Foreign Universities in India 2026: Full List, Fees and Courses

Latest Updates on Foreign Universities in India

August 2026 is the busiest month yet for foreign campuses in India. Three campuses are running classes, UNSW Bengaluru starts on August 10, and four more open by the end of September.

• August 10, 2026: UNSW Bengaluru begins classes at Embassy Manyata Business Park with around 200 students, offering Business, Computer Science and Data Science at UG level and Cyber Security at PG level.
• August 3, 2026: The Lok Sabha was told the UGC has issued 16 Letters of Intent to 15 foreign institutions and five Letters of Approval. The Ministry confirmed these degrees are equivalent to Indian degree.
• Applications open now: Liverpool Bengaluru and Bristol Mumbai have waived the INR 2,000 application fee until August 17. University of York Mumbai is taking applications for its 2026 intake, and Victoria University Gurugram is open for August 2026 with a INR 3 lakh first-year tuition waiver.
• September openings: Bristol Mumbai (up to 250 students at Cignus Powai), University of York Mumbai, Illinois Tech at Navi Mumbai, and Queen's University Belfast at GIFT City.

Also Check: Indian Universities Abroad

What Are Foreign Universities in India?

Foreign universities in India are wholly owned branch campuses of international universities, not tie-ups with Indian colleges. They admit students directly, set their own fees and award the parent university's own degree.

• These are not affiliated colleges, not online programs and not joint degrees with Indian institutions.
• They are standalone branch campuses that operate under the academic standards of the parent university.
• The degree you receive from a foreign university campus in India is awarded by the parent university, not by an Indian institution.

A student graduating from the University of Southampton Gurugram receives a University of Southampton degree. A student graduating from Deakin University GIFT City receives a Deakin University degree. The academic content, curriculum and assessment standards are aligned with the parent campus.

These campuses do not all operate under the same law, and most coverage gets this wrong. Campuses at GIFT City in Gujarat are registered under the IFSCA Regulations 2022. Campuses everywhere else in India operate under the UGC Regulations 2023. Deakin, Wollongong and Coventry are GIFT City IFSCA campuses. Southampton Gurugram was the first campus approved under the UGC mainland route, and every campus opening in 2026 and 2027 follows that same route.

Explore all study abroad options for Indian students

UGC 2023 Regulations: What Changed and Who Qualifies

Before November 2023, no foreign university could run its own campus in India. International universities could only enter through partnerships with Indian institutions: twinning programmes, joint degrees or franchise arrangements. The UGC Regulations 2023, published on November 8 and 9, 2023, created the first legal pathway for wholly owned foreign campuses.

A Facilitation Committee for Foreign Higher Educational Institutions was constituted on December 16, 2025 to help universities complete campus setup after the Letter of Intent is handed over.

Not every campus runs under the UGC route. GIFT City campuses are registered under the separate IFSCA Regulations 2022, which is why Deakin, Wollongong and Coventry appear on approval lists but not among the UGC's five Letters of Approval. GIFT City was designated as India's first special zone for foreign campuses, with tax benefits and lighter regulatory requirements. Deakin opened there in July 2024 as India's first international branch campus. Southampton Gurugram opened in August 2025 as the first under the UGC route.

Check: Top Universities to Study Abroad for Indian Students

Operational vs Approved vs Announced

Only three campuses are teaching today. Headlines counting "20 foreign universities in India" merge four very different statuses into one figure. Here is the breakdown as of August 2026.

A Letter of Intent is permission to build, not permission to teach. Universities have roughly 18 months from the LoI to complete infrastructure and regulatory requirements before a Letter of Approval is issued, so an LoI announced today typically means a campus two academic years out. If a university has no published fee structure and no live application portal, it is not admitting students this year, regardless of how its approval is described.

Complete List of Foreign Universities in India 2026

Every foreign university that is operational or holds a formal UGC approval or Letter of Intent as of August 2026, sorted by opening date.

Twelve of these twenty campuses will be teaching by the end of September 2026, up from three today. UNSW Bengaluru is the highest-ranked foreign university with an India campus at #19 in QS 2027. Mumbai has the largest cluster with five campuses, and three of them sit in the same Powai corridor: Bristol, York and Aberdeen, all within reach of IIT Bombay.

One date to watch: Western Sydney's Greater Noida campus was announced for August 2026, but the university's own site now says it will welcome students in 2027. Most coverage still lists it as a 2026 opening.

Foreign Universities Already Operational in India

Three foreign universities are currently running classes in India. Two are at GIFT City in Gujarat and one is in Gurugram. UNSW Bengaluru joins them on August 10, 2026. Fees below are from official university sources.

Deakin University — GIFT City, Gujarat

Deakin was the first international university to open a campus in India. Its GIFT City campus is located in Gandhinagar, Gujarat — approximately 30 minutes from Ahmedabad airport — within India's first International Financial Services Centre.

