Table of contents
- Main points
- Overview
- Overall long-term migration for those on a study-related visa
- Study-related visas and length of stay in the UK
- Nationalities of those arriving in the UK on a study-related visa
- Subjects studied and geographical location of international students in higher education
- UK international students’ data
- Glossary
- Data sources and quality
- Future developments
- Related links
- Cite this article
1. Main points
Immigration of non-EU+ migrants initially arriving on a study-related visa decreased from 423,000 in year ending (YE) December 2023 to 266,000 in YE December 2024; a decrease in student dependants following government policy changes accounts for around two-thirds of this change.
In YE December 2023 study-dependant visas accounted for 29% of all non-EU+ migrants initially arriving on a study-related visa (121,000); this fell to 6% (17,000) for YE December 2024 arrivals.
Emigration of non-EU+ migrants initially arriving on a study-related visa increased from 114,000 in YE December 2023 to 135,000 in YE December 2024; this may in part reflect higher levels of study immigration since 2021 as these students finish their courses.
Since 2022, decreasing study-related immigration and increasing study-related emigration resulted in lower long-term net migration of non-EU+ international migrants initially arriving in the UK on a study-related visa; this decreased to 131,000 in YE December 2024 compared with our updated YE December 2023 estimate of 309,000.
The proportion of non-EU+ students and their dependants who had transitioned to a different visa type after three years increased for arrivals in YE December 2021 (46%) compared with arrivals in YE December 2019 (18%).
These are official statistics in development, and we advise caution when using the data. The methods are currently under development, which means estimates may be revised and updated as improvements are introduced and as further and more recent data become available. More information can be found in Section 9: Data sources and quality.
2. Overview
This article provides further insights into our Long-term international migration, provisional: year ending December 2024 bulletin, focusing on estimates of long-term international students and their dependants, including analysis of their characteristics and migration patterns. This publication builds on our Reason for international migration, international students update: November 2024 article.
We provide new insights into international migrants immigrating into the UK on a study visa between July 2022 and June 2023 in Section 6: Subjects studied and geographical location of international students in higher education. Using Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) data we provide an interactive chart for selected nationalities, showing our investigation so far. This displays the interaction between:
main subject
level of study
sub-national location of the international students in term time
We use Home Office Borders and Immigration data (HOBI) to provide further detail on long-term international migrants who come to the UK for study purposes. At this stage in our research, we can only apply our methods to non-EU+ nationals. Non-EU+ migrants account for the majority of long-term study immigration to the UK in recent years. Those on a study-related visa (study visas and study-dependant visas) make up 35% of non-EU+ nationals who immigrated in year ending (YE) December 2024. A full definition of non-EU+ can be found in Section 8: Glossary.
Methods to estimate migration of EU+ nationals using HOBI are still in development. More information can be found in our International migration research, progress update: February 2025 article. A definition of EU+ can be found in Section 8: Glossary.
Estimates for YE December 2024 are released with the expectation that they may be revised and updated as further, more recent, data become available. More information on revisions is available in Section 6 of our Provisional long-term international migration estimates bulletin.
Back to table of contents6. Subjects studied and geographical location of international students in higher education
Our November 2024 article in this series included analysis using published Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) data to provide additional insights into international higher education (HE) students. Using HESA microdata, for 2022 to 2023, we improved the coherence of these insights with long-term international migration (LTIM) estimates.
Our bespoke population of international (non-British national) HE students closely matches our definition of a long-term international migrant on a study visa. This population is referred to in this section as the "international student population" or "population" and contains students beginning HE courses in the 2022 to 2023 academic year. Further information on the methods for this are given in Section 9: Data sources and quality.
The majority of students in our population had a non-EU+ nationality. Nationals from India, China and Nigeria made up 65% of our total international HE student population. This is consistent with the top nationality groups seen in Home Office Borders and Immigration data (HOBI) (find more information in Section 5: Nationalities of those arriving in the UK on a study-related visa). Nationals from EU+ countries accounted for 7%, and the French nationality was the most common (1% of the total international student population). London was the most popular destination for both non-EU+ (29%) and EU+ (43%) nationals in our international student population. Nationals from Nigeria were an exception as they were more evenly dispersed throughout Great Britain (Table 1).
