Beijing's Tsinghua and Peking universities have tied for 16th place in the latest edition of the Times Higher Education World University Rankings, the highest position ever achieved by Chinese mainland universities.

Tsinghua climbed four places from last year's ranking and Peking seven places, to give the Chinese mainland two institutions in the top 20 universities in the world for the first time. Oxford University in the United Kingdom retained top spot for the sixth consecutive year in the rankings, which were released on Thursday.

A record 10 universities from the Chinese mainland were in the top 200, with nine of them improving on their previous ranking,

The rankings covered 1,662 institutions this year, 136 more than last year. Eight Chinese mainland universities made their debut in the rankings, taking the Chinese mainland's total representation to a record 97 universities.

The Chinese mainland was the fourth-most-represented country or region in the rankings, behind the United States with 183, Japan with 118 and the UK with 101.

The COVID-19 pandemic influenced the rankings, with universities involved in research on understanding and managing the pandemic seeing significant boosts in their rankings.

Eleven Chinese mainland universities benefited from such research, including Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, Hubei province (181), Southern Medical University in Guangzhou, Guangdong province (401-500), Capital Medical University in Beijing (501-600), and Wenzhou Medical University in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province (601-800), which all moved up at least two ranking bands.

Phil Baty, chief knowledge officer at Times Higher Education, said: "The world's elite universities have enjoyed a long period of dominance at the top of the table with help from historic reputation, global status and reliable income. But our data shows us there are clear shifts happening across higher education around the world, and perhaps most rapidly in the Chinese mainland."

Continued improvement

"Last year, we witnessed the Chinese mainland achieve a top 20 position for the first time. This year, we see it double its representation in the group as Tsinghua University and Peking University both tie in the highest position ever for the country."

He added that Chinese mainland institutions have continued to improve in the university rankings despite the pandemic. "It will be interesting to witness what happens in the post-pandemic world, and whether the Chinese mainland can challenge the US and UK's long-running dominance in the global top 10," Baty said.

The top 10 positions were held by the same universities, with the US having eight and the UK two.

The California Institute of Technology and Harvard University in the US both moved up to equal second, while the UK's Cambridge University tied for fifth after dropping to sixth last year. Princeton University in the US also improved, moving up two places to seventh.

This year, Japan, South Korea, Russia, Singapore, New Zealand and Hong Kong all claimed their best finishes in the top 200 since the current methodology was introduced in 2016. The University of Tokyo (tied for 35th), University of Hong Kong (tied for 30th), Seoul National University (tied for 54th), the National University of Singapore (21st), the University of Auckland (tied for 137th) and Lomonosov Moscow State University (tied for 158th) all moved up the table.