The purpose of the research is to classify academic organizations in Kazakhstan and analyze overall higher education competitiveness using the hierarchical cluster analysis method. The results of the study can be used as an effective source of information in development of institutional policies and benchmarking. The lack of a classification scheme for academic organizations in Kazakhstan imposes restrictions on policy research as well as academic research. Without a classification scheme for academic organizations, researchers and policy makers have to work with relatively random comparable groups. Such studies may lead to inappropriate and inconsistent results. Regarding this need, the main purpose of this study is to classify the academic organizations in Kazakhstan in terms of their institutional size and performance. As a result of the clustering analysis, the academic organizations were divided in 4 groups forming in the dendogram. Academic organizations in cluster A are academic organizations with a focus on growth and research. The cluster consists mainly of high quality education and high performing academic organizations. Academic organizations in cluster B include the oldest medium-sized academic organizations. Cluster C is composed of academic organizations located in the Western region of Kazakhstan, while Cluster D contains small and medium-sized and relatively old academic organizations.