國立臺灣大學 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Former names | Taihoku Imperial University (1928–1945) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Motto | 敦品勵學，愛國愛人[a] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Motto in English | Integrity, Diligence, Fidelity, Compassion[1] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Type | Publicnationalresearch university | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Established | March 16, 1928; 97 years ago (1928-03-16) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Endowment | $67.3 billionNTD (2024)[2] ($2.24 billionUSD) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| President | Chen Wen-chang | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Academic staff | 2,029 (2020–21)[3] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Administrative staff | 6,765 (2020–21) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Undergraduates | 16,773 (2020–21) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Postgraduates | 12,533 (2020–21) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 3,668 (2020–21) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Location | , 25°00′58″N121°32′10″E / 25.016°N 121.536°E /25.016; 121.53625°01′N121°32′E / 25.017°N 121.533°E /25.017; 121.533 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Campus | Urban, 1.6 km2 (0.62 sq mi) (Greater Taipei combined); 344 km2 (133 sq mi) (Nantou County combined) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Colors | Maroon and Gold [4] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Website | ntu.edu.tw | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Chinese name | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 国立台湾大学 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 國立臺灣大學 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Taihoku Imperial University | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 台北帝国大学 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 臺北帝國大學 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Alternative Japanese name | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Kanji | 台北帝国大学 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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National Taiwan University (NTU;Chinese:國立臺灣大學) is anationalpublicresearch university with its main campus inTaipei, Taiwan.[5] Founded in 1928 duringJapanese rule asTaihoku Imperial University (臺北帝國大學), the seventh of theImperial Universities of theEmpire of Japan, it is the oldest university in Taiwan and is supervised by theMinistry of Education.
The university has three major campuses in Taipei and operatessatellite campuses across the country. It hosts over 200 degree programs and consists of 17 colleges, including theCollege of Medicine, and 61 departments, 152 affiliatedresearch institutes, and more than 100 other national research centers, such as theNational Taiwan University Hospital.[6] Itsfinancial endowment of NT$67.3 billion (US$2.24 billion) is the largest in the country andone of the largest in Asia.
National Taiwan University has institutional affiliations with theHarvard–Yenching Institute,[7] theMax Planck Society, theInstitute for Advanced Study, and produces thePerformance Ranking of Scientific Papers for World Universities.[8] It publishes academic works through itsuniversity press, theNational Taiwan University Press. In 2015, NTU formed auniversity system with theNational Taiwan University of Science and Technology andNational Taiwan Normal University.
Notable graduates of the university include fivepresidents of the Republic of China, sixvice-presidents of the Republic of China, more than 120 members ofAcademia Sinica, and 25 members of the U.S.National Academy of Sciences,[9] in addition toNobel Prize,[b]Turing Award,[c] andWolf Prize laureates.[d] It has also produced the heads of other major universities, such as theUniversity of California, Berkeley,[e] and theUniversity of California, Santa Barbara.[f]
During theJapanese rule of Taiwan (1895–1945), theEmpire of Japan established the modern Taiwanese education system by installing educational institutions that used Western-style academic systems.[10]Den Kenjirō, theGovernor-General of Taiwan, proposed the establishment of a university in Taiwan in 1922 and Japanese prime ministerTanaka Giichi presented a bill titled "Establishment of the Taiwan Imperial University" to theCabinet of Japan on February 25, 1928.[11] It was planned to be located on the grounds of the Taihoku Senior School of Agriculture and Forestry inTaihoku Prefecture.[12]
On March 16, 1928, National Taiwan University was founded as "Taihoku Imperial University" (Japanese:台北帝国大学,romanized: Taihoku Teikoku Daigaku;Chinese:臺北帝國大學;pinyin:Táiběi dìguó dàxué), the seventh of the Japanese Empire'sImperial Universities.[13][14] It was Taiwan's first and only university and primarily served to promoteJapanese culture, assimilate the local population, and direct students to professions useful to colonial expansion.[15] The firstfreshman class was inaugurated on April 30, 1928, with classes beginning on May 5. Of the 1931 graduating class, 41 students were Japanese and five were Taiwanese.[12][g]
