Trinity College Dublin is the top college in the country.

The Sunday Times Good University Guide 2020 has put the college ahead of University College Dublin and University College Cork who are in joint-second place.

Athlone Institute of Technology is up two places to seventh and is the highest ranked institute of technology.

The Good University Guide's Dr Colm Murphy said Trinity’s lead over other colleges is closing.

“The main finding is that Trinity College Dublin tops the rankings in this year’s guide and that is for the 18th successive year,” he said.

“But its gap on the other universities is closing. Both University College Dublin and University College Cork are within a whisker now of Trinity College and both are joint-second in the table.

“That is because both of those other universities score better for student satisfaction than Trinity.”

The guide found that Trinity has the highest spend on facilities and services of any Irish third-level institution and attracts by far the best qualified students.

It finds that Trinity students achieve an average of 520 Leaving Cert points.

However, both UCD and UCD significantly outscored trinity when it came to student satisfaction, helping to close the gap on the top college.

Athlone IT returned the best student satisfaction scores of any institution on the list.