The 20 best executive MBA programs in the world

20. CUHK Business School

19. Warwick Business School

18. NYU Stern School of Business

17. Columbia Business School

16. National University of Singapore Business School

15. Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management

14. Cambridge Judge Business School

12 (tie). IE Business School

12 (tie). UCLA Anderson School of Management

11. Yale School of Management

9 (tie). ESADE Business School

9 (tie). Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley

7 (tie). London Business School

7 (tie). INSEAD

6. The University of Chicago Booth School of Business

5. Oxford Saïd Business School

4. MIT Sloan School of Management

3. IESE Business school

2. The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania

1. HEC Paris

Method and data source

The latest ranking from QS Quacquarelli Symonds uses different metrics to find the best executive MBA programs around the world. 

Graduates of executive MBA programs can expect a boost in pay. According to the 2020 Executive MBA Council Student Exit Survey based on 1,619 students, the average salary and bonus together for program graduates was $193,200, a 14.1% increase in compensation after completing the program.

This ranking is also different than QS' best full-time MBA programs. QS writes that EMBAs are typically for managers that already have between 10 to 15 years of work experience.

To rank the executive MBA programs from around the world, QS used five different metrics that measure different aspects of being a highly-rated program.

These metrics are the program's reputation for employers (which has the highest weight for determining the overall score), thought leadership, executive profile, career outcomes, and diversity (which has the lowest weight for determining the overall score). Executive profile includes the work, management, and C-suite experience of students in a program. The five metrics are then used to calculate an overall total score.

Using this method, HEC Paris placed at the very top for 2021, moving up two spots and taking over The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania's spot from the 2020 ranking. Among the five metrics, HEC Paris' highest score was in employer reputation where it scored a 99.7 out of 100.

"Driven by increases in its levels of international diversity, and by improvements in the one-year salary uplift that it offers its graduates, HEC Paris has taken the title of world's number-one Executive MBA provider," QS Quacquarelli Symonds wrote in a press release.

The full ranking, along with how each program scored in each of the five metrics, is available on QS Quacquarelli Symonds.