The first faculties founded at Taihoku Imperial University were the Faculty of Literature and Politics and the Faculty of Science and Agriculture, totalling 59 students. Subsequently, the Faculty of Medicine was established in 1935 and the Faculty of Engineering was established in 1943.[13] The Faculty of Science and Agriculture was divided in 1943 as two separate colleges: the Faculty of Science and the Faculty of Agriculture.[16] Because the university was considered a part of expanding theJapanese colonial empire in thePacific Ocean, it was supported by multiple Japanese scholars and received governmentresearch grants for funding policy programs.[13] Taiwanese students could not compete with Japanese students since the university prioritized Japanese enrollment.[13] From 1928 to 1943, the university's student body was approximately 80 percent Japanese and 20 percent Taiwanese.[17] Of its more than 300 faculty members in 1940, all professorships but one were held by Japanese scholars.[18]
Taihoku college classes consisted of "lectures" taught by professors, assistant professors, and other faculty. By 1945, it had five colleges with a total of 114 lectures.[16] The university's first president was Japanese historianTaira Shidehara [ja] (1928–1937), a graduate ofTokyo Imperial University who was appointed to the presidency on March 16, 1928.[19] Japanese scholarToyohachi Fujita (1869–1929) was appointed as the first dean of the Faculty of Literature and Politics while Kintaro Oshima was named the inaugural dean of the Faculty of Science and Agriculture.[12] Enrollment years were shortened duringWorld War II and university functions were limited following the Americanbombing of Taipei,[20] which damaged its main gate and boulevard.[21]
After theSurrender of Japan in September 1945, the government of theRepublic of China (ROC) assumed control of the university and initiatedsinicization reforms. On August 15, 1945, theKuomintang government appointedLo Tsung-lo, a Japanese-educated academic, to oversee the transition of Taihoku's curriculum, teaching system, and faculties from its Japanese administration. At the time, the university had 1,614 faculty and staff members to teach 1,767 students, 351 of whom were Taiwanese. All Japanese students were later transferred back to Japan.[22]
Under the Kuomintang, the ROC government initiated a program of reforming all universities and colleges in accordance with Chinese models that incorporated American academics, administration, and organization, in addition to installing American curriculum and degree requirements.[23] Reforms also had the goal of reversing theJapanization that had influenced Taiwan during Japanese rule.[15] Universities and colleges were opened to Taiwanese students without restrictions; Taihoku Imperial University was renamed "National Taiwan University" in November 1945 and it was reorganized and expanded to six faculties: Liberal Arts, Law, Science, Medicine, Engineering, and Agriculture.[24] Up to 500 students could enroll in each faculty and the enrollment period was standardized to four years as opposed to the Japanese system of three to six years.[25] Under governorChen Yi, however, the school received no government funding from 1945 to 1947, causing it to cease operations until Chinese historianFu Ssu-nien assumed the presidency.[26] Fu oversaw the abolition of theJapanese college-preparatory school system and, by the end of 1947, the university operated entirely on a Chinese higher education model.[26] The university became the most prominent educational institution in the country, with more than 80 percent of all Taiwanese high school applicants listing the university as their preferred choice for college admission by 1977.[27]
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In the following decades after World War II, National Taiwan University underwent rapid expansion.[16] Anight school was established to providecontinuing education for adults in 1955 and the NTU Research Library was completed in 1968.[9] The College of Management, the College of Public Health, and the College of Electrical Engineering were established in 1987, 1993, and 1997, respectively. The NTU Department of Law was expanded to the NTU College of Law in 1999 and the College of Life Science was established in 2003.[16] In November 2003, the university consisted of ten colleges, 52 academic departments, 82 graduate institutes, 1,778 full-time faculty, and more than 27,000 students.[29] By 2009, NTU grew to 54 departments, 100 graduate institutes (which offered 100 master's programs and 91 doctoral programs in total), and 25 research centers, including the Center for Condensed Matter Sciences, the Center for Biotechnology, the Japanese Research Center, and others.[30]
The main campus of National Taiwan University is located in theGongguan neighborhood ofDaan District,Taipei City, and contains most of the university's departmental and administrative buildings.[31]
