 International rankings place CEU-UCH at the top of the 23 Spanish private universities, rankings like Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s "Academic Ranking of World Universities" ("ARWU") placed CEU-UCH the second Spanish private university, after the University of Navarra, in terms of research in 2013.In 2014 "U-Multirank", a new global university ranking financed by the EU which assesses the performance of more than 850 higher education institutions worldwide, placed CEU-UCH as the tenth European university in agreement to regional involvement, scientific productivity and international orientation

It is run by the CEU Foundation which is the biggest private educational group in Spain.Centro de Estudios Universitarios includes two other universities (CEU San Pablo University in Madrid and CEU Abat Oliva University in Barcelona), many primary and secondary schools and different centres of study (MBA, Senior University, etc).