Sun Yat-sen University

Founded in 1924 by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the university is one of China’s best-known comprehensive public institutions and celebrates a century of development in 2024. It is rooted in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and operates five campuses across Guangzhou, Zhuhai, and Shenzhen, together with ten affiliated hospitals. The university describes itself as comprehensive, research-driven, and internationally oriented. SYSU reports 69 schools and departments, 34,168 undergraduates, 36,968 graduate students, and 507 international students, alongside 74 countries represented among the international student body. Its academic portfolio spans humanities, sciences, medicine, engineering, agriculture, and the arts. Eleven disciplines have been selected for China’s second round of the Double First-Class initiative, 21 disciplines are in the global top 1% of Essential Science Indicators, and 13 are in the global top 0.1%. SYSU also reports 129 undergraduate majors, 69 master’s disciplines, 47 doctoral disciplines, 88 post-doctoral research centers, 10,527 exchange student programs, and 10 full-time faculty and staff members per the facts page. The university highlights 21 members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering, as well as 58 national awards and 227 provincial awards in research. Its international student intake includes undergraduate, master’s, doctoral, and pre-university pathways, with many programs taught in Chinese and some master’s and doctoral offerings taught in English. Scholarship support includes Chinese Government Scholarship routes, SYSU scholarships, Guangdong provincial awards, and other named programs for degree-seeking international students.