The University of Pretoria (UP) has been ranked 74th in the prestigious Times Higher Education BRICS and Emerging Economies Rankings for 2017. This is an improvement of three places compared to last year when UP was placed 77th. As one of the top five South African universities ranked, UP is the only South African research-intensive university which has improved its position in this ranking. This position places UP among the best research-led universities in the developing world.  

The Times Higher Education BRICS and Emerging Economies Rankings is based on analysis of data from 300 institutions in 41 countries. As part of the process, 50 countries classified as emerging economies (advanced and secondary) or regarded as 'frontier economies' by FTSE (a company that specialises in indexing), were considered, but institutions from only 41 of these countries made the final top 300 list.

The evaluators use the same 13 rigorous performance indicators as The Times Higher Education World University Rankings, examining each university's strengths against its core missions - teaching, research, knowledge transfer and international outlook. However, the methodology has been recalibrated to better reflect the characteristics and development priorities of universities in developing economies. For example, more weight is given to a university's industry links and international outlook, both of which are areas where UP has achieved high scores.