Meanwhile, the latest data from HESA – which monitors official numbers of international students in the UK – shows that there was a record total of 679,970 non-UK students in the UK as of the 2021/22 academic year.
However, 2021/22 figures show that non-EU enrolments increased to 559,825 compared to 452,224 the previous year, representing a 25% rise year-on-year. First-year students from non-EU countries rose by a whopping 85,000 year-on-year to 350,324 in 2021/22
And total EU student numbers plummeted to 120,140 compared to 152,905 the previous year – a 21% drop.
But this is retrospective data and the publication of more up-to-date figures representing numbers for the 2022/23 academic year has been delayed until August.
A number of reports have criticised the data infrastructure of HESA’s data.
More recent ONS data published in May 2024 shows the number of international students choosing to stay in the UK after completing higher education there is on the wane.
Provisional ONS data shows that the net migration of non-EU nationals who came to the UK on a study-related visa dropped to 247,000 for the year ending dECEMBER 2023, compared to approximately 328,000 the previous year.
Indian and Nigerian students represented the biggest increase in study-related visa applications between December 2018 and December 2002, the data shows. Indian nationality surged from 13,100 to 142,200 within that time, while Nigerian nationality increased from 4,300 to 89,800.
