New foreign enrollment at US universities fell 20% this past spring from a year earlier, according to a survey of 149 institutions co-published by NAFSA, the association of international educators. Graduate programs did worse, down 24% on average. That slide began well before spring. In August 2025, the month when most students arrive, international student travel to the US was down 19% from the year before. That figure includes returning students.
The instinctive reading is a transfer of wealth: America’s loss, Asia’s gain. There’s evidence for it. Some 82% of surveyed Asia-Pacific institutions outside Australia reported growing international undergraduate numbers, against 47% in Europe.