| Destination Popularity | Total Non-EU+ | Total EU+ | Indian | Chinese | Nigerian |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | London 29% | London 43% | London 36% | London 28% | North West 13% |
| 2nd | Scotland 11% | Scotland 13% | East Midlands 10% | Scotland 16% | Scotland 12% |
| 3rd | South East 10% | South East 12% | West Midlands 9% | Yorkshire and The Humber 12% | Yorkshire and The Humber 11% |
| 4th | Yorkshire and The Humber 9% | South West 6% | North West 8% | South East 12% | North East 11% |
| 5th | West Midlands 8% | North West 5% | South East 8% | West Midlands 8% | London 11% |
Download this table Table 1: London was the most popular location for international students
.xls .csvThe level of study and choice of main subject was distinctly different between the non-EU+ and EU+ nationality groups. Master’s level of study was chosen by 75% of non-EU+ nationals, with another 22% choosing an undergraduate course and 3% studying for a doctorate.
For those with EU+ nationality, there was an even split between those studying for an undergraduate level qualification (50%) and those studying for either a master’s (43%) or doctorate (8%) qualification.
Figure 4: Nigeria had the highest proportion of students studying for a master’s degree, while nationals from the USA had a more even split between undergraduate and master’s levels of study
Level of study by nationality groups and selected nationalities, UK, 2022 to 2023 academic year
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Notes:
- Numbers have been rounded to the nearest percentage. The sum of individual numbers may not equal totals seen elsewhere.
- This population of international (non-British national) Higher Education (HE) students was designed to closely match our definition of a long-term international migrant (LTIM) on a study visa.
- Undergraduate level of study includes honours degrees, ordinary degrees and higher diplomas, as well as those studying for a foundation degree.
- Copyright Jisc 2023. Jisc cannot accept responsibility for any inferences or conclusions derived by third parties from its data.
Around two-thirds of undergraduate or master’s students studied non-STEM subjects. Business and management, a non-STEM subject, was the most popular subject overall, with 40% of non-EU+ students and 26% of EU+ students choosing it as their main subject. The popularity of other main subject areas varied by nationality and level of study (Figure 5). A definition of STEM can be found in Section 8: Glossary.
Figure 5: The most popular subjects of study at all levels varies by nationality
Subjects studied by nationality groups, selected nationalities and level of study, UK, 2022 to 2023 academic year
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Notes:
- Numbers have been rounded to the nearest percentage. The sum of individual numbers may not equal totals seen elsewhere.
- This population of international (non-British national) higher education (HE) students was designed to closely match our definition of a long-term international migrant (LTIM) on a study visa.
- "Other subjects" includes all subjects outside of the top five most prevalent subjects for that nationality.
- Undergraduate level of study includes honours degrees, ordinary degrees and higher diplomas, as well as those studying for a foundation degree.
- Postgraduate level of study includes doctoral and master's degrees and postgraduate certificates.
- Copyright Jisc 2023. Jisc cannot accept responsibility for any inferences or conclusions derived by third parties from its data.
7. UK international students’ data
Long-term international student migration, provisional estimates
Dataset | Released 22 May 2025
Long-term international student migration to the UK, 2019 to 2024, including status of migration and visa, age, sex and nationality. These are official statistics in development.
8. Glossary
Cohort
A group of student and student dependant long-term migrants that arrived in the UK in the same year ending (YE) period.
Dependant visas
International migrants that have entered the UK on a visa may be eligible to bring their dependant partner or child with them through a dependant visa, depending on the type of visa the main applicant holds. A dependant partner or child is any of the following of an international migrant:
a husband, wife, civil partner or unmarried partner
a child aged 18 years and under, including those born in the UK during the international migrant's stay
a child aged 18 years and over if they are currently in the UK as the international migrant's dependant
EU, EU+ and non-EU+
EU is the European Union. It is the sum of EU14, EU8, and EU2, plus Malta, Cyprus and Croatia (from 1 July 2013). British nationals are not included in these numbers at any time point. The European Union groups are:
Romania and Bulgaria (EU2)
Czechia, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia (EU8)
Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Republic of Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Sweden (EU14)
"Other EU" is Malta, Cyprus and Croatia (joined from 2013)
"EU+" is all current EU countries plus Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Switzerland.
"Non-EU+" is the sum of the rest of the world, including the rest of Europe, not included in the EU+ category. British nationals are excluded from these numbers.
