International enrolment declines hit 75% of Canadian universities

“This is not temporary turbulence,” heard delegates of The PIE Live North America, as sector leaders presented the findings of this year’s Global Enrolment Benchmark Survey by Studyportals, NAFSA and the Oxford Test of English. Undergraduate and postgraduate enrolments dipped year-on-year for around three-quarters of Canadian institutions, the study found.

The survey of nearly 500 global institutions garnered sobering findings from North America, with 82% of Canadian universities and 48% of US institutions reporting lower undergraduate enrolments in 2025 compared with the previous year.  

“The scale of the decline in Canada and the US reflects structural contractions influenced by policy shifts, heightened visa uncertainty and affordability pressures in various markets,” said Ashley Fitchette, Studyportals’ senior vice president: global partnerships.  

“Globally, North America is the outlier now, which traditionally has not been the case.” 

At the postgraduate level, the data showed 71% of Canadian institutions and 63% of US institutions reported declines this year – a trend Fitchette said was “strategic, not cyclical”. 

In Canada, the drastic falls amounted to 36% and 35% drops at the bachelor’s and master’s levels respectively, compared to the previous year.  

Meanwhile, declines in the US amounted to a 6% drop in undergraduate students and a 19% drop in postgraduate students.  

Experts highlighted myriad policy changes across Canada and the US impacting work rights, study-to-career pathways and new constraints on dependants that are “reshaping decision-making at every level of the student journey”. 

In Canada, institutions have weathered nearly two years of policy changes since the government’s study permit caps in January 2024, with student numbers set to fall far short of government targets for next year – in what many experts see as an “overcorrection” on the government’s part.  

The damaging repercussions of federal policy changes were reflected starkly in the survey, with 90% of Canadian respondents citing restrictive government policies as the number one obstacle facing their institution, compared to a global average of 68%. 

In face of such challenges, 60% of Canadian universities said they would cut budgets in the coming year, while half are anticipating staff layoffs.  

It’s mission critical for North American universities to be building bridges and fostering alliances with their Asian counterparts

Ashley Fitchette, Studyportals

In the US, international students have been a central target of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, with 85% of US respondents now seeing restrictive government policies and issues obtaining visas as a major problem – up from 58% in 2024, the survey revealed.  

Elsewhere, Fitchette said Europe and Asia were becoming “new gravity centres for students looking for welcoming communities”, absorbing the redistributed demand.  

In the UK, international enrolments grew by 3% across study levels, but the destination saw the worst affordability challenges of any country, with 72% saying tuition and living costs were a top barrier, up from 58% last year. 

Among Asian countries, bachelor’s enrolments rose by 8% from the previous year, while master’s grew by 3%, with European countries experiencing similar modest growth. 

As was noted elsewhere in the conference, it is not just ‘big four’ woes driving the shifts in global mobility, but the increasing perception of the quality of education in emerging destinations is also playing a large role – with strong attention paid to Asia.  

“That’s where this big four is turning into the big 14,” said Fitchette, advising North American institutions that it was “mission critical” to build bridges and foster alliances with Asian counterparts.  

At the same time, 60% of Canadian and over half of American institutions said they planned to diversify into new markets – marking a “proactive approach to offsetting those financial pressures”, said Mary Phillips, recognition manager at OUP.  

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