Apple Tops 'World's Most Admired Company' List for 17th Consecutive Year

Apple's iron-clad grasp on the top spot of Fortune's "World's Most Admired Companies" shows no signs of weakening, with the tech giant finishing ahead of the 300+ pack for the 17th consecutive year.

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Apple was placed above Microsoft in second place, followed by Amazon in third. All three companies have rounded out the top three for the fifth year in a row. Notably, Nvidia, whose GPU chips are powering servers for generative AI around the world, soared to its highest-ever ranking at number 10.

Fortune ranks companies through a collection of "key attributes of reputation," such as innovation, quality of management, social responsibility, use of corporate assets, financial soundness, quality of products and services, and global competitiveness. Apple topped the list in every category.

As it has in the past, Fortune collaborated with partner Korn Ferry on its survey of corporate reputations.

To select our 50 All-Stars, Korn Ferry asked 3,720 executives, directors, and securities analysts who had responded to the industry surveys to select the 10 companies they admired most. They chose from a list made up of the companies that ranked in the top 25% in last year’s surveys, plus those that finished in the top 20% of their industry. Anyone could vote for any company in any industry.

To see the full ranking of the World's Most Admired Companies, visit Fortune's website.

Tag: Fortune

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Top Rated Comments

WarmWinterHat Avatar
13 months ago

This is just embarrassing for a company of this size - we do not need more emojis ?
You need to tell that to Unicode. Apple doesn't decide to make new ones, they are just following Unicode guidelines so iPhone users don't end up with blank squares when another platform uses a new Emoji.

https://home.unicode.org/emoji/about-emoji/
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
neuropsychguy Avatar
13 months ago
This ranking can't be right. Apple is one of the least admired companies, per the comments from some on MacRumors. Those commenters surely know more than the "3,720 executives, directors, and securities analysts" who were surveyed.
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
japanime Avatar
13 months ago
Forbes must regard us proles as fools. This has nothing to do with "innovation" or "social responsibility" or any of the other feelgood phrases they attach to this list.

All you need to do is look at the Top 10 and realize that the real, unspoken reason these companies are "most admired" is because they are making the billionaire class more and more money. ?
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
seggy Avatar
13 months ago
The fact that Amazon is third speaks volumes about what kind of techbro definition of Admired it is here
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
yellow8 Avatar
13 months ago
I think it's well-deserved, even though one might always find room for improvement, it's globally ok.
IMHO.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
wanha Avatar
13 months ago

...most admired among "executives, directors, and securities analysts". They probably admire its stock performance first and foremost.
I would imagine they admire not just the results, but also the professionalism and structures that Apple has in place that allow them to do so.

A friend of mine who is in finance and is not a big Apple fan admires the efficient machine Apple has built over the past 20+ years.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)