Best Universities in Chattogram: Rankings and Admission Guide

Searches for "universities in Chattogram" mix two different things. Chattogram city is the port city and its immediate surroundings. Chattogram division is the administrative region, which also covers Cumilla, Noakhali, Rangamati, Cox's Bazar, Feni, Chandpur, Lakshmipur, Brahmanbaria and Bandarban.

Ulkaa stores both a division and a city for every institution, and this guide keeps them apart. The Ulkaa Edu Rank 2027 division list for Chattogram has 12 universities. Seven of them are in or around Chattogram city: CUET (recorded at Raozan), the University of Chittagong (recorded at Hathazari), and five in the city itself, BGC Trust, International Islamic University Chittagong, Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, Premier University and Southern University Bangladesh. The other five are elsewhere in the division: Noakhali Science and Technology University (Noakhali), Comilla University, CCN University of Science and Technology and Britannia University (all Cumilla), and Rangamati Science and Technology University (Rangamati).

Raozan and Hathazari are upazilas of Chattogram district, some distance from the city centre, so students should check travel and housing instead of assuming a city address. Official names keep the older spelling "Chittagong", while the city itself is now written Chattogram.

The division list below follows Ulkaa Edu Rank 2027, published 5 October 2026 with data to 2 October 2026. Positions 1 to 14 of the national table reflect Ulkaa's admission competitiveness assessment. All other positions are computed from the published Ulkaa methodology 2027.1. Universities in a band such as 31-40 are not ordered inside it by this guide.

• CUET: national position 5 (score 90), public, Raozan
• Noakhali Science and Technology University: 23 (59.46), public, Noakhali
• BGC Trust University Bangladesh: 29 (55.35), private, Chattogram
• International Islamic University Chittagong: band 31-40 (54.57), private, Chattogram
• University of Chittagong: band 31-40 (54.28), public, Hathazari
• Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Sciences University: band 31-40 (50.46), public, Chattogram
• Comilla University: band 41-50 (49.39), public, Cumilla
• Premier University: band 41-50 (43.52), private, Chattogram
• Southern University Bangladesh: band 51-75 (34.13), private, Chattogram
• CCN University of Science and Technology: band 51-75 (33.74), private, Cumilla
• Rangamati Science and Technology University: band 51-75 (24.06), public, Rangamati
• Britannia University: band 76-100 (9.98), private, Cumilla

Not every institution in the city appears here. Port City International University, University of Science and Technology Chittagong, East Delta University, Chittagong Independent University, University of Creative Technology Chittagong and Chittagong Medical University have no position in Ulkaa Edu Rank 2027. That means there was no position to publish, not that they were judged low.

Three general and specialist public universities sit in or around Chattogram city, and a fourth serves health sciences.

University of Chittagong, founded in 1966, is the large general university of the region. UGC annual report data for 2023 lists 27,910 students, 1,579 teachers and 375 teachers with a PhD. It has 10 programmes in the Ulkaa 2027 record, and the stored accreditation count is 1 in 2026.

CUET, established in 2003, is the engineering and technology university. Its 2023 figures are 5,897 students and 348 teachers, 105 of them with a PhD. It is also the only Chattogram-division institution in the stored QS subject table: QS World University Rankings by Subject 2026 lists CUET in Petroleum Engineering at 151-175.

Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, founded in 2006, is a specialist institution. The 2023 report lists 1,394 students and 140 teachers.

Chittagong Medical University (2016) is the public health sciences university. Ulkaa Edu Rank 2027 has no entry for it, and no Ulkaa medical ranking table exists yet.

Private universities in the city vary widely in age and size.

• International Islamic University Chittagong (1995): 9,903 students and 485 teachers in 2023, with 6 programmes in the 2027 record and 4 accredited programmes in the 2026 count.
• BGC Trust University Bangladesh (2001): 3,033 students in 2023, 8 programmes in the 2027 record and 1 accredited programme in 2026. The BGC Trust also runs BGC Trust Medical College, listed with 100 MBBS seats.
• Premier University (2002): 6,205 students in 2023 and 21 programmes in the 2027 record. Its 2026 accreditation count is 8, higher than any other private university in the city in the stored data.
• Southern University Bangladesh (1998): 2,488 students in 2023, with 3 programmes and 3 accredited programmes in the stored counts.
• Port City International University (2012): 5,271 students in 2023, though it has no Ulkaa position yet.
• East Delta University (2006), Chittagong Independent University (2013), University of Science and Technology Chittagong (1992) and University of Creative Technology Chittagong (2015) complete the city's main private list.

Chattogram is also home to the Asian University for Women, an international institution founded in 2008. It has no Ulkaa position, but it appears in QS Asia 2026 at 801-850, and THE lists it as a reporter in the 2027 world edition.

