The University of Peradeniya has again been ranked the top university in Sri Lanka in the 2026 UI GreenMetric World University Rankings, which assess universities on how sustainably they run their campuses.
Peradeniya placed 200th globally out of 2,016 universities from 110 countries, with a score of 8,262.5 points, Hiru News reported.
What the ranking measures
The GreenMetric exercise scores institutions across a set of campus-environment indicators rather than research output or academic reputation:
- Setting and infrastructure
- Energy and climate change
- Waste and water management
- Transportation
- Education and governance
This year’s edition ran under the theme “Advancing Sustainable Campuses through Governance, Digitalisation, and Integrated Action.”
Peradeniya’s campus — spread across the Hantana foothills outside Kandy and among the largest university estates in the country — has long been central to its standing in environmental assessments of this kind.
Where other Sri Lankan universities placed
Two more local institutions appear in the table, NewsFirst reports:
| University | Global rank |
|---|---|
| Peradeniya | 200 |
| Kelaniya | 237 |
| Colombo | 276 |
That puts 37 places between Peradeniya and the next-ranked Sri Lankan university.
Not reported
Neither report gives Peradeniya’s placing in the previous year’s ranking, so the scale of any movement is unclear, and neither says what the maximum attainable score is or how the 8,262.5 total breaks down across the indicators. Scores for Kelaniya and Colombo are not given, and no other Sri Lankan institution’s position is listed. Neither report carries comment from any of the universities, and neither says when the rankings were released.
