The Times Higher Education (THE) Ranking publishes a variety of special rankings in addition to its annual institutional ranking, including rankings according to subject and region, and the reputation rankings, which the organization compiles using a questionnaire administered by Elsevier. This survey provides information on which higher education institutions enjoy the best reputation among researchers. To gather data, THE sends an invitation to highly respected scholars to participate in the survey and asks them to name a maximum of 15 higher education institutions from the same discipline. THE is careful to ensure that all disciplines receive equal representation. Moreover, THE places value on having researchers from all over the world participate.

Three Swiss higher education institutions are now among the 100 top-ranked universities. Moreover, UZH is the first Swiss comprehensive university to be in the top 100; previously, only the technical universities ETH Zurich (current rank 22) and EPF Lausanne (current rank 46) achieved this result.

* THE limits its exact rankings to the 50 best universities. From place 51, the differences in reputation are so insignificant that a discrete result is not constructive. Instead, these universities are placed in groups of ten and listed in alphabetical order.