Nigeria plummets fourth in UK’s international student market in 2025

Nigeria is fallen behind India, China, and Pakistan in the United Kingdom’s (UK) sponsored study visa issuances for international students in 2025.

The UK’s Home Office report states, “The largest drops were from India, Nigeria, and Bangladesh. China declined, but not nearly as much as other top markets, and it has returned to its position as the top source country for UK educators.

“The rise of alternative destinations in Asia and the Middle East may be drawing some students away from the UK, but the so-called dependants’ ban was the main drag on demand.”

Recent data indicate that international students’ visa applications and grants to study in the UK increased at the end of 2024 and into the first quarter of 2025, seeing many UK universities facing financial struggles due to declining foreign enrolments.

Sponsored study visa issuances for international students coming to the UK fell by 14 percent in 2024 compared with 2023, according to the International College of Economics and Finance (ICEF) report.

A total of 393,125 sponsored study visas were issued to main applicants (i.e., students) in 2024, a 14 percent drop compared with 2023. This percentage drop is very close to the 15 percent decline we predicted last year in an ICEF Insights article on dependants, which also noted that:

“The largest losses (if partial-year data trends were to hold] would be from non-European countries, including Nigeria and India, except that the impact on Chinese students would be minimal if we go by ‘dependant-to-main-applicant ratio’ trends. That ratio was 1.16 for Nigerian students compared to less than 0.01 for Chinese students.”

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The top 10 markets for the UK according to a study of visa issuances in 2024 are China with 102,940, India with 88,860, Pakistan with 35,045, Nigeria with 18,900, and the US with 15,275 applicants.

Others are Nepal with 12,235, Bangladesh with 6,400, Malaysia with 5,420, Hong Kong with 5,180, and Saudi Arabia with 4,875 applicants.

Nigeria and Pakistan switch spots, and Nepali demand remains strong. The drastic -55 percent drop-off from Nigeria, paired with a somewhat surprising 13 percent increase from Pakistan, means that Pakistan is now the UK’s number three student market, with Nigeria bumped to fourth.

This data confirms that the so-called dependants’ ban that went into effect in January 2024 has had a significant impact on student demand for the UK in top markets such as Nigeria, India, and Bangladesh.

“Since January 2024, most international students have not been allowed to bring their family with them while they study in the UK. The only exceptions are for students in research-oriented postgraduate programmes and those on government-sponsored scholarships,” the report indicates.

Before the ban, students in taught master’s programmes had been permitted to bring family with them, which was a key reason these programmes were so popular in emerging markets.

That popularity has waned since the launch of the dependants ban. As reported in Times Higher Education, the share of study visas for master’s programmes fell from 66 percent in 2023 to 61 percent in 2024.

The countries accounting for the most master’s visas are now, in order, India, China, and Pakistan. There was an 84 percent decrease in dependant applications for the year ending January 2025.

Sure enough, visas issued to Nigerian and Indian students declined by -55 percent and -26 percent, respectively, in 2024 versus 2023. Issuances for Chinese students, by contrast, fell by only -6 percent.

The far gentler softening of the Chinese market saw China regain its position as the top international student source country for UK educators, reversing a two-year trend in 2022 and 2023 where India had held that spot. India is now second, with 88,860 visa issuances compared with China’s 102,940 in 2024.