School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal

How is School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal ranked in 2026?

School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal is most prominently ranked #11 in the NIRF Architecture and Planning category 2025 with a score of 60.69, its best published national standing and the figure aspirants should treat as the institute's headline rank heading into 2026. As an Institute of National Importance established in 2008 under the Ministry of Education, SPA Bhopal sits firmly inside the country's top tier for architecture and planning, just behind the older zonal SPAs and the architecture departments of the leading NITs and IITs. The NIRF 2026 Architecture list had not been released at the time of writing, so the #11 (2025) position remains the most recent verified rank; applicants should confirm the 2026 result on the official nirfindia.org portal once published. Beyond NIRF, SPA Bhopal has also featured strongly in private surveys, reported at #4 in the Outlook-ICARE 2025 "Architecture (Government)" category and #6 in The Week 2025 architecture list.

Year-Wise Rankings

The table below consolidates School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal's verified, year-attributed rankings so you can see exactly which body awarded which rank in which year. It answers the core question "what rank did SPA Bhopal actually hold each year?" and pairs every rank with its published score where NIRF provides one. Read each row independently: the ranking body and category define the peer set, the rank is the position within that set, and the score is the NIRF composite out of 100. Figures are attributed to the exact year they were published and must not be carried across years.

The takeaway is that NIRF moved SPA Bhopal up one place, from #12 in 2024 to #11 in 2025, even as its composite score eased slightly from 61.75 (2024) to 60.69 (2025). That combination, a better rank on a marginally lower score, signals that competing institutes' scores fell faster, lifting SPA Bhopal's relative position. The strong #4 (2025) showing among government architecture schools in the Outlook-ICARE survey reinforces that, when judged only against public peers, SPA Bhopal ranks even higher than its all-India NIRF position suggests.

Ranking Trajectory of School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal

School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal's NIRF trajectory is one of quiet, upward consolidation: rank #12 in 2024 (score 61.75) improved to rank #11 in 2025 (score 60.69). For an institute founded only in 2008, holding a stable position in the top 12 of the NIRF Architecture and Planning list year after year is the more important story than any single-place movement. The one-rung climb in 2025 places SPA Bhopal at the threshold of the national top 10, the bracket occupied by SPA New Delhi, the architecture wings of the senior IITs, and the strongest NITs.

What the trajectory signals to a 2026 applicant is durability rather than volatility. The slight dip in absolute score from 61.75 (2024) to 60.69 (2025) is small and did not cost the institute its standing; instead it gained a place, which usually reflects steady performance on NIRF's teaching, research, graduation-outcome, outreach and perception parameters while rivals slipped. Aspirants should read SPA Bhopal as a consistently top-12 architecture institute with momentum toward the top 10, and should check the forthcoming NIRF 2026 release to see whether that single-place gain extends further.

How School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal Compares

Against its immediate NIRF 2025 peers, School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal at #11 (score 60.69) sits just below VNIT Nagpur at #10 (score 61.22) and clearly behind the senior School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi at #8 (score 65.11). The table below positions SPA Bhopal next to these verified NIRF 2025 reference points so you can gauge the gaps in real score terms rather than rank alone. Use it to understand how tightly bunched the institutes around SPA Bhopal are and how much ground separates it from the category leaders.

The comparison shows SPA Bhopal is separated from VNIT Nagpur (#10) by barely half a point of score (61.22 versus 60.69), so a single strong year could push it into the top 10. The wider gap to SPA New Delhi (65.11 at #8) reflects the senior institute's longer history and deeper research base. For an applicant, the practical reading is that SPA Bhopal competes credibly with established NIT architecture departments and the older SPAs while offering the focused, planning-and-architecture-only environment of a dedicated school.