University rankings and the challenge for the Brazilian universities

The university rankings have gained importance in the international and national scenario and constitute one of the performance analysis mechanisms of the universities. This research analyzes the performance of 29 Brazilian universities rated at the Leiden, Shanghai, QS and THE rankings. The results obtained allowed to conclude that the Brazilian universities performances is very good, especially in terms of the amount of scientific output, however, the impact, measured by the citations, still constitutes a vast challenge. The amount of papers at the journals Nature and Science, as well as the international collaboration, are strategies that can expand the impact and pave the way for reaching better positions at these rankings.