NIRF Ranking 2025 Overall: IIT Madras retains top spot for 7th time, IISc Bangalore in second place

For the seventh time, the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras has bagged the top position in the National Institutional and Ranking Framework (NIRF), India Rankings 2025, under the overall category. The Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, is now in second place.

Live Updates: NIRF Ranking 2025

The top 6 positions remain the same as last year dominated by the IITs, with only IISc Bangalore being the exception.

The India Rankings 2025 was announced by union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan and minister of state for education Sukanta Majumdar on Thursday at an event in Bharat Mandapam.

The National Board of Accreditation (NBA) ranked colleges and universities in 17 categories this year.The Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) was added this year as a new category, where institutions were ranked on the basis of “Green practices and societal impact”.

The other categories include – overall category, university, college, engineering, management, pharmacy, law, medical, architecture and planning, dental, innovation, agriculture and allied sectors, research institutions, open universities, skill universities and state-funded public universities. The last three categories were added in 2024.

Top 20 institutions in overall category

NIRF Ranking 2025: The front runners

In the overall category, IIT Madras retained its top position. This year apart from IISc Bangalore, which is in second position, IITs dominated the top seven ranks. IIT Roorkee has moved to the 7th spot from last year’s eighth position.

Congratulating the students, faculty, alumni and non-teaching staff for their hard work, V. Kamakoti, Director, IIT Madras, said, “Being a topper consistently is a result of a collective, cohesive and focused team effort. Thanking the Almighty for blessing us with such a wonderful team. Together, we pledge to put in our best efforts towards Viksit Bharat@2047.”

AIIMS Delhi has slipped to the 8th position this year from the 7th in 2024 and 6th in 2023. This year IIT Guwahati has fallen off from the top 10 ranks in the overall category to the 11th position now

JNU and BHU have moved to the 9th and 10th position, respectively.

This year Aligarh Muslim University has slid to the 19th position from the 16th position in 2024.

BITS Pilani has this year entered the top 20 in the overall category, from the 23rd position in 2024. Similarly, Homi Bhabha National Institute has moved up on the 20th position from 27 in 2024.

NIRF Rankings 2025: New rules

As per NBA it has introduced stricter rules for evaluation and ranking. It has introduced negative marking for the retraction of research papers and citations. Anil Sahasrabudhe, chairman NBA called this a “double whammy”.

This year over 14,000 institutions participated in the India Rankings 2025. A growth of 30.6% in a year highlighted higher education secretary Vineet Joshi.

“Third party verification of the data has been undertaken in the rankings,” said Joshi.

The parameters for ranking broadly cover “Teaching, Learning and Resources,” “Research and Professional Practices,” “Graduation Outcomes,” “Outreach and Inclusivity,” and “Perception”.

Over the years, several stakeholders have raised objections over the parameters on which NIRF is based. However, Sahasrabudhe while addressing the gathering on Thursday called the India Rankings the most “transparent ranking system in the world”.

NIRF was approved by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) and launched on September 29, 2015, with four categories.