Academic Reputation: based on survey responses from over 94,000 academics;

Employer Reputation: based on survey responses from over 44,000 employers about the relationship between institution and graduate employability;

Citations per Faculty: measuring research impact, it divides the total number of citations received by a university's research papers over a five-year period by the number of faculty at an institution;

Faculty/Student Ratio: a proxy for teaching capacity. Student numbers are divided by faculty numbers, giving the global student body some indication of likely class sizes at their selected institution;

International Faculty Ratio: one of QS's two measures of internationalization, it measures the proportion of non-domestic faculty at an institution;

International Student Ratio: the second of QS's two measures of internationalization, it measures the proportion of non-domestic students at an institution. This, in turn, provides an indication of a university's ability to attract talent from across the world.

On July 11, Clarivate Analytics released the latest ESI data for July 2019. ESI (basic science indicators database) is one of the most important indicators used to evaluate the international academic level and influence of universities, academic institutions, countries or regions worldwide. The data covers from January 1, 2009 to April 30, 2019.

In terms of international rankings, the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences is still the top university in mainland China and currently ranks 86th in the world. Peking University and Tsinghua University ranks the 2nd and 3rd in mainland China respectively, 89th and 93rd in the international rankings. Peking University remained unchanged from May 2019, while Tsinghua University advanced one place. Zhejiang University, Shanghai Jiaotong University and Fudan University following closely.

Sun Yat-sen University and Nanjing University advanced one and two places respectively, while the University of Science and Technology of China remain unchanged. A total of 9 universities in mainland China are among the world's top 200, with impressive performances.

Many of the universities in mainland China have made significant progress in this ESI top 100. The biggest improvement was made by China University of Mining and Technology, advanced 29 places in the international rankings, followed by the Shenzhen University which advanced 26 places in the rankings. Furthermore, Nanjing University of Information and Technology advanced 23 places.