Lancaster University is rated among the UK’s top universities for teaching, academic support and the high quality of its learning resources by students participating in this year’s National Student Survey (NSS).
The NSS is one of the largest surveys of its kind in the world and this year received responses from nearly 346,000 final year students across 520 universities, colleges and other higher education providers across the UK.
Students were asked 27 questions about a range of factors related to their academic experience, including teaching, resources, assessments and feedback and asked to rate these with results used to calculate a positivity measure.
The survey was completed by almost three quarters (74.6% compared to 72.3% national response) of Lancaster University final-year undergraduate students.
Students overwhelmingly rated Lancaster University’s teaching positively, with 88.5% students positively rating the quality of the teaching of their course.
Ratings for teaching also included:
- 93.5% positively scoring how good Lancaster staff are at explaining things
- 90.4% rating Lancaster courses as being intellectually stimulating.
Lancaster’s cutting-edge facilities and award-winning library were also held in high regard by participating students.
Among the 130 universities included in the 2024 survey, Lancaster achieved the sixth* highest positivity measure rating for its learning resources with 91.5%.
- 94% (joint third* highest of 130 universities) of Lancaster students saying the University’s library resources supported their learning
- 91.1% of students positively rating how easy it is to access resources when they are needed
- 89.6% rating how well IT resources and facilities supported their learning.
Lancaster was also rated 13th* for academic support, receiving a positive score by 89.9% of students.
Students said they felt it was easy to contact teaching staff when they needed to, with this question receiving a positivity score of 91.4% - the tenth* highest rating among UK universities.
Lancaster was also ranked 12th* for the Organisation and Management of its courses.
Overall, Lancaster outperformed the benchmark for positivity measures on nearly all areas questioned in the NSS.
Professor Wendy Robinson, Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Education at Lancaster University, said: “Lancaster University prides itself as a warm, welcoming, friendly and safe collegiate university that is at the forefront of ground-breaking research and is also a wonderful place for students to come to study.
“These NSS results make me very proud that our fantastic students have such an overwhelmingly positive view of their experiences here. It is not only testament to the world-class facilities we have put in place, but also to the dedication, hard work and commitment shown by staff across the university to make studying at Lancaster such a positive experience.
“We will be looking carefully at the results from the survey as we continuously seek to improve and enhance the quality of our students’ learning experience at Lancaster.”
Lancaster University is currently ranked joint tenth in the Complete University Guide 2025, 11th in The Guardian University Guide 2024 and 14th in the Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2024.
Lancaster is also in the top 150 universities in the world in the QS World University Rankings 2025 – placed 141st of 1,503 universities across 106 countries and regions.
*Lancaster University has compared the positivity measures for ‘all undergraduates’ at different institutions using the publicly available NSS 2024 results to calculate Lancaster’s position relative to the 130 participating universities but excluding further education colleges and specialist institutions.
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