66,633	8799	2313
54	University of Hertfordshire	77,353	2.12	71,363	3677	2313
55	University of Dundee	76,665	1.2	66,821	6,235	3609
56	University of Liverpool	74,365	1.64	62,793	8903	2669
57	Kingston University	73,335	1.16	60,843	8929	3563
58	Loughborough University	73,117	2.23	52,467	16,400	4,250
59	University of Strathclyde	72,328	2.78	64,050	6151	2127
60	University of Leicester	72,323	4.34	48,715	7,055	16,553
61	Sheffield Hallam University	71,549	1.71	62,496	7,652	1401
62	Northumbria University	70,917	1.07	61,301	8483	1133
63	University of Portsmouth	70,528	1.56	60,646	8413	1469
64	Heriot-Watt University	69,533	2.09	66,638	1101	1794
65	Queen's University Belfast	69,100	2.28	66,294	840	1966
66	University of Bath	69,056	2.6	61,128	3,914	4,014
67	University of East London	67,444	1.1	61,273	3790	2381
68	University of Central Lancashire	65,516	1.12	58,722	5038	1756
69	Soas, University of London	64,739	1.33	52,534	5,157	7048
70	Manchester Metropolitan University	64,356	1.77	57,564	5437	1355
71	Leeds Beckett University	63,347	0.93	53,794	8377	1176
72	Aston University	62,863	1.51	51,295	9340	2228
73	Robert Gordon University	58,977	0.74	54,291	3374	1312
74	Teesside University	58,470	0.63	53,243	5111	116
75	University of Reading	55,814	1.86	44,865	8305	2644
76	Plymouth University	55,228	1.54	47,614	6019	1595
77	Canterbury Christ Church University	54,862	0.58	51,422	2621	819
78	University of St Andrews	53,168	2.24	42,285	9,917	966
79	University of Lincoln	52,595	2.17	43,441	9069	85
80	University of Brighton	52,523	1.69	48,370	2229	1924
81	University of Stirling	52,424	0.92	45,000	6820	604
82	Staffordshire University	51,917	1.13	46,509	3882	1526
83	University of Hull	51,179	1.37	44,022	6118	1039
84	University of Northampton	49,659	0.44	45,073	3153	1433
85	Durham University	48,901	1.51	26,738	16,100	6063
86	Keele University	48,139	0.89	38,641	7898	1600
87	Bournemouth University	47,959	1.57	36,126	8903	2930
88	Birkbeck, University of London	47,369	1.12	42,722	2012	2635
89	Swansea University	47,044	1.57	38,701	7436	907
90	University of Huddersfield	46,662	1.14	38,289	6782	1,591
91	University of Bedfordshire	43,797	0.79	39,455	2224	2118
92	Edge Hill University	39,152	0.61	31,065	6460	1627
93	Glasgow Caledonian University	36,040	0.66	33,936	2104	0
94	Cardiff Metropolitan University	35,105	0.62	29,851	4341	913
95	University for the Creative Arts	34,846	0.27	26,590	6,210	2046
96	Liverpool John Moores University	33,615	1.27	26,032	2941	4642
97	Southampton Solent University	33,210	1.09	29,107	2703	1400
98	University of Suffolk	32,087	0.17	25,221	5968	898
99	Falmouth University	30,197	0.62	22,449	7,017	731
100	University of Gloucestershire	27,629	0.46	25,566	1311	752
101	University of Bolton	26,571	0.57	23,497	2681	393
102	University of Bradford	24,387	0.88	19,538	3079	1770
103	University of Chester	24,284	0.44	16,534	6758	992
104	Aberystwyth University	23,529	1.43	21,235	521	1773
105	York St John University	22,423	0.44	18,856	3130	437
106	Bucks New University	22,033	0.2	18,856	2573	604
107	Bath Spa University	21,536	0.66	17,796	3071	669
108	Ulster University	21,385	0.83	19,873	1039	473
109	St Mary’s University, Twickenham	20,031	0.22	17,400	1734	897
110	University of Worcester	18,685	0.28	14,717	3461	507
111	University of Winchester	18,629	0.48	15,972	1851	806
112	University of West London	18,178	0.55	15,203	1,727	1248
113	University of Cumbria	17,831	0.33	15,186	1998	647
114	Queen Margaret University	17,706	0.17	16,063	1332	311
115	Abertay University	17,406	0.33	15,898	802	706
116	Liverpool Hope University	15,718	0.27	13,602	1684	432
117	University of Wales Trinity Saint David	14,251	0.29	13,601	0	650
118	Leeds Trinity University	13,292	0.15	11,103	1853	336
119	University of Chichester	12,434	0.07	10,031	2271	132
120	Newman University	6,126	0.17	5,234	697	195
121	Wrexham Glyndwr University	3,723	0.21	2,153	1030	540