International students in UK double over past decade

International student mobility has continued to grow across nearly all OECD countries, with the US, UK and Australia hosting the highest number of international students in 2023, the OECD’s Education at a Glance 2025 report has shown. 

“The growth of international student mobility across OECD countries is good news,” said Pamela Baxter, IELTS managing director at Cambridge University Press & Assessment, at a Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) event on September 9 which marked the launch of the report.

“It is especially pleasing to find that the UK continues to be one of the most attractive destinations for international students – second only the US,” added Baxter.  

As a share of the overall student population, Luxembourg (52%), Australia (27%) and the UK (23%) were found to have the highest proportion of international students, compared to an OECD average of 7%. 

Despite slowing in recent years, the report found global educational attainment reached an all-time high in 2023, with nearly half of young adults in OECD countries now completing tertiary education – up from 27% at the turn of the century.

Speakers hailed the UK’s more than doubling of its international student population over the past decade as an endorsement of the quality of higher education, as well as commending the country’s relatively low university dropout rates.  

And yet, the report also exposed “sad truths” that the UK is performing “relatively poorly” when it comes to outcomes for lower-skilled learners and the proportion of young men out of education or employment, said HEPI director Nick Hillman.  

In the past decade, international student numbers across the OECD have risen by 72%: from roughly three million in 2013 to more than five million in 2023.  

“While there is one international student for every three home students in the UK, across the OECD as a whole the ratio is completely different at 1:13,” said Hilman, unveiling the data.  

“From the vantage point of the OECD in Paris, this is a real UK success story – though the Home Office continues to push for policies to reverse recent trends,” he continued. 

Unlike its predecessor, the current Labour government has repeatedly paid lip service to the value of international students to the UK, but policies have not always aligned with the rhetoric.  

This spring, the government published its highly anticipated immigration white paper which proposed shortening the graduate route, implementing stricter compliance metrics for universities, and imposing a 6% levy on the income from international student fees.  

Speaking at the report’s launch event, the UK’s recently re-appointed minister for skills Jacqui Smith said the government was “proud to be a leading destination for international students,” with a 15% market share amongst OECD countries.  

“We will remain committed to welcoming genuine high calibre international students to study in the UK and ensuring that our higher education system continues to be world class,” said Smith, acknowledging the “considerable investment” they’re asked to make.  

Across the OECD, England has the second highest tuition fees for master’s programs, after Lithuania and followed by the US, Canada and Australia, the report revealed.  

What’s more, while a relatively high percentage of the UK’s GDP is invested into education, the country has one of the lowest shares of public funding in tertiary education, which has fallen significantly since 2015.  

Hundreds of thousands of international students are attracted to the UK each year and they prop up the system via their high fees

Nick Hillman, HEPI

Amid steep financial challenges facing UK higher education, Hilman suggested the system placed “perhaps too few expectations on taxpayers” with international students increasingly relied upon to “prop up the system via their higher fees”. 

The data highlighted the value of tracking mobility trends which “serve as important signals about the attractiveness of national education systems and their ability to integrate diverse student populations.” 

As of 2023, approximately 46% of OECD international students studied in the US, UK, Australia or Canada, with policy disruption across traditional destinations causing the rise of emerging destinations outside the ‘big four’.

According to OECD director for education and skills, Andreas Schleicher: “It’s no longer just the English-speaking countries” that are attracting large volumes of international students, pointing to the decline of the US in relative terms, whose international student population comprised roughly 5% of higher education enrolments in 2023.

Among non-English speaking countries, France, Germany, and Türkiye each take about 5% or more of the total share of international students across the OECD. 

In terms of source countries, students from Asia remain the largest regional group of international students, making up 58% of the OECD total in 2023.  

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