For the second year in a row, Oxford University’s Saïd Business School claims the top spot in the QS Global Executive MBA Rankings.
The 2025 rankings, released this week, evaluated 204 EMBA programs across the world on employer reputation, academic leadership, executive profile, diversity, and career outcomes.
Oxford Saïd is followed by HEC Paris and IESE Business School in Spain.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology Sloan School of Management was the highest ranked U.S. school at No. 4, followed by London Business School at No. 5. All five schools held their positions in the top five from last year, with HEC Paris and IESE swapping second and third.
QS’ TOP 10 GLOBAL EXECUTIVE MBAS
2025 Rank |
2024 Rank |
School |
Country |
| 1 | 1 | Oxford (Said) | United Kingdom |
| 2 | 3 | HEC Paris | France |
| 3 | 2 | IESE Business School | Spain |
| 4 | 4 | MIT (Sloan) | United States |
| 5 | 5 | London Business School | United Kingdom |
| 6 | 8 | Yale School of Management | United States |
| 7 | 6 | Penn (Wharton) | United States |
| 8 | 7 | Northwestern (Kellogg) | United States |
| 9 | 9 | INSEAD | France |
| 10 | 15 | Warwick Business School | United Kingdom |
Oxford Saïd scored particularly high in diversity (99.8), thought leadership (97.4), and employer reputation (96.7).
“It is an incredible achievement to rank first in the world for our Executive MBA, but to do it in consecutive years should be truly celebrated,” says Soumitra Dutta, the Peter Moores Dean at Oxford Saïd. “Ensuring the greatest possible impact on the wider world is our fundamental aim, and our track record of success is testament to the dedication of our students, staff and faculty.”
EUROPEAN AND U.S. SCHOOLS DOMINATE
As they typically do, European and U.S. schools dominated the top of the QS EMBA Ranking, accounting for the first 13 spots. Of those, five are located in the United States, three are in Spain, three are in the United Kingdom, and two are in France.
In all, 67 U.S. schools made the list. MIT Sloan was the highest-ranked U.S. school (No. 4 globally), the same as last year. It was followed by Yale School of Management (No. 6 globally), and University of Pennsylvania’s The Wharton School (No. 7 globally). Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management (No. 8) and UC Berkeley Haas School of Management (No. 12) rounded out the top five for U.S. programs.
BEST U.S. SCHOOLS IN QS’ 2025 EMBA RANKING
2025 Rank |
2024 Rank |
School |
Overall Score |
| 1 | 1 | MIT (Sloan) | 94.9 |
| 2 | 4 | Yale School of Management | 93.8 |
| 3 | 2 | Penn (Wharton) | 92.8 |
| 4 | 3 | Northwestern (Kellogg) | 91.9 |
| 5 | 5 | Berkeley (Haas) | 90 |
| 6 | 6 | Chicago (Booth) | 89.2 |
| 7 | 7 | UCLA (Anderson) | 86.8 |
| 8 | 8 | Columbia Business School | 83.5 |
| 9 | 9 | NYU (Stern) | 80.6 |
| 10 | 10 | USC (Marshall) | 79.1 |
European business schools also did particularly well with 72 schools – including the top three overall. London Business School was the fourth best European school, ranking No. 5 overall. It was followed by France’s INSEAD (No. 9 overall) and
United Kingdom’s Warwick Business School which rose five places to No. 10 globally. Spain’s ESADE Business School was the fifth highest European school at No. 11.
Now in its 21st year, Oxford Saïd’s EMBA has welcomed more than 1,350 students onto the program since its inception in 2004.
The 22- to 24-month program is geared to experienced senior executives and known for its diverse student body, global leadership, and entrepreneurial mindset. The typical class is between 65 and 70 students from 38 countries and 33 employment sectors. The average age is 38 while 38% of the class are women.
BEST EUROPEAN SCHOOLS IN QS’ 2025 EMBA RANKING
2025 Rank |
2024 Rank |
School |
Country |
Overall Score |
| 1 | 1 | Oxford (Said) | United Kingdom | 100 |
| 2 | 3 | HEC Paris | France | 98.4 |
| 3 | 2 | IESE Business School | Spain | 97.3 |
| 4 | 4 | London Business School | United Kingdom | 94.2 |
| 5 | 5 | INSEAD | France | 91.2 |
| 6 | 8 | Warwick Business School | United Kingdom | 90.5 |
| 7 | 7 | ESADE Business School | Spain | 90.2 |
| 8 | 6 | IE Business School | Spain | 89.9 |
| 9 | 10 | Imperial College Business School | United Kingdom | 88.9 |
| 10 | 9 | Cambridge (Judge) | United Kingdom | 87.3 |
THE EMBA RANKING LANDSCAPE
QS (Quacquarelli Symonds) is a British-based admissions events company that conducts rankings for online, executive, and full-time MBA programs. It also ranks MBA specializations and business master’s degrees.
While EMBA rankings are a useful guide, they are not as closely scrutinized as MBA rankings. A large number of EMBA choices are made based on geography, because executives want to attend the best program in their city or region to cut down on travel for in-person classes. (New hybrid and online options are making this less of a concern.)
QS ranks EMBAs based on five metric groups, with data collected from its two long-standing surveys – the QS Global Employer Survey and the QS Academic Survey, according to its methodology.
Schools were also asked to submit EMBA specific data.
Its five metric groups include:
- Employer Reputation (30% weight): This is collected through the employer survey sent to evaluate sentiment of thousands of companies and hiring managers around the globe. QS has administered the survey for more than 20 years, so gives the greatest weight to the most recent responses.
