Decline in overseas students could ‘threaten UK sector by 2030’

UK universities “will be looking at a serious funding gap by the end of the decade” if they don’t adapt to stagnating international applications, an analysis by UCL researchers using machine learning predicts.

The number of prospective undergraduates from China and Hong Kong will fall by the end of the decade, while the growth in demand from India will “plateau”, the paper forecasts. Meanwhile, applications from the European Union (EU) will remain far below their pre-Brexit level.

Combined, these regions account for more than half of the UK’s current international undergraduate student enrolment.

Published by the scientific journal Nature Communications on 17 September, the article, “Machine learning forecasts suggest a concentration paradox in international student mobility to the UK”, presents a bleak prognosis for the sector.

The title’s “paradox” refers to the fact that the UK’s reliance on students from a small number of origin countries increases even as applications from those countries stagnate or decrease owing to the high fees they pay in comparison with domestic students.

The research, produced in collaboration with the University of Liverpool and Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Germany, is believed to be the first to use machine learning to predict international student numbers in the UK.

It comes in the wake of Home Office data revealing a stark drop-off in the number of people seeking sponsored study visas in the key month of August. Some observers have suggested the decline could spark university closures.

The UCL analysis also predicts a serious funding gap for higher education should current trends continue. Based on an evaluation of data gathered by admissions service Ucas, the study considers how changes in demand from international students – who currently comprise about one-quarter of the UK student population – could impact university finances.

Looking at applications made from 86 countries between 2010 and 2024, the modelling finds that applications from EU students, who made up about 36 per cent of all international applications in the pre-Brexit period, fell to 16 per cent between 2020 and 2024 and will fall further to around 10 per cent between 2025 and 2030.

And while applications from India are expected to hold up, applications from Hong Kong and mainland China, of which there were 20,200 in 2024, will experience a “gradual decline” to roughly 18,000 applications by 2030, the forecast suggests.

“This dynamic aligns with evidence of growing domestic higher education capacity [in China] and shifting geopolitical relations,” researchers write.

The findings have “direct implications for UK higher education and migration governance”, the researchers say. “International students have long been treated as a stable revenue stream within institutional and governmental planning, but our results suggest that this assumption is increasingly untenable.”

The article points to policy changes including restrictions on international students’ right to bring dependants to the UK, the tightening of post-study work pathways, and plans for an international student levy, as ones that “risk undermining the financial foundations of the sector”.

These policy changes are pursued in a wider global context defined by “instability” and “shifting migration regimes”, the authors say.

The paper advises institutions to diversify the range of countries they recruit from, and it calls on UK governments to change university funding models to reduce universities’ dependence on international student fees. It also calls for migration policies to balance political concerns with the need for “stable” international student recruitment.

According to lead author Ruth Neville, a research assistant in computational social science at UCL: “With no or limited growth projected for the countries that it most relies on, the UK higher education sector is facing a potential crisis.

“International student enrolment is fundamentally shifting, and if universities don’t adapt, they will be looking at a serious funding gap by the end of the decade.”

georgia.luckhurst@timeshighereducation.com