The main campus houses some of the country's best-preserved examples ofred brick Japanese colonial architecture, most of which are located along the Royal Palm Boulevard that leads to the five-storyNational Taiwan University Library building (completed in 1998),[32] in addition to the Old Main Library, the College of Liberal Arts, and the Administration Building.[33] The College of Liberal Arts, constructed during Japanese rule inRomanesque fashion, houses the university's landmark Fu Bell which rings 21 times at the end of each school period.[34] The majority of campus buildings built after World War II are a hybrid of Chinese and Western architecture, 20 of which were designed by architectWang Da-hong.[34]
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The university has four additional campuses throughout Taiwan: the Shuiyuan Campus (7.7 hectares, located inZhongzheng District,Taipei); the College of Medicine Campus (located inZhongzheng District); the Yunlin Campus (54 hectares, located inYunlin County); and the Zhubei Campus (22 hectares, located inHsinchu County). The university also governs farms, forests, and hospitals for education and research purposes, including: visiting professor residences (34 hectares, located onYangmingshan,Taipei); the NTU University Farm (19.5 hectares, located inXindian District,New Taipei City); the Wenshan Botanical Garden (5 hectares, located inShiding District,New Taipei City); the Experimental Forest Office (25.9 hectares, located inNantou County); and the Experimental Forest (33,310 hectares, located inNantou County).[31] The total area of NTU exceeds 340 square kilometers (34,000 hectares), accounting for one percent of Taiwan's total land area.[14]
As of 2025, National Taiwan University consists of seventeen colleges, including Liberal Arts, Engineering, Science, Social Sciences, Political Science & Economics, Law, Bio-Resources & Agriculture, Management, Public Health, Electrical Engineering & Computer Science, Medicine, Life Science, General Education, the International College, the Graduate School of Advanced Technology, Design & Innovation, and Continuing Studies.[6] They offerbachelor's degrees,master's degrees, anddoctoral degrees in multiple disciplines and specializations across science, arts, and the humanities. Some majors are considered more competitive than others and require a higher score in theGeneral Scholastic Ability Test or other national examinations. In recent years,medicine,electrical engineering,law, andfinance have been the most selective majors. Most majors take four years to complete while the dental program and the medical program take six years to finish.
Students are able to select courses offered by any of the colleges, with up to 8,000 courses made available for selection each semester. Undergraduate students are required to take a mandatorycore curriculum, which is composed of courses in Chinese, English, physical education, and public service. The medical school also requires each of its students to takephilosophy andsociology classes as well as seminars inethics andthanatology.Military training is no longer an obligatory course for male students, but it is a prerequisite if they plan to apply to become officers during their compulsory military service. Most students at the university come from wealthy families with highersocioeconomic status.[36]
NTU is a member of theAssociation of Pacific Rim Universities,[37] theAssociation of East Asian Research Universities, theAssociation of Southeast Asian Institutions of Higher Learning, theAssociation to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, and theEuropean Union Centre in Taiwan. It also has partnerships with several American universities such asWashington University in St. Louis, which, since 2012, has funded NTU students to complete doctoral degrees at the university.[38] In 2024, NTU and theUniversity of Texas at Arlington began a partnership to host a dual master's degree program in architecture between the two universities.[39]
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TheInternational Chinese Language Program (ICLP), founded byStanford University, is located at National Taiwan University.[40]
In 2021, the "International College" was established, primarily enrolling international students of foreign nationality and offering courses entirely in English.[41] In July 2025, theMax Planck Society and theInstitute for Advanced Study established the Max-Planck-IAS-NTU Center, aresearch center dedicated to studyingparticle physics,cosmology, andgeometry on campus.[42]
| University rankings | |
|---|---|
| Global – Overall | |
| ARWU World[43] | 201–300 (2024) |
| CWUR World[44] | 104 (2024) |
| CWTS World[45] | 100 (2023) |
| QS World[46] | 63 (2026) |
| THE World[47] | 140 (2026) |
| THE Reputation[48] | 126-150 (2023) |
| USNWR Global[49] | 233 (2024–2025) |
| Regional – Overall | |
| QS Asia[50] | 21 (2024) |
| THE Asia[51] | 26 (2024) |
| USNWR Asia[52] | 48 (2024–2025) |
National Taiwan University is widely considered to be the best university in Taiwan. Most high school applicants generally consider NTU to be their most preferred choice for college.[53]
NTU was ranked 63rd worldwide in theQS World University Rankings 2026,[54] 140th worldwide in theTimes Higher Education World University Rankings 2026, 203rd worldwide in the US News 2022-2023, and 201-300th worldwide in the ARWU 2022.