- Academic Reputation & Thought Leadership (25%): This is collected through QS’ academic survey which surveys schools on their perceptions of peer schools’ reputations. Based on the results, it aims to measure a school’s research, academic partnerships, their educational innovativeness, and greater impact.
- Career Progression (20%): This category looks at mean percentage salary increase and percent of graduates promoted within 12 months of program completion.
- Executive Profile (15%): Considers average years of work experience, average years of managerial experience, and the percentage of students with C-suite experience in the enrolled class.
- Class Diversity (10%): Considers percent of women and number of nationalities in the enrolled class.
27 JOINT EMBAs RANKED
QS also ranked 27 joint EMBAs run by two or more global business schools. The Trium EMBA operated by New York University’s Stern School of Business, the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), and HEC Paris finished first for the second straight year.
It is followed by the joint program from UCLA Anderson School of Management and the National University of Singapore.
The full joint ranking is displayed in the table below.
QS EMBA Joint Program Ranking 2025 |
||||||||
2025 Rank |
Program/Schools |
Region |
Employer Reputation Score |
Thought Leadership Score |
Executive Profile Score |
Diversity Score |
Career Outcomes Score |
Overall Score |
| 1 | TRIUM (HEC/LSE/NYU) | France | 93.3 | 95.5 | 100 | 89.9 | 85.9 | 100 |
| 2 | UCLA/NUS | Singapore | 97 | 88.9 | 99.9 | 65.9 | 94 | 98 |
| 3 | Tsinghua/INSEAD | China Mainland | 91.9 | 92.5 | 94.4 | 61.7 | 91.1 | 94.2 |
| 4 | EMBA-Global Americas & Europe (Columbia/LBS) | United Kingdom | 100 | 100 | 47 | 65.6 | 91.1 | 90.5 |
| 5 | IE-Brown Executive MBA | Spain | 83.8 | 62.7 | 97.2 | 97.2 | 94.8 | 86.3 |
| 6 | Kellogg/HKUST | Hong Kong SAR | 97.3 | 83.7 | 58.4 | 60.7 | 92.8 | 85.4 |
| 7 | The Rotman – SDA Bocconi Global Executive MBA | Italy | 83.2 | 76.8 | 75.6 | 91.5 | 92.1 | 84.8 |
| 8 | Kellogg/WHU | Germany | 97.7 | 82.2 | 44.6 | 62.9 | 68.5 | 74.7 |
| 9 | ESSEC/Mannheim | France | 70.9 | 77.8 | 59.4 | 72.5 | 93.4 | 73.3 |
| 10 | Guanghua-Kellogg | China Mainland | 97.1 | 83 | 38.9 | 49 | 68.4 | 71.3 |
| 11 | Kellogg/Schulich | Canada | 96.7 | 82 | 31.5 | 44.2 | 76.2 | 70.7 |
| 12 | WU Executive Academy/Carlson | Austria | 72.4 | 73.7 | 60.4 | 52.6 | 69.3 | 62.1 |
| 13 | Washington/Fudan | China Mainland | 64.4 | 65.8 | 77 | 54.1 | 70.1 | 59.8 |
| 14 | Hong Kong University/Fudan | China Mainland | 61.9 | 72.5 | 24.2 | 47.9 | 60.9 | 45.2 |
| 15 | EGADE/Carey | Mexico | 60.6 | 67.1 | 90.3 | 25.6 | 25.8 | 43.5 |
| 16 | IITBombay-Washington University in St Louis | India | 57.5 | 54.2 | 82.8 | 33.5 | 43.6 | 42.1 |
| 17 | The Lisbon MBA Católica|Nova | Portugal | 54 | 42.7 | 65.7 | 47.2 | 58.7 | 38.9 |
| 18 | BI Norwegian/Fudan | Norway | 58.2 | 66.1 | 24.8 | 67 | 33.9 | 35.8 |
| 18 | Pacifico/Esade | Peru | 78.2 | 33.4 | 85.3 | 23.2 | 21.6 | 35.8 |
| 20 | UBI/Middlesex | Belgium | 21 | 22.3 | 43.7 | 100 | 100 | 31.5 |
| 21 | Xiamen/Tulane | China Mainland | 44 | 27 | 95.4 | 65 | 20 | 26 |
| 22 | Xi’an Jiaotong/Liverpool University | China Mainland | 37.8 | 36.2 | 28.5 | 59.7 | 64 | 23.8 |
| 23 | EADA/Ponts LeadTech Executive MBA | France | 32.8 | 25.4 | 37.2 | 87.5 | 63.2 | 23.5 |
| 24 | Almaty Management University/GSOM | Kazakhstan | 39.3 | 31.5 | 81.8 | 21 | 37.1 | 20.9 |
| 25 | ROCA Executive MBA (BBS-ASE/ESG-UQAM) | Romania | 20 | 20 | 88.5 | 64.7 | 52.6 | 20.6 |
| 26 | CENTRUM Católica/Tulane | Peru | 47.1 | 39.5 | 44.6 | 20 | 42.7 | 20.5 |
| 27 | Durham/European Business School | Germany | 54.1 | 44 | 20 | 39.4 | 33.6 | 20 |
The full 2025 QS Executive MBA Global Rankings include 204 ranked schools across seven regions. Click through the following pages to see the results.
Next page: The QS 2025 Global Executive MBA Ranking, No. 1-50