Deakin is ranked in the global top 210 and rated #1 in Australia for international student satisfaction. Its GIFT City programmes are accredited by the Australian Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA) and the Australian Computer Society (ACS), so standards match Deakin's Australian campuses.

Fee rate is AUD 2,475 per credit point across a 16 credit point programme. Converted at 1 AUD = INR 66.74 as of August 4, 2026.

Both degrees are India-exclusive. Neither is available to international students onshore in Australia or through Deakin Online — GIFT City delivery is on-campus only. Applications are open for the July 2026 intake with limited places.

Industry partners include HSBC, KPMG, National Australia Bank, Aditya Birla Group, Bank of America and Ernst and Young. Students also have access to immersion programmes at Deakin's Australian campuses.

University of Wollongong (UOW) — GIFT City, Gujarat

Wollongong was the second foreign university to open at GIFT City, inaugurating in November 2024. UOW sits in the top 1% of universities worldwide and ranks #16 among the world's best young universities. It is also top 200 globally for Accounting and Finance and top 300 for Computer Science and Information Systems in the QS World University Rankings by Subject 2024.

UOW offers a wider range of programmes than Deakin, including undergraduate options. A five-day Dubai fintech immersion is built into the curriculum.

Converted at 1 AUD = INR 66.74 as of August 4, 2026. Fees are payable in Australian dollars.

The 18-month Master of Financial Technology began on 3 August 2026, with applications having closed on 31 July. Check the official site for the next intake.

University of Southampton — Gurugram

Southampton Gurugram is the first UK university with a fully functional campus in India and the first approved under the UGC mainland route. It enrolled its first cohort of around 170 students in August 2025. Southampton is ranked in the global top 100.

Teaching is in English and content matches the UK campus. Undergraduate programmes run 3 years and postgraduate 1 year, the same as the UK. The campus, at International Tech Park Gurgaon near Sector 59, has a Financial Laboratory with Bloomberg Terminals.

Explore University of Southampton courses and fees

Foreign University Campuses Accepting Applications Now

Four campuses are taking applications for their first intake. Everything else on the list above is still building.

Four more are taking expressions of interest ahead of formal applications: University of Aberdeen (Mumbai, September 2026), University of Western Australia (Mumbai September 2026, Chennai March 2027), Illinois Institute of Technology (Navi Mumbai, September 2026) and Western Sydney University (Greater Noida, 2027).

Liverpool Bengaluru is the most advanced of the openings. Groundbreaking took place at Alembic City, Whitefield in December 2025, and the first cohort joins in August 2026 across six undergraduate and two postgraduate programmes: Computer Science, Computer Science with Software Development, Accounting and Finance, Biomedical Sciences, Business Management and Game Design.

• Tuition is INR 11,50,000 a year for domestic students and INR 13,00,000 for international students, so INR 34.5 lakh for the full three years.
• A one-time admission fee of INR 50,000 and a security deposit of INR 50,000 apply, both refundable under UGC guidelines.
• Payment runs 20% on offer acceptance (fully refundable if you withdraw), 30% before semester one in July to September 2026, and 50% before semester two in January to February 2027.
• The INR 2,000 application fee is waived until 17 August 2026. The standard fee is INR 5,000.
• The university is targeting 5,000 students within five years and 10,000 within ten.

Read More: University of Western Australia launches its Mumbai and Chennai campuses

Fees at Foreign University Campuses in India

Fees at foreign campuses in India run from around INR 11.5 lakh to INR 17.6 lakh a year. Each university sets its own and there is no government cap. Figures below are total programme cost, so they compare directly.

AUD figures converted at 1 AUD = INR 66.74 as of August 4, 2026.

The cheapest full degree is Liverpool Bengaluru's MSc at INR 15 lakh. The most expensive is Southampton's three-year undergraduate at INR 39.6 lakh. Two campuses charge a higher international tier: Liverpool at INR 13 lakh a year against INR 11.5 lakh, and Southampton at INR 15.4 lakh against INR 13.2 lakh.

Against the parent campus, tuition is broadly a third to a half of the cost, though the gap varies sharply by level. A three-year undergraduate degree at Southampton in the UK runs to roughly INR 85 lakh to 1.15 crore for international students, against INR 39.6 lakh in Gurugram. A one-year master's is a much narrower gap: roughly INR 24 to 42 lakh in the UK against INR 16 to 23 lakh in India. Undergraduate study is where the India campus saves you the most.

Budget beyond tuition. Add roughly INR 8 to 15 lakh a year for living costs in India, against INR 15 to 25 lakh abroad. Liverpool also charges a one-time admission fee of INR 50,000 and a security deposit of INR 50,000, both refundable.

The saving is real, but it is not the full picture. Studying abroad also buys a student visa, the right to work part-time up to 20 hours a week in the UK and Australia, post-study work visa eligibility and the international campus experience. None of that comes with an India campus.