First year entrants onto undergraduate and postgraduate degrees

Published 8 August 2023

Contents

1. Main facts and figures

• in the 5 academic years ending in July 2022, the percentage of people starting undergraduate study who were white went down from 74.2% to 71.5%
• the percentage of people starting undergraduate study who were Asian went up from 11.3% to 12.9% – the biggest increase out of all ethnic groups
• the number of people starting undergraduate study went up in every ethnic group
• 70.4% of people starting postgraduate study in the 2021 to 2022 academic year were white – 10.2% were Asian, 6.6% were black, 3.7% had mixed ethnicity, and 2.0% were from the ‘other’ ethnic group
• the percentage of people starting postgraduate study who were white went down from 77.2% to 70.4% in the 5 academic years ending in July 2022
• in the 5 academic years to July 2022, the number of entrants from each of the white, Asian, black, mixed and ‘other’ ethnic groups was highest in the 2020 to 2021 academic year

2. Things you need to know

What the data measures

The data measures the number of students who started full-time and part-time undergraduate and postgraduate study in the UK, by ethnicity.

Undergraduate study is mainly bachelor’s degrees, such as a Bachelor of Arts (BA) and Bachelor of Science (BSc). Students must be on courses that lead to the award of a qualification or higher education credit.

Postgraduate study is mainly master’s degrees, such as a Master of Arts (MA) and Master of Science (MSc).

The student’s first year of study does not have to be the first year of an undergraduate or postgraduate programme. For example, the data includes students joining the second year of a part-time postgraduate course.

The data only includes students whose normal residence before starting their study was in the UK, Guernsey and Jersey (including their smaller islands) and the Isle of Man.

Student numbers are rounded to the nearest 5. Percentages are rounded to 1 decimal place, and have been calculated using unrounded student numbers.

Not included in the data

Students from outside the UK are not asked to report their ethnicity and are not included.

The ethnic groups used in the data

Data is shown for 5 aggregated ethnic groups:

• Asian
• black
• mixed
• white
• other

This means figures are shown for these groups as a whole.

Students record their own ethnicity, either when they apply for a course or when they register with a higher education provider.

The percentages are based only on students whose ethnicity was known (98% of first year undergraduate entrants and 97% of postgraduates in the 2020 to 2021 academic year).

Methodology

Read the detailed methodology document for the data on this page.

In the data file

See Download the data for data from 2002 to 2019 (5 years combined) and for weighted and unweighted sample sizes.

3. By ethnicity over time (first year undergraduate entrants)

• Location: England and Wales
• Time period: August 2015 to July 2022
• Source: Who's studying in HE?

Percentage and number of first year entrants on undergraduate study by ethnicity

	Asian		Black		Mixed		White		Other
Year	Asian %	Asian Number	Black %	Black Number	Mixed %	Mixed Number	White %	White Number	Other %	Other Number
2015/16	10.5	61,545	8.2	48,335	3.8	22,125	76.0	446,040	1.5	8,715
2016/17	11.0	63,540	8.5	49,140	4.0	22,925	75.0	434,580	1.6	9,290
2017/18	11.3	65,305	8.6	49,835	4.1	23,555	74.2	428,385	1.8	10,340
2018/19	11.5	66,625	8.5	49,285	4.2	24,455	73.9	426,915	1.8	10,170
2019/20	12.2	70,690	8.7	50,670	4.5	25,860	72.6	422,030	2.0	11,640
2020/21	12.2	77,155	8.3	52,865	4.5	28,760	72.9	461,475	2.0	12,975
2021/22	12.9	81,770	8.5	53,735	4.8	30,230	71.5	452,490	2.3	14,790

Download table data (CSV) Source data (CSV)

4. By ethnicity over time (first year postgraduate entrants)

• Location: England and Wales
• Time period: August 2015 to July 2022
• Source: Who's studying in HE?

Percentage and number of first year entrants on postgraduate study by ethnicity

	Asian		Black		Mixed		White		Other
Year	Asian %	Asian Number	Black %	Black Number	Mixed %	Mixed Number	White %	White Number	Other %	Other Number
2015/16	9.4	17,095	6.1	11,065	3.1	5,585	79.8	144,570	1.6	2,940
2016/17	9.5	19,755	7.8	16,185	3.3	6,830	77.7	161,835	1.7	3,585
2017/18	10.1	21,780	7.4	16,090	3.4	7,405	77.2	167,050	1.8	3,965
2018/19	10.4	22,910	7.3	16,035	3.6	7,940	76.8	168,980	1.9	4,255
2019/20	10.8	23,800	7.4	16,455	3.7	8,230	76.1	168,245	2.0	4,480
2020/21	10.6	28,880	7.3	19,895	3.8	10,390	76.1	206,420	2.1	5,605
2021/22	10.2	27,770	6.6	17,965	3.7	10,090	70.4	191,025	2.0	5,390

Download table data (CSV) Source data (CSV)

5. Data sources

Source

Who's studying in HE?

Type of data

Administrative data

Type of statistic

National Statistics

Publisher

Higher Education Statistics Agency

Publication frequency

Yearly

Purpose of data source

Student information collected by the Higher Education Statistics Agency is used for:

• funding
• performance indicators
• publications (including UNISTATS)
• league tables

The student record includes:

• their entry profile and personal characteristics
• module and course-level data
• funding information
• their qualifications

6. Download the data

First year entrants on postgraduate study - Spreadsheet (csv) 3 KB

This file contains the following: Measure Time Time_type Ethnicity Ethnicity_type Value (% of first year enrolments on postgraduate study) Numerator Denominator

First year entrants on undergraduate study - Spreadsheet (csv) 3 KB

This file contains the following: Measure Time Time_type Ethnicity Ethnicity_type Value (% of first year enrolments on undergraduate study) Numerator Denominator

Publication release date: 8 August 2023

full page history

1. 8 August 2023 First published

From: Higher Education Statistics Agency

This page replaces 2 older pages:

1. First year entrants onto postgraduate study
2. First year entrants onto undergraduate study

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