Best Online MBA Programs 2022 | QS

The results are out: IE Business School boasts the world’s best Online MBA program, according to the latest QS Online MBA Rankings. 

Leading the QS list of the world’s best online MBA programs for 2022, Spain’s IE Business School beat off the competition to top the ranking for the fifth consecutive year.

UK schools, Imperial College Business School and Warwick Business School, rank second and third, while the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM) at the University of New South Wales places fourth.

When you’re considering online MBA programs, there are various questions you should ask yourself. Where should I study an online MBA? What is the best value online MBA? Is an Online MBA worth the money?

That’s where the annual QS online MBA ranking comes in, breaking down the top online MBA programs worldwide. 

QS ranks the quality of online MBA programs using four criteria that are given different weights to produce an overall score: faculty and teaching (35%), employability (30%), class profile (30%), and class experience (5%).

The Best Online MBAs

With interest in online MBAs increasing in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, rankings like the QS list are a good place to start researching and comparing programs.

In 2022, IE Business School achieved the highest score out of all programs on the list for faculty and teaching, and joint second for class experience. In the employability category, IE was also at the top of the pack, ranking second.

UK business schools are well-represented in the 2022 QS ranking: 10 out of 72 entrants are offered by UK business education programs. Imperial and Warwick retained their second and third positions from the previous year in 2022, while Alliance Manchester dropped slightly from fifth to sixth.

However, business schools in the United States dominate the list overall, with 38 programs in total—and five of the top 10 online MBA programs—offered by US schools.

According to QS, Marshall School of Business in Los Angeles offers the best-ranked Online MBA program in the US, ranked fifth overall. Marshall excels in the class experience category, boasting a score of 89.7 out of 100.

The Asia-Pacific’s best online MBA program, offered by the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM) at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Business School, comes in fourth.

Elsewhere, Italy’s Politecnico di Milano School of Management offers Continental Europe’s second-ranked Online MBA program, placing 11th.

Read: The Most Affordable Online MBA Programs

Ivy League online MBA

Can’t find an Ivy League online MBA in QS’s global ranking? 

That’s because there isn’t a single Ivy League business school that has officially launched a full online MBA program. However, these super-selective schools do offer online education in a different format.

They mainly deliver to students shorter, online courses at the fraction of the cost of an MBA. Harvard Business School Online runs courses for several weeks at as little as $1,050, covering entrepreneurship, economics, and business analytics. 

In our article on the online education options at Ivy League business schools, we tell you about the opportunities open to students, the pros and cons of distance learning at an Ivy League school, and why there hasn’t been an online MBA launch at any of the Ivy schools. 

In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, schools have been forced to push their education online, which begs the question: Will we see an Ivy League online MBA once the crisis has subsided?

Speaking about online education generally, Nunzio Quacquarelli, CEO and founder of QS Quacquarelli Symonds, says that “the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is obliging higher education providers to ensure that they are able to offer outstanding teaching and learning experiences in the virtual classroom, and demand for online education is likely to accelerate as lockdowns across the world continue.”

Only time will tell if this pushed the Ivy schools into the realm of fully fledged online MBAs, but it wouldn’t be a surprise given the current circumstances, to see an Ivy League online MBA surface in the coming years.