Five of the 12 ranked institutions lie outside Chattogram city, and several students searching for "Chattogram" are really looking at them.

Noakhali Science and Technology University (2006) is the strongest of these in the Ulkaa table. It holds position 23 in Ulkaa Edu Rank 2027, a THE World band of 1401-1600 and a QS Asia 2026 placement at 851-900. Comilla University (2006) sits in the 41-50 band. Rangamati Science and Technology University (2014) and the private CCN University of Science and Technology and Britannia University complete the division list. Smaller towns in the division, among them Feni, Cox's Bazar and Brahmanbaria, have private universities that Ulkaa records but has not yet ranked.

Choosing between city and division is practical as much as academic. A student from Cumilla or Noakhali may reasonably prefer a campus closer to home.

International rankings are far narrower than the Ulkaa list, and most Chattogram universities do not appear in them.

In QS World University Rankings 2027, published 18 June 2026, CUET is listed at 1401+, the sixth Bangladeshi university in that edition. No other Chattogram institution is in the stored QS 2027 list.

In THE World University Rankings 2027, published 30 September 2026, four Chattogram-division universities share the 1401-1600 band: CUET, University of Chittagong, International Islamic University Chittagong and Noakhali Science and Technology University. The national position stored for each is 17, which is a shared position, not an order. Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Sciences University and the Asian University for Women are listed as reporters.

In the Asia tables, QS Asia 2026, published 5 November 2025, places CUET at 385, University of Chittagong at 646, Asian University for Women at 801-850, Noakhali at 851-900, Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Sciences University at 1101-1200 and International Islamic University Chittagong at 1201-1300. In THE Asia 2026, published 25 April 2026, CUET is at 501-600, with University of Chittagong and Noakhali both at 601-800.

The accreditation counts below are the stored 2026 figures. They count accredited programmes, so read them as a prompt to ask a department what it holds, not as a quality score.

• CUET: 1 accredited programme, from BAETE, the Board of Accreditation for Engineering and Technical Education
• International Islamic University Chittagong: 4 in total, including 2 BAETE-accredited programmes
• Premier University: 8 in total, including 1 BAETE programme (BSc in Electrical and Electronic Engineering)
• Southern University Bangladesh: 3 in total, including 1 BAETE programme (BSc in Civil Engineering)
• University of Chittagong, BGC Trust University Bangladesh and University of Science and Technology Chittagong: 1 each

For engineering, CUET is the public option in the region, while Premier and Southern list BAETE-accredited private programmes. For medicine, the Chattogram division holds many MBBS colleges. Chittagong Medical College, the public college founded in 1957, lists 225 MBBS seats and 2,200 hospital beds in the Wikipedia list Ulkaa uses. Admission to government medical colleges runs through the national medical admission test, not through the university.

Ulkaa holds one recent demand figure for a Chattogram general university: the 2025-26 session at the University of Chittagong. Based on news reports, 233,327 candidates applied for 4,165 seats, about 56 candidates per seat.

News reports also give per-unit counts, which the demand file keeps as separate rows: unit A (science) 87,694 applicants for 1,093 seats (80.2 per seat); unit B (arts and humanities) 69,287 for 690 (100.4); unit C (business administration) 16,925 for 510 (33.2); and unit D (social science, law, education) 51,506 for 849 (60.7). These unit rows do not add up to the overall figure, so use each one as reported and do not sum them.

CUET's 2025-26 admission is on a different footing. According to a BSS report, 13,942 candidates took the test held on 17 January 2026 for 931 seats, about 15 per seat. The candidates were already shortlisted from the HSC results, so the number cannot be compared with an open-application count such as the University of Chittagong's.

Ulkaa holds no applicant counts for the city's private universities. It does hold enrolment: for 2023 the UGC annual report lists 8,751 new admissions at the University of Chittagong, 4,682 at International Islamic University Chittagong and 2,198 at Premier University. These are intake figures, not demand.

• Which Chattogram. Confirm whether the campus is in the city, in Hathazari or Raozan, or elsewhere in the division. Daily travel changes a student's year more than a ranking band does.
• Public or private. Public universities admit through their own tests or shared admission systems. Private universities set their own entry requirements.
• The programme, not the university. Ranking tables describe institutions. Look at the specific department, its accreditation and its teaching staff.
• Edition and year. A position is tied to a named edition. This guide uses Ulkaa Edu Rank 2027, QS World University Rankings 2027, THE World University Rankings 2027, QS Asia 2026 and THE Asia 2026.
• Official notices. Seat numbers, test dates and requirements change each session. Rely on the university's own circular. This guide gives no tuition or fee figures.