The Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences saw improvements in a wide range of its subject rankings in the Complete University Guide (CUG) 2027, with ten placing in the UK’s top ten.

We moved up to No.1 for Sports Science, accompanying the same ranking in both The Guardian University Guide 2026 and The Times & The Sunday Times Good University Guide 2026.

Education placed second — a rise of two places from last year’s rankings — while Social Policy saw the biggest improvement, moving up seven places to 3rd. Politics also saw a significant rise of two places to 9th.

There were positive outcomes in terms of Graduate Prospects too, with French, Iberian Languages, and Sports Science all placing in the top five in this category, and Economics, Politics, Psychology, and Sociology in the top ten.

Courses in our other subject areas achieved the below rankings:

  • Psychology (6th)
  • Sociology (6th)
  • Iberian Languages (7th)
  • Economics (8th)
  • German (8th)
  • French (9th)

Speaking about the rankings, Professor Deborah Wilson, Dean of the Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences, said:

I’m immensely proud of our six Departments, with subject areas in each securing deserved positive rankings in this year’s Complete University Guide.

Our Department for Health getting a third No.1 ranking to match the latest rankings from The Guardian and The Times is incredible, and all of our Departments having subject areas in the top ten nationally shows the Faculty’s breadth of expertise and excellence.

I want to thank my dedicated and skilled colleagues, the professional services staff who work tirelessly behind the scenes, and our fantastic students and graduates.

Overall, the University of Bath maintained its top ten place. This is now the seventh year in a row that Bath has been in the CUG’s top ten, and it marks a decade as the number one University in the South West.

The main league table is based on ten measures: entry standards, student satisfaction, research quality, research intensity, academic services spend, facilities spend, continuation, student-staff ratio, graduate prospects – outcomes, and graduate prospects – on track. It includes 130 institutions.

Find out more about our CUG 2027 rankings, as well as other UK and international rankings.