The Aggregate Ranking of Top Universities (ARTU), which sorts universities based on their aggregate performance across THE, QS, and ARWU, ranked NTU 135th worldwide in 2022.[55]
With other peering references of academic ranking, NTU also releases NTU World Universities ranking annually on theDouble Ten Day, the National Holiday of theRepublic of China.[56]
In the QS and ARWU subject rankings, NTU is ranked first in Taiwan in the majority of subjects.[57][58] In the THE Subject Rankings, NTU is ranked first in Taiwan in all subjects.[59]
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The president heads the university. Each college is headed by a dean and each department by a chairman. Students elect their own representatives each year to attend administrative meetings.
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National Taiwan University has produced notable alumni in politics, business, academia, science, medicine, and numerous other fields. Graduates of the university disproportionately comprise a majority of the political and business elite in Taiwan.[53] As of 2024, about half (48.7%) of allacademicians ofAcademia Sinica are NTU graduates and 70 percent of all Taiwanese members of the U.S.National Academy of Sciences (NAS) are.[61] 25 graduates of NTU are members of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.[62]
Five of the eightpresidents of the Republic of China are graduates of the university:Lai Ching-te, the current president of Taiwan;Tsai Ing-Wen, the first woman to be elected to the position;Ma Ying-jeou;Chen Shui-bian, the first member of theDemocratic Progressive Party (DPP) to hold the office; andLee Teng-hui, the first native-born Taiwanese to become president. In addition, six out of the 13vice-presidents of the Republic of China have graduated from NTU, including Lee Teng-hui,Lien Chan,Annette Lu,Wu Den-yih,Chen Chien-jen, and Lai Ching-te. The heads of major political parties—such asEric Chu andCheng Li-wun,chairs of the Kuomintang;Ko Wen-je, former mayor of Taipei and founder of theTaiwan People's Party (TPP); andHuang Kuo-chang, chairman of the TPP—also graduated from NTU.
In science, graduates includeYuan T. Lee, who received the 1986Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the development ofreaction dynamics, andAndrew Yao, who was awarded theTuring Award in 2000 for his contributions tocryptography andcomputation. Other scientific achievements by alumni include contributions tochemical synthesis by chemistChi-Huey Wong, winner of the 2014Wolf Prize in Chemistry, and contributions tobiosynthesis by botanistShang Fa Yang, winner of the 1991Wolf Prize in Agriculture. AlumnusChenming Hu was awarded theIEEE Medal of Honor in 2020;Simon Sze theJ. J. Ebers Award in 1991; andGeorge Kuo the 1994William Beaumont Prize for the discovery of theHepatitis C virus. Notable mathematicians who graduated from NTU includeFan Chung, the Paul Erdős Professor in Combinatorics at theUniversity of California, San Diego;Wu-Chung Hsiang, topologist and professor atPrinceton University; andHorng-Tzer Yau, Merton Professor of Mathematics atHarvard University.
In academia, alumni include two chancellors of American universities:Chang-Lin Tien, chancellor of theUniversity of California, Berkeley, andHenry T. Yang, chancellor of theUniversity of California, Santa Barbara. Otheracademic administrators includeAmbrose King, vice-chancellor of theChinese University of Hong Kong, andVincent Chang, vice-chancellor ofBRAC University. Academicians of Academia Sinica include political scientistChu Yun-han; economistsHu Sheng-cheng,Cyrus Chu,Cheng Hsiao,Yu Tzong-shian,Mai Chao-cheng, andGeorge C. Tiao; and legal scholarsHu Fo andHungdah Chiu.[63]
Many of the university's graduates have gone on to found or head major companies, includingQuanta Computer'sBarry Lam,Mediatek'sTsai Ming-kai andGarmin'sMin Kao.
Foreign alumni of the university include Canadian philosopherRoger T. Ames, who graduated from NTU with a master's degree in philosophy in 1972; British diplomatDavid Coates,ambassador of the United Kingdom to Ivory Coast;Roel Sterckx, Joseph Needham Professor of Chinese History at theUniversity of Cambridge; and South Korean philosopherDo-ol, who earned a master's degree from NTU.
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