Dalhousie's global and national performance improved in different ways in the latest y.
Globally, Dal ranked 107 in the 2026 report out this week. While that's the same overall ranking as last year for Dal, the number of institutions participating has risen substantially this year to more than 2,000 鈥� meaning Dal placed in the top 6% globally.
Meanwhile, Dal edged into the top 10 nationally out of 41 participating Canadian universities. That's up two spots from last year, despite nine more Canadian schools joining the ranking.
The ranking 鈥� which launched with just 700 institutions in 2022 鈥� evaluates universities across three broad categories: Environmental Impact, Social Impact, and Governance.
Each category contains performance 鈥渓enses鈥� based on indicators related to specific .
Learn more about the听听for this ranking.
Delving into Dal鈥檚 success
Dalhousie鈥檚 overall score in the ranking rose to 89.3 out of 100 this year, up 3.5 points from 85.8 last year.
Here鈥檚 how the university performed across the three categories and supporting lenses globally and in Canada:
Social Impact
Overall score:听 91.9 out of 100, up 5.1 points year over year.
Ranking outcome:听 121st globally (tie) and 13th nationally.
What it measures: The category of Social Impact recognizes the efforts universities are making to transform society for the better through equality measures,听sharing knowledge, providing strong graduate outcomes, and ensuring students have a great campus experience.
Highlights: Dal achieved a near perfect score of 99.3 out of 100 for the Equality lens this year, earning it a tie of 26th globally and fourth in Canada. The university scored 89.7 and rose 169 spots to tie at 245 globally in Knowledge Exchange. In Health & Wellbeing, it continued to score well with 96.4, despite dropping 4 spots in the ranking. For Impact of Education, Dal scored 89.7 and tied 117th globally, up 89 spots year over year.
Environmental Impact
Overall score: 84.4 out of 100, up 1.7 points year over year.
Ranking outcome: 112th globally (tie) and ninth nationally.
What it measures: Environmental Impact attempts to capture the efforts universities are making through research into areas such as the environment and climate science, a strategic focus on climate mitigation, and how impactful alumni have been in creating a more sustainable world.
Highlights: Dal scored 97.5 in Environmental Research, up one point, despite dropping to 80th in ranking. Dal鈥檚 score for Environmental Sustainability also rose, climbing 5.8 points to 65.6 鈥� landing it 10 spots higher at 214 in the ranking. In Environmental Education, Dal鈥檚 score stayed relatively flat at 89.8, while its ranking dropped 38 spots to 102 in the category.
Governance
Overall score: 91.1 out of 100, up 6.1 points year over year.
Ranking outcome: 202nd globally (tie) and 21st nationally.
What it measures: This category recognizes universities that have good governance embedded throughout their policies, procedures and strategy. It looks at the centrality of ethics within the institution, good hiring practices, open decision-making, existence of a student union, and other related indicators.
Highlights: Dalhousie rose 94 spots overall in this category, bringing it close to the top 200 institutions.