The 2025-26 academic year in figures

The student population continues to grow: the 2025-26 academic year sees a total of 4,750 students enrolled in Bachelor's, Master's, PhD and continuing education programmes, an increase of 214 enrolments compared to the previous academic year. USI's commitment to competitive research is also confirmed, with approximately £33.5 million in funding secured by researchers across the Lugano, Mendrisio, and Bellinzona campuses.

4,750 students

The total number of students enrolled at USI is 4,750: 2,078 in Bachelor's programmes, 1,977 in Master's programmes, 616 doctoral students, and 79 enrolled in continuing education (at least 60 ECTS).

The faculty with the most students is Economics with 1,258 enrolled, followed by Communication, Culture and Society (1,058), the Academy of Architecture (844), Informatics (660), Biomedical Sciences (490) and Theology (440).

The origins remain unchanged compared to the previous academic year: 21% come from the Canton of Ticino, 10% from the rest of Switzerland, 49% from Italy, and 20% from other countries. Focusing the analysis on the origin of new students (in the first year of Bachelor's and Master's programmes), there has been an increase in the percentage of students from Ticino and other Swiss cantons compared with the previous academic year.

Competitive research funding

Once again this year, USI has confirmed its profile as a research-intensive university.

Competitive research refers to research funded through grants awarded on a competitive basis by bodies such as the European Union, the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), which this year also funded European replacement schemes, the Swiss Innovation Promotion Agency - Innosuisse, swissuniversities, and private foundations.

The total amount obtained by USI for 2025 is approximately CHF 33.3 million, of which approximately CHF 23.8 million comes from the SNSF, CHF 3.7 million from SERI for participation in European collaborative projects, CHF 529,000 from swissuniversities, CHF 554,000 from Innosuisse and CHF 4.6 million from other entities.

The data, expressed as annualised amounts, should be contextualised taking into account certain recent developments, such as the slowdown in acquisitions, changes in SNSF success rates and the prospect of possible reductions in federal research funding.

Quality and impact in research

The 2025 edition of the Stanford/Elsevier World's Top 2% Scientists Network ranking, based on Scopus data and available on the topscinet.com platform, highlights the strong presence of researchers from USI and its affiliated and joint institutes (USI-SUPSI, USI-EOC). Nearly 100 researchers appear on this ranking, which lists the world's most influential researchers based on citation and impact metrics.