Humanitarian reason for migration
For non-EU+ nationals, the reason for migration is based on their visa type. The "humanitarian" category includes people who immigrated into the UK under visas classified as:
protection
British national (overseas) (BN(O))
Ukrainian support schemes
asylum applicants
International student
An international student is currently defined as someone who arrives in the UK to study and remains for a period of 12 months or more. In line with the current United Nations (UN) definition of a long-term migrant, international students are included in our estimates of long-term immigration.
Level of study
Level of study indicates the level of the higher education course on which a student is engaged.
Undergraduate level of study includes honours degrees, ordinary degrees and higher diplomas, as well as those studying for a foundation degree.
Postgraduate courses include doctoral and master's degrees and postgraduate certificates.
More information on determining level of study is available in Higher Education Statistics Agency's (HESA) student definitions.
Long-term international migrant
Someone who recently migrated into the UK on a study related visa and started a new higher education course that they expect to last for 12 months or more.
STEM
Subjects classed as science, technology, engineering or mathematics. HESA defines STEM subjects as:
medicine and dentistry
subjects allied to medicine
biological and sport sciences
psychology
veterinary sciences
agriculture, food and related studies
physical sciences
mathematical sciences
engineering and technology
computing
geography, earth and environmental studies (excluding human geography)
Further information on subject groupings is available within the HESA bulletin on subjects studied from April 2025.
We defined the other terms we have used in this article in our Reason for international migration, international students update: November 2024 article.
Back to table of contents9. Data sources and quality
Official statistics in development
These statistics are labelled as "official statistics in development". Until September 2023, these were called "experimental statistics". Read more about the change in the Office for Statistics Regulation's Guide to official statistics in development.
Estimates for the most recent time period in our data series (year ending (YE) December 2024) are provisional and provide users with an early indication of migration during this period. Our Population and International Migration Statistics Revisions Policy methodology shows they are released with the expectation that they may be revised and updated as further, and more recent, data become available. We are also continuing to develop and refine our methods for measuring long-term international migration, including international students.
More information on revisions is available in our Long-term international migration, provisional: year ending December 2024 bulletin.
Higher Education Statistics Agency data
In Section 6: Subjects studied and geographical location of international students in higher education, we used record level data supplied by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA). The broad range of information collected by HESA provides additional detail and insight into the behaviour and characteristics of students studying at higher education providers within the UK.
Using record level data for the 2022 to 2023 academic year, we filtered the HESA student population to match, as closely as possible, our definition of a long-term international migrant (LTIM). We have filtered out records where the student:
has any form of British citizenship
previously studied at another institution within the UK, or were permanently living in the UK prior to starting their current course
did not expect their course to last 12 months
did not require a study visa for the course (applying eligibility rules for study visas from the gov.uk website)
was not in the first year of their course
was recorded as not being actively engaged in the course
was engaging in the course as a distance learner outside the UK
was missing information on their nationality (3.5% of all records)
Allocation of students to countries of the UK and regions in England was by the postcode or local authority district of their term time address or, if this was unavailable, their higher education provider.
Analysis of the location of international students during term-time is for Great Britain, not the UK, because of high levels of missing nationality data of those international students resident in Northern Ireland.
Each record is an instance of a student engaging on a course. The proportion of students in our filtered population with more than one engagement is less than 0.01%. The number of records is therefore considered to be an excellent proxy for the number of students in our population.
The bespoke definition of our international student population prevents direct coherence between our findings and statistics on the HESA website.
Back to table of contents10. Future developments
We will continue to update estimates of international student migration as we receive more data, improve methods and provide more insights. This includes:
extending the use of Home Office Borders and Immigration (HOBI) data for EU+ nationals once methods are fully developed
building on new analysis of Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) data to provide further insights
We have undertaken an engagement exercise to understand user needs regarding an additional international net migration estimate which excludes students. There was mixed feedback on the need for this, but the overall preference was to not introduce such an estimate. It also highlighted areas where additional information on international students would be useful.
Following this exercise, a decision was made not to publish an additional estimate of international net migration excluding students at this time. We will review the suggestions provided by users and look for opportunities to take them forward through our research and development work. More information can be found in our consultation response document.
We want your feedback
Your feedback is important. We want to hear what our users need from the development of these statistics to ensure we are providing the best insights on population and migration.
Please get in touch with any feedback by emailing [email protected].
Back to table of contents12. Cite this article
Office for National Statistics (ONS), released 22 May 2025, ONS website, article, Reason for international migration, international students update: May 2025