How are Australian universities approaching international recruitment in 2026?

Studymove founder Keri Ramirez recently presented a webinar anticipating trends in the Australian international education sector in 2026 based on student applications and visa issuance volumes, the global competitive context, and the national policy landscape.

Mr Ramirez sees 2026 shaping up to be a relatively stable year for Australian educators given an expectation that no major policy adjustments are upcoming. Recruitment efforts will be strengthened by North American competitors’ very challenging circumstances, but they will also be also more costly in the past because of the extra resources needed to stay compliant with regulations.

The national and geopolitical factors at play

The national recruitment context is a tighter policy environment governing the intake of international students; higher financial requirements and visa application fees; and more governmental scrutiny of institutions, agents, and students.

At the same time, colleges and universities in Canada are struggling amid a punishing policy landscape that includes the lowest ever cap on new international students, and US institutions are challenged by the anti-immigrant rhetoric and rules of their current president, Donald Trump.

The weaker competition from Canada and the US helped Australian higher education providers to avoid a devastating level of decline in international student commencements in 2025, which sets them up for a more positive 2026 than many of their North American counterparts can expect to have.

While students are submitting slightly fewer applications for study visas at the higher education level than in 2023, and while there was a -5.5% decrease in visa issuances in July to October 2025 compared with the same period in 2024, demand and visa grants have followed a mostly stable trendline since October 2024. In addition, the average number of days for visas to be granted also stabilised in 2025 after months of irregularity, with about 75% of higher education visas granted within 33 days. These trends suggest that Australian educators tasked with enrolment planning and management do have some predictable patterns with which to work in 2026.

Some stability, some unpredictability

Mr Ramirez believes that while Australian educators are not expecting to be surprised by any major policy twists this year, they are challenged by the unpredictability or timing of the way policies are implemented.

For example, there is still some confusion about why some visas are granted to students while others are not, suggesting a lack of transparency in this process.

There is the also the issue of the timing of New Overseas Student Commencements allocations (NOSCs). These are indicative limits given to educators for the number of new international students they should enrol in a specific year. Once an institution hits 80% of its total NOSC threshold, Australian immigration officials begin to slow down visa processing for additional applications, which acts as a curb on overambitious growth. These allocations were announced in November 2025. They are set at 295,000 for the entire sector for 2026, up modestly (+9%) from the level last year. More than half of NOSCs go to public universities.

The NOSC allocations can be stressful to manage for Australian educators. As Mr Ramirez says, “Even if you have a higher allocation, it doesn’t mean automatically that you’re going to get those students. There’s work to be done, you’ve got a pipeline of about 18 months, and there is pressure to get to your threshold of 80%. It is hard for educators to react quickly to their NOSC allocation … hopefully in the future the government will decide to do two-year allocations to enable more long-term planning.”

Ministry of Education data shows that the sector has already reached about half of total NOSC allocations for 2026.

Policy framework is increasing the cost of recruitment

Mr Ramirez says that the recruitment model is changing for many Australian schools and universities as a result of the current policy environment, and that unfortunately, this is a higher-cost model.

Previously, much of the recruitment effort went into attracting applications (the top of the enrolment funnel). By the time a new student was ready to enrol, the process was mostly automatic, requiring a CoE and deposit.

Now, in a stricter regulatory environment, the focus is on the lower (commencement) part of the funnel. Not only do institutions have to ensure applicants are a good fit for their school, but now they also have to ensure that the student will meet a much longer list of compliance requirements to get a visa. This requires additional staff and additional technologies, says Mr Ramirez.

Resources must also be allocated to ensuring conversions happen quickly and accurately because of the NOSC setup, especially for universities that have met or passed the 80% mark of applications. After 80%, institutions must rush to get admissions offers out to applicants as quickly as possible and to convert them, knowing that their visas are automatically going to be processed more slowly than those of students converted before the 80% threshold was met. Again, this increases recruitment costs because of the additional resources needed to ensure conversion timing and management.

How educators are adapting to the era of NOSCs

Mr Ramirez says the policy framework – including NOSC allocations and visa processing penalties for unfettered growth – has created a landscape where about half of Australian universities are growth constrained in terms of international enrolments and the other half have room to grow. This requires adaptation in recruitment practices for both groups, some of which Mr Ramirez believes will happen over time and some of which is already underway.

What is happening immediately, he said, is much more dynamism within the sector than in past years with regard to pricing. At the undergraduate level, there has been an average international student tuition fee increase of 6.3% between 2025 and 2026, compared to the average hike of 5.3% last year. At the graduate level, the average increase for 2026 is 6.5% compared to 5.3% last year.

These are the highest average fee increases Mr Ramirez has seen in the industry, and he believes it highlights the pressure Australian universities are encountering in their operations. What’s more, there is a huge range of pricing levels across the universities who provided their data for the analysis, with growth-potential institutions more likely to be implementing more significant fee increases.

The NOSC allocations are also playing a role in the increased use of scholarships in recruitment strategies. When a university reaches its 80% threshold of applications, the race is on to secure conversions as quickly as possible, and scholarships naturally help a prospective student accept an offer more easily and quickly than if this financial incentive were not offered.

Country-specific scholarships are on the rise, and in general, Mr Ramirez says many universities are being much more strategic with their scholarship programmes than in the past, targeting them carefully for maximum impact and cost management. For example, it is more common now for a university to offer multiple levels of scholarship depending on factors such as academic performance and country of origin.

The pros and cons of current Australian policy settings

Mr Ramirez’s presentation highlights that Australian educators are encountering more pressure than in the past with regard to resourcing their international recruitment and admissions functions. Recruitment success hinges more than ever on timing due to the way in which applications that happen after the 80% threshold move to a slower lane of visa processing. What’s more, the window of time with which universities can react to NOSC announcements is very small, making it difficult to use long-term planning models in enrolment management.

Australian institutions require more staff and technology now to enable the precise targeting of applicants not just for institutional fit but for visa compliance. A prospect who might well be a good fit for a university might not be as good a candidate for visa approval, and this potential mismatch adds an extra layer of difficulty into recruitment decisions.

At the same time, current policy settings are expected to remain in place throughout 2026, a welcome reprieve for an industry that has had to cope with so many new regulations and uncertainty over the past couple of years. The more stringent regulatory environment is encouraging more integrity and managed growth across the sector, which is good for the Australian education brand both at home and overseas. As Mr Ramirez says, it would be helpful to see some tweaks that would make it less costly for institutions to adjust their recruitment strategies to the regulatory framework. But overall, Australian universities may be in for a less challenging year in international recruitment than their North American counterparts.

For additional background, please see:

• “Australia passes integrity legislation; sharpens definition of agents and agent commissions”
• “Australia continues its path towards ‘managed growth’ of international student enrolments with Ministerial Direction 115”