These are the world's top universities for computer science and how much they cost international students

By Khanh Linh March 2, 2026 | 08:06 pm PT

The United States dominates the top 30 institutions for computer science, with annual tuition fees for international students ranging up to US$71,300.

Times Higher Education in late January released its 2026 World University Rankings by subject. Among the top 30 universities for computer science, 16 are based in the United States, six are in Asia, and the remainder are in Europe and Canada.

University of Oxford ranked first, earning a near-perfect score of 99.9/100 for teaching, and also charges the highest tuition fees for international students, at $85,800.

Other U.K. universities on the list charge close to $60,000 per year, while U.S. institutions range from about $22,300 to $71,300 annually.

The tuition of the world's top 30 universities for computer science in 2026 are as followed:

Rank	University	Country	Tuition (USD/year)
1	University of Oxford	U.K.	85,800
2	University of Cambridge	U.K.	59,700
3	ETH Zurich	Switzerland	5,500
4	Massachusetts Institute of Technology	U.S.	64,300
5	Princeton University	U.S.	68,100
6	Stanford University	U.S.	67,700
7	Carnegie Mellon University	U.S.	67,000
8	Harvard University	U.S.	59,300
9	Imperial College London	U.K.	58,500
10	Peking University	China	4,300
11	California Institute of Technology	U.S.	65,600
12	Tsinghua University	China	4,300
13	National University of Singapore	Singapore	30,600
13	University of California, Berkeley	U.S.	22,300
15	Technical University of Munich	Germany	4,800-7,100
16	Nanyang Technological University	Singapore	14,200
17	Cornell University	U.S.	71,300
18	University of California, Los Angeles	U.S.	54,900
19	University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign	U.S.	47,800
20	University of Washington	U.S.	44,600
21	École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne	Switzerland	5,700
22	University of Toronto	Canada	51,700
23	Zhejiang University	China	3,600
24	Columbia University	U.S.	70,170
25	Shanghai Jiao Tong University	China	3,600
25	Hong Kong University of Science and Technology	Hong Kong	28,000
27	Yale University	U.S.	69,900
28	Georgia Institute of Technology	U.S.	33,600
29	New York University	U.S.	65,600
30	University of Texas at AU.S.tin	U.S.	48,400

Peking University is the only Asian institution in the top 10, placing tenth and recording the lowest tuition within that group at roughly $4,300 per year.

Two other Chinese universities, Tsinghua and Zhejiang, also offer some of the lowest tuition fees among the top 30.

The 2026 computer science ranking assesses performance across areas including software development and engineering, artificial intelligence and machine learning, and cybersecurity and networks, among other fields.

Khuôn viên Đại học Cambridge. Ảnh: University of Cambridge Fanpage

The University of Cambridge in the U.K. Photo by the university

A total of 1,165 universities across 84 countries and territories were evaluated using five key indicators. Research environment carries the greatest weight (29%), followed by teaching (28%), research quality (27.5%), industry income and technology transfer (8%), and international outlook (7.5%).

To qualify, universities must have published at least 500 engineering-related research papers between 2000 and 2024 and employ a minimum of 20 academic staff in the discipline, representing at least 1% of total faculty.