Issue 024: 80 universities and colleges lost fee income

In 2024/25 international fee income fell at 80 of the 146 UK universities and colleges that earned at least £5 million from it in 2023/24, and rose at 66. Six universities each added more than £50 million, half of all the gains between them and more than the net increase for all 146. HESA publishes the table for every provider (source). The Spotlight puts it next to the forecasts that regulators in England and Scotland have called optimistic. The Office for Students said so in May, and on Thursday 1 October the Scottish Funding Council said in its key messages that the sector's planned recovery to 2027/28 is "mainly driven by optimistic forecast tuition fee assumptions by many universities" (source).

In other news last week, the Home Office suspended Buckinghamshire New University's Student sponsor licence on Wednesday 30 September, giving it "20 working days to respond to the decision" and no public reason (source); the university says "many of the issues raised by the Home Office relate to historic international student recruitment activity" (source). Australia's new rules on dependants and on applying from inside the country came into force on Friday 2 October (source). Times Higher Education's rankings on Wednesday 30 September put Oxford first for an eleventh year and Cambridge fifth, down from joint third (source). Staff at Edinburgh began a five-week strike on Monday 28 September over £140 million of cuts, and Nottingham's strike runs from Monday 5 October to December (source).

HESA publishes tuition fee income by domicile for every UK provider, and the 2024/25 returns are in its finance tables. We took the 146 universities and colleges with at least £5 million of international fee income in 2023/24 and a return for both years, and compared the two years provider by provider. International fee income rose at 66 of them and fell at 80. Added together, the 146 took £12.29 billion from international students in 2024/25, which is 1.2% or £143 million more than in 2023/24. The sector figure is a small rise. The provider figures underneath it are not.

The rises add up to £831 million and the falls to £688 million, and most of the £831 million went to a small number of universities. Six each added more than £50 million. They are UCL (+£98.0 million, up 14.2% on 2023/24), Birmingham (+£91.1 million, +37.3%), Glasgow (+£61.4 million, +20.3%), King's College London (+£55.7 million, +15.3%), Manchester (+£52.4 million, +11.5%) and Imperial (+£52.1 million, +14.7%). Between them the six added £411 million, which is half of all the gains and nearly three times the net increase for all 146. The ten largest gainers took two thirds of the gains. The 80 that fell are not small institutions either. Between them they held 42% of the 146's international fee income in 2023/24.

The Russell Group is on both sides of the chart. Its 23 members with returns added £377 million between them, but ten of the 23 fell, and the two largest falls in the country are both members. Leeds lost £53.8 million, a fall of 16.0% on 2023/24, and Sheffield lost £46.8 million (-21.8%). Southampton (-9.9%), Cardiff (-13.9%) and Queen's Belfast (-5.1%) also fell, and Newcastle, Liverpool, York, Exeter and Queen Mary fell by less than 5%. The other 123 providers lost £234 million between them, and 70 of them fell. Leeds's annual report for the year, signed by its Chair of Council and its Vice-Chancellor, says that "the reduction in international student recruitment has contributed to a small deficit this year" (source).

Providers with at least £5 million of international fee income in 2023/24 and returns in both years. Russell Group count excludes Nottingham, which has no 2024/25 return published. Source: HESA Finance Table 6.

The steepest falls by share are at smaller institutions. Bath Spa lost 57.6% of its international fee income in one year, Bedfordshire 53.9% (from £67.4 million to £31.1 million), Swansea 45.2%, Winchester 42.5% and Lincoln 41.9%. Wales had the worst year of the four nations, with seven of its eight universities losing international fee income. Alongside Swansea, South Wales fell 25.0%, Bangor 23.4%, Cardiff Metropolitan 16.6%, Wrexham 14.2%, Cardiff 13.9% and Aberystwyth 10.2%, and only Wales Trinity Saint David rose. Wales's regulator, Medr, reported on the same year in March 2026. The eight universities forecast international fee income to grow 18.7% between 2024/25 and 2027/28 with 1.4% fewer international students, and Medr described their income forecasts as "intentionally cautious" (source). Across the UK, 48 of the 146 lost more than 10% of their international fee income in one year, and 21 lost more than 20%.

