Universities

Fudan University, established in 1905, is situated in Shanghai’s Yangpu District and forms part of China’s national key universities. Its campus hosts over 30,000 students and includes five national key laboratories alongside a library holding more than five million volumes. The university comprises multiple schools and colleges, offering undergraduate, master’s, and doctoral programmes across disciplines. Teaching and research span the humanities, sciences, medicine, and social sciences. Its location in central Shanghai supports close ties with academic, cultural, and professional communities in the city. The university operates primarily in Mandarin, though some postgraduate programmes are delivered in English.

Founded in 1920 in Harbin, northeast China, Harbin Institute of Technology is a national key university with strengths across engineering, science, management, and humanities. It hosts multiple schools and institutes, offering undergraduate, master’s, and doctoral programmes. The campus spans several sites in Harbin, with the original campus situated near the city’s central walking street. HIT maintains a strong research orientation and a long-standing commitment to multidisciplinary education. Around 1800 international students from over 100 countries study at the university each year. Its location in Harbin provides a distinct regional context, shaped by both historical development and seasonal character.

The Institute for International Students handles international student enrollment at Nanjing University. It is a national test site for HSK, the Test of Practical Chinese (C.Test), and the Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language (TCFL) Capability Test. It has hosted more than 10,000 international students from over 70 countries. Graduates have gone into politics, business, and scholarship. The Institute includes the Department of Chinese Language, the Department of TCFL, the Institute of Chinese-Foreign Culture Comparison Studies, the Postgraduates Center, and the Teaching Materials Center for TCFL. It offers Chinese language and culture programs, short-term language training, and degree programs (B.A., M.A., Ph.D.). Faculty: 33 full-time (23 professors or associate professors) plus over 30 adjunct faculty, experienced in teaching Chinese to foreign students. It has served as a training site for organizations including the Chinese Department of the UN, CIEE, the Chinese Teaching Association of the New York Area, and the American National Chinese Flagship Program, and works with foreign governments, companies, diplomatic services, the military, and schools. It offers Chinese language and culture programs and HSK prep courses; HSK candidates from the university have traditionally ranked highly.

Established in 1898 in Beijing, Peking University is China’s first national university. Its campus hosts five faculties—Humanities, Social Sciences, Sciences, Medicine, and Information and Engineering—alongside 47 colleges and departments. The university offers over one hundred undergraduate programmes and more than five hundred graduate and doctoral programmes. With around 34,000 students including nearly 2,400 international learners from 80 countries, its academic community is both large and diverse. The teaching staff includes over 5,800 full-time faculty members, among them more than 1,700 professors and over 60 academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Chinese Academy of Engineering. Research infrastructure includes 11 national key laboratories, 46 state key laboratories, and a library holding 7.7 million volumes—the largest university library in Asia.

Founded in 1896, Shanghai Jiao Tong University is one of China’s oldest universities and is based in Shanghai’s Minhang and Xuhui districts. It comprises 28 schools and departments, offering 64 undergraduate programmes across nine disciplinary areas including engineering, medicine, science, and management. The university hosts over 44,000 students, including nearly 6,000 international learners, and employs more than 2,800 full-time academic staff. Its research infrastructure includes eight state key laboratories and multiple national engineering research centres. SJTU awards degrees at bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral levels across a broad range of disciplines, with particular depth in engineering and the natural sciences. The university operates several affiliated hospitals and maintains close ties with Shanghai’s municipal government and national education authorities.

It was formed in June 2016 by merging Shanghai Lixin University of Commerce and Shanghai Finance University. Its roots go back to Lixin education founded by Dr. Pan Xulun in 1928. In 2022, the School of Business and Administration received five-year full AACSB accreditation. SLU has three campuses in Pudong, Songjiang, and Xuhui, covering more than 1,200 mu (about 800,000 square meters). It has more than 19,000 full-time students, including over 370 graduate students; 3 master’s degree programs and 40 undergraduate majors; more than 1,630 faculty and staff, including over 1,240 full-time teachers

Founded in Beijing in 1958 and relocated to Hefei in the early 1970s, the University of Science and Technology of China operates under the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Its academic structure integrates teaching with CAS research institutes across disciplines including mathematics, physics, chemistry, and nuclear science and technology. The university hosts 20 schools and 30 departments, with additional facilities in Nanjing, Shanghai, Suzhou, Shenyang, and Changchun. It maintains over 50 laboratories and research centres, among them the National Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory and the Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale. With around 25,000 students—including more than 17,000 postgraduates—and nearly 2,000 faculty members, USTC delivers undergraduate, master’s, and doctoral programmes. It was the first institution in China to establish a graduate school, doing so in 1978.

Xi'an Jiaotong University, founded in 1896, is situated in Xi’an—a historic city that served as capital to thirteen Chinese dynasties. Its three campuses—Xingqing, Yanta, and Qvjiang—form a connected academic presence across the city. The university hosts nearly 30,000 full-time students, over half of whom are enrolled in postgraduate programmes. It offers a broad range of study options, including 82 undergraduate, 242 master’s, and 154 doctoral programmes. English-medium master’s degrees have been available since 2011, with fields such as management science, electrical engineering, and mechanical engineering among those taught entirely in English. The clinical medicine programme for international students, launched in 1995, remains one of its longest-running English-language offerings.

Zhejiang University, founded in 1897 in Hangzhou, is one of China’s leading comprehensive research universities. Teaching and research span science, engineering, medicine, humanities, and social sciences. International students study across a wide range of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes.