POSTECH has been accredited as a world university by The Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2012-2013. It was ranked 50th in the world, three levels higher than last year, and the fifth in Asia. Moreover, it achieved first place in the citations category in Asia. By the data from The Times Higher Education World University Ranking, it was proven that POSTECH is one of the world leading research oriented universities. The data was released online on Oct. 4. Seoul National University ranked 59th and KAIST ranked 69th this year.

The Times Higher Education World University Ranking is one of the most recognized ranking systems in the world and it is powered by Thomson Reuter. The evaluating methods are updated every year and with the new system, every university is scored again and ranked. It evaluates global universities according to five categories: teaching, international outlook, industry income, research, and citations. The score of teaching is measured by the ratio of faculties to total students, ratio of Doctorate degrees to Bachelor’s degrees, number of total Doctorate degrees awarded, and the amount of institutional income. Teaching determines 30% of the overall ranking. Research also determines 30% of the ranking. It is assessed based on quality of research, amount of income and the number of research papers published. Another 30% of grade is from Citation and it evaluates how much the university’ research papers affected the world. International outlook takes 7.5% of total grade gauges as how the university is looked in the world and how much globalization of school is accomplished. It is determined by ratio of international students to domestic students, the ratio of international faculties to domestic faculties and the amount of journal papers written with international co-worker. Finally, last 2.5% of score is from industry income. It assesses participation of the university in development of Industry and how much business supports research.
Compared to last year, POSTECH earned lower score only in citation category but  higher score in other catagories except industry income. It obtained lower score, 88.2 this year in citations than the score, 92.3 last year and the same score in industry income with the score, 100. However, while it received 25.0 in international outlook, 51.9 in research, and 56.4 in teaching last year, it acheived 28.8, 63.9, and 63.9, respectively, this year. With an overall score of 69.4, POSTECH was listed as 50th among world universities. This marks the third year that POSTECH has been recognized as the best Korean university.