The universities that gained are also the ones that depend most on international fees. At each of the six, international students paid between 59% and 78% of all tuition fee income in 2024/25. Among the 80 that fell, only 20 were above 50%. The sector's eggs are moving into fewer, more international baskets. The fuller test of dependence is the share of total income, which counts research, grants and everything else a university earns, and Issue 4 ran it on the same HESA year in May. On that measure 22 UK institutions took more than half of their total income from overseas tuition in 2024/25, and 34 took more than 40% (source). A fall in international fee income lands hardest on those institutions. A university with a broad income base can carry the same fall far more easily.

Some universities are already looking for income that does not depend on a visa. Oxford Brookes published a tender notice on Friday 2 October for an online programme partner worth up to £5 million, to "mitigate the risk of potential future restrictions on international students studying in the UK" (source).

Student numbers tell a different story from fee income. HESA's student table for the same providers counts 657,500 international students at the 146 in 2024/25, 5.6% fewer than in 2023/24, in a year when their international fee income rose 1.2% (source). Fee income per international student rose from about £17,400 to about £18,700. Of the 66 whose fee income rose, 32 had fewer international students than in 2023/24, among them Manchester, Oxford, Edinburgh and Cambridge, so at those universities the rise came from higher fees rather than more students. The six largest gainers had 5.4% more international students between them and 17.0% more fee income. At the 80 where fee income fell, international student numbers fell 14.1%, and 66 of them lost students and fee income together.

Scotland shows what these figures look like when a regulator puts them next to its universities' forecasts. The Scottish Funding Council published its report on university finances on Thursday 1 October. It covers 17 universities and their forecasts to 2027/28. Ten of them reported an adjusted operating deficit in 2024/25, up from nine in 2023/24. Ten expect a deficit in 2026/27 and eight in 2027/28, and the report says that last number "may increase in 2027-28 due to the currently optimistic international student tuition fee income forecasts" (source).

The forecasts depend on one line. Sector income is planned to rise from £5.11 billion in 2024/25 to £5.24 billion in 2027/28, an increase of £122 million, and international fee income from £1.39 billion to £1.49 billion, an increase of £102 million. So 84% of the growth Scotland's universities are planning on is international fees. The SFC says the projections "may need to be further adjusted following the autumn 2026 student recruitment cycle", that seven universities already forecast a fall in 2025/26, and that a suspended sponsor licence "could cause an immediate stop to all international student recruitment". It published that warning the day after the Home Office suspended one.

The last actual year looked different. Scotland's international fee income rose by £64 million in 2024/25, to the £1.39 billion the SFC uses, but three universities added more than the whole rise between them. Glasgow added £61.4 million, Edinburgh £25.5 million and St Andrews £12.4 million, £99 million in all. Seven of the other 14 lost international income in the same year, and five of those seven are among the ten in deficit.

The 12 Scottish institutions with more than £20 million of international fee income in 2024/25, ranked by income. The adjusted operating surplus or deficit is the SFC's measure, the operating result adjusted for pension provision movements and staff restructuring costs. Source: HESA Finance Table 6 (EU plus non-EU fees) and SFC Annex A, 2024/25. Dundee is excluded from both.

2024/25 is the year the forecasts were built on. The OfS said in May that providers' projections "continue to be overly optimistic" (source), and the English providers' own forecasts, which Issue 14 set out, add up to 22.5% more international students by 2028/29 (source). The SFC said the same about Scotland on 1 October in its own words. Both forecasts assume the sector grows. The 2024/25 returns show growth at fewer than half of the institutions, half of it at six, and falls at more than half. The two regulators give different reasons, and both apply across the UK. The OfS points to forecasts that have overshot before. The SFC says Scotland's sector average "is skewed by the financial results of the four ancient universities". A sector growth rate is the wrong number to plan with when half the growth is at six institutions and more than half of the institutions are going the other way. The regulators' word for that is optimistic, and on this evidence it is the right word.

Things to think about this week

Regulators in England and Scotland have both used the word optimistic about the sector's international fee forecasts. The 2024/25 returns show what the word means institution by institution, with growth at six, falls at 80, and fewer students at two in three.

The table in this issue is the one to test this year's forecast against. If your university was one of the 80, the recovery plan needs to start from your own 2024/25 figures rather than from a sector growth rate. If it was one of the 66, it is worth knowing how much of the rise came from higher fees rather than more students before the forecast counts on it again.

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