February 2016
International student numbers 2015
This snapshot provides an overview of the number of international students studying in Australia on a student visa in 2015. The department's monthly international student data records student 'enrolment' and 'commencement' numbers rather than actual student numbers. This approach avoids double counting students who follow study pathways, for example enrolling in English Language Intensive Courses for Overseas Students (ELICOS) and then a higher education course in the same year. However, at the completion of a calendar year, it is possible to reconcile enrolments data to calculate the number of students who studied in Australia over the year.
There were 498,155 international students studying on a student visa in Australia in 2015. This represents a 10.0 per cent increase over 2014 figures.
Students from China contributed 27.3 per cent of all international students in Australia, the highest of any nationality. India was second, contributing 10.8 per cent. Nationalities in the top ten countries (Table 2.) together contributed just over two thirds (66.2%) of total international student numbers. Of these top ten, seven countries had more students in the higher education sector than any other. The exceptions were the Republic of Korea, Thailand and Brazil which had larger share of students in vocational education and training (VET) than in higher education. Brazil had a larger proportion of students in ELICOS in 2015, the second highest student numbers in ELICOS sector after China.

Table 2 shows there were slightly more international male students to females at 52.5 per cent and 47.5 per cent respectively, across all nationalities in 2015. However, the gender distribution varied with student nationality. Seven out of ten (71.5%) students from India were male. In contrast, almost two in three (65.1%) students from Thailand were female.
The most common age range of international students in 2015 was between 20 and 24 years (43.0%) while 6.0 per cent were 35 years and over and 3.7 per cent were under 18 years. Students in the VET sector tended to be slightly older, where 33.3 per cent were aged 25 to 29 years. Students in the schools sector were commonly younger with 67.4 per cent under 18 years of age. Students in the higher education, ELICOS and non-award sectors were mostly aged between 20 and 24 years (50.9%, 40.4% and 64.1% respectively).
Table 2. International Student Numbers, 2015