Oxford top of the class

20 May 2010, 05:20 | Updated: 20 May 2010, 16:14

Oxford has beaten Cambridge to take the top spot for best university. .

But the UK's only private university, Buckingham, tops three categories in The Complete Universities Guide.

It had the best student to staff ratio, and scored highest for student satisfaction and graduate prospects.

As well as scoring the highest for student satisfaction and graduate prospects, the institution - which has been included in the rankings for the first time - also took first place for having the best student to staff ratio.

Oxford University took the top spot overall, followed by Cambridge, the same as last year.

Buckingham's final position was 20th - it scored among the lowest marks in the research category as its private status means it is not included in the Government's research funding.

Buckingham's vice-chancellor Dr Terence Kealey said:

"We are thrilled to have done so well. We hope it reflects our commitment to our students. Because it is the students and not the government paying, you are incentivised to focus on the needs of the students rather than the requirements of government."

Bottom of today's league table were London South Bank and London Metropolitan University. London Met was forced to pay back £36.5 million last year after it was found the institution received tens of millions of pounds in overpayments after submitting inaccurate student data.

The table rates 115 universities on student, satisfaction, research, entry standards, student to staff ratio, spend on academic services, spend on facilities, honours, graduate prospects and completion rates and gives each one an overall ranking.

Here is the full list of 115 universities' overall rankings in a league table compiled by the Complete University Guide.

1 Oxford
2 Cambridge
3 Imperial College London
4 Durham
5 London School of Economics
6 St Andrews
7 Warwick
8 Lancaster
9 University College London
10 York
11 Edinburgh
12 Bath
13 King's College London
14 Southampton
15 School of Oriental and African Studies
16 Bristol
17 Aston
18 Nottingham
19 Sussex
20 Buckingham
21 Leicester
22 Birmingham
23 Exeter
24 Loughborough
25 Sheffield
26 Glasgow
27 Leeds
28 East Anglia
29 Newcastle
30 Royal Holloway
31 Manchester
32 Liverpool
33 Surrey
34 Heriot-Watt
35 Strathclyde
35 Queen's, Belfast
37 Essex
38 Kent
39 Queen Mary
40 Reading
41 Hertfordshire
42 Cardiff
43 Keele
44 Aberdeen
45 Dundee
46 Brunel
47 City
47 Aberystwyth
49 Nottingham Trent
50 Oxford Brookes
51 Robert Gordon
52 Stirling
53 Chichester
54 Ulster
55 Bournemouth
56 Hull
57 Goldsmiths College
58 Birmingham City
59 University of Wales Institute, Cardiff
60 Swansea
61 Bradford
62 Gloucestershire
63 Bangor
64 Northumbria
65 Plymouth
65 De Montfort
67 Huddersfield
68 Sheffield Hallam
68 University of the West of England, Bristol
70 University of the Arts, London
71 Lincoln
72 Central Lancashire
73 Brighton
74 Edinburgh Napier
75 Coventry
76 Winchester
77 Queen Margaret
78 York St John
79 Glasgow Caledonian
80 Staffordshire
81 Chester
81 Cumbria
83 Bath Spa
84 Kingston
85 Leeds Metropolitan
86 Glamorgan
87 Roehampton
88 Edge Hill
89 Manchester Metropolitan
89 University of Wales, Newport
89 Portsmouth
92 Glyndwr
93 Sunderland
94 Westminster
95 Thames Valley
96 Salford
97 Middlesex
98 Abertay, Dundee
99 Lampeter
100 Northampton
101 Bedfordshire
102 Liverpool John Moores
102 Worcester
104 Derby
105 Teesside
106 Anglia Ruskin
106 Canterbury Christ Church
108 Buckinghamshire New
109 University for the Creative Arts
110 Greenwich
111 Southampton Solent
112 Bolton
113 East London
114 London South Bank
115 London Metropolitan