
Ask HN: What Is the Best University in Europe for MS in Computer Science? - Recursing
Hi HN,<p>I would like to ask the same question asked 10 years ago here https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=703346<p>Which do you think are the best universities in Europe, for a MS in the various fields of Computer Science?
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oneplane
In the EU there isn't much of a ranking of Universities. It's practically more
of a good-uni-with-proper-acceditation vs. the rest. At the same time, almost
no company really cares what school you went to or what it was called.

The only real choice or 'best' is the surrounding ecosystem. Going to a
university that has no internet connection will still get you the same
information and skills but for most people having no internet isn't all that
fun. Same goes for studying somewhere very cold when you like warm days, or
somewhere warm when you like it cold.

If you want something 'extra' (which again, no company cares about) like
prestige, you can make a list of all the places that have your preference to
be (climate, language etc.) and then check what 'extra' things they have, like
solar cars or public-private AI partnerships, or military applications or
space/esa connections. It won't do you much good if that extra experience has
nothing to do with what your goals are, and you can gain that experience
without a university just fine.

Perhaps some context in the origins of your thinking/culture would be best.
Most people assume USA mindset when this type of question gets asked.

~~~
Recursing
Thanks for the answer

The idea was to get a list of interesting places to choose from, apply to a
bunch of them and try to have as much information as possible for choosing the
final one

Another interesting question would be which culture would be the best fit for
me, I hadn't thought of that, thanks

~~~
oneplane
If you know what kind of topics you find most interesting, you should put that
on your list of preferences (combined with culture, location etc). If you have
a weird mix like Biomedical Computing, Program Correctness, Computer Vision
and you really like SAT solvers, finding out where the hotspots for those
topics are can help you select a uni. I know of a few people that selected
based on professors that would be available to them, and some that were purely
interested in getting into any of the FAANG, that does limit your options and
as a result should make your list much shorter.

------
TheyCallMeMaxi
1\. ETH Zurich 2\. EPFL 3\. Cambridge 4\. Oxford 5\. Imperial College London
6\. TU Munich 7\. TU Delft 8\. KTH Sweden

PS: I have a MS CS from one of the above.

~~~
nextos
tl;dr For a MSc try to choose a department with strong faculty in your area of
interest.

I've been both at Cambridge and Oxford. I think Oxford has had a much better
CS department for a number of years. A lot of Cambridge faculty was hired by
Microsoft Research long ago and they never recovered. Google Brain has also
drained a lot of their talent lately, mostly from the Engineering Department.

Oxford has tons of famous people now: Luca Cardelli, Marta Kwiatkowska (formal
methods), Yee Whye Teh (Bayesian non parametrics), Dan Olteanu (database
systems) and others.

As for mainland Europe, I agree ETH and EPFL are probably among the top. I
would also consider French CS, which is super good. Any French department
associated with an INRIA in the topic you are interested in might be a great
choice. In particular, ENS Paris might rival with ETH or EPFL in terms of
quality.

Lots of smaller Scandinavian, German and Belgian / Dutch unies might be a
great choice too. E.g. UCL Louvain, DTU, etc. It really depends on what you
wanna do.

~~~
Recursing
How can I know if there is a "strong faculty in my area of interest"?

H-index on google scholar?

~~~
ploika
University Rankings are like the Body Mass Index of figuring out how good a
university is - not entirely useless, but not to be used as anything more than
a very rough gauge of what's going on.

That said, QS break down their (global) rankings by subject. Below is the link
for computer science.

[https://www.topuniversities.com/university-
rankings/universi...](https://www.topuniversities.com/university-
rankings/university-subject-rankings/2019/computer-science-information-
systems)

There's no easy way of telling how much better the nth-ranked university
really is compared to the (n+m)th-ranked one, but it could be informative
nonetheless.

------
rvz
> Which do you think are the best universities in Europe, for a MS in the
> various fields of Computer Science?

I can only name the best two that are worthy of this for a Masters degree in
Computer Science or similar.

Even 10 years later, it is still both Imperial College and Cambridge
University in that order.

------
atmosx
In Greece the most famous one is CEID. Has produced quite a few strong
engineers. No tuitions for Europeans, but classes are in Greek and the entry
exam is a bit hard.

That said, I’ve worked with strong engineers that came from unknown
universities. Loving what you do can get you far.

------
lamchob
I heard great things about both, Copenhagen and Saarbrücken

~~~
Msurrow
If in Denmark, then not Copenhagen for CS. Aarhus Uni instead. Much better
research groups on Crypto, Algos, Prog languages, and Human-Computer
Interaction

~~~
Recursing
Thank you! What about Aalborg, mentioned by another commenter?

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alt_f4
University of Edinburgh

ETH Zurich

TU Munich

EPFL

Cambridge/Oxford are _very_ overrated imho. I have a masters from one of them.

------
jokinko
My uni in Slovakia, Zilina.

just kidding, Aalborg.

~~~
Recursing
Interesting that two of the four commenters mentioned Denmark

Why Aalborg over Copenhagen?

~~~
nift
While I know I discovered this thread late, I hope it's not too late to reply
:)

Being a Dane it mostly seems to me that people defend their university a lot
and it often correlates with where you grew up/went. So people saying Aalborg
is the best probably grew up near Aalborg or went to study there. This is of
course very anecdotal but when I studied CS in a CPH university nobody ever
spoke of Aalborg. People spoke about KU, ITU and DTU. Sometimes Aarhus was
mentioned.

Not saying Aalborg isn't great, but my general observation is people defend
their university choice like it's holy. Probably the same in other countries
:) so my suggestion would always be go where things are "closest to home". If
you're a foreigner, pick the one closest to the airport for convience.

One example is from outside Denmark is another commenter in this thread
mentioned the royal Stockholm uni, but forgot to mention Lund University (LTH)
which is just as prestigious.

In the end I never noticed anyone caring except in jest. Never met anyone who
cared professionally.

~~~
Recursing
Thanks for the answer! It's never too late ;)

I agree that everybody (especially professors) think their university is The
Best™, for many reasons (probably if they didn't like it they would have gone
to another place)

The idea of this thread was mostly to collect a (hopefully big) set of
candidates to choose from, and choose between them based on available programs
and general quality of life indicators (and average salary in the area...)

------
tetek
University of Warsaw

~~~
Recursing
Why do you think Warsaw is a top university? It's the first time I hear about
it

~~~
tetek
It has a very strong math/cs department. (MIMUW
[https://www.mimuw.edu.pl/en](https://www.mimuw.edu.pl/en)).

I've been doing my master's degree there. Although I've never finished the
final paper, I consider it to be one of the best decision / time well spent.

Great staff. Professors are just awesome (some of them are also lecturing at
abroad universities). Students as well. You will find the brightest polish
minds there (the entry exam is not that easy, and big part of the students are
math Olympiad finalists).

Courses:

1\. Logic - Poland has produced some of top logicians, you can see the
inheritance during the lessons. Loved it.

2\. Compilers - you will be able to compile in head and on paper.
JVM/LLVM/Assembly, you will learn how to write parsers, compilers etc.

3\. Cryptography - there are a lot of crypto enthusiasts in the department,
you will learn anything you need.

4\. Parallel computing - access to super computers, programming Nvidia,
verification.

5\. Seminars aka what you want to focus on, there's a long list from which you
can pick from. My main focus was on game theory, and I've learned a ton and
had a great support from professors.

Perks: FAAMGS companies line up couple times a year recruiting for internships
and work (always seducing with free pizza). Some of the students I know spent
every summer in Bay Area, and would accumulate enough money to live in Warsaw
for the next academic year.

