Degrees Taught in English Outside the English Speaking World

Where "English speaking" undersells the options

The UK, the US, Canada, Australia, Ireland and New Zealand are not the only places to study a full degree in English. This site holds verified records for eighteen other countries where at least some universities teach in English, and the shape of that offer differs sharply by country. Some teach almost everything in English. Some teach the bachelor's degree in the national language and the master's in English. Some run English as one track inside a much larger national-language system. What follows uses this site's own university and country records, not a general impression of where English is said to be common.

Where English is the default, not the exception

A handful of destinations run most or all of their university system in English regardless of level. Hong Kong is the clearest case: teaching at all eight government-funded universities is conducted in English, a structure adopted in its 2012 shift to four-year degrees, with IELTS Academic typically 6.0 to 6.5 or TOEFL iBT 79 to 93 asked of applicants whose own schooling was not in English (studyinhongkong.edu.hk; admissions.hku.hk). Singapore works the same way at the three universities this site holds full records for: the National University of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University and the Singapore University of Technology and Design all teach in English, with NUS asking IELTS 6.5 with 6.5 in reading and writing, NTU accepting 6.0 overall, and SUTD reviewing scores holistically with no published cutoff (nus.edu.sg; ntu.edu.sg). Malaysia splits by institution type: public universities teach mainly in Malay with English-medium options in science, engineering, medicine and business, while private universities and foreign branch campuses, among them Multimedia University, Taylor's University and the Malaysian campuses of Curtin, Heriot-Watt, Nottingham, Swinburne and Xiamen, teach almost entirely in English (educationmalaysia.gov.my).

Bachelor's in the national language, master's in English

In several European countries the level matters more than the country does. Switzerland states this most plainly: bachelor's degrees are almost never taught in English, and both federal institutes of technology keep their own bachelor's teaching in French, at EPFL, or German, at ETH Zurich, while teaching most of their master's programmes in English, a pattern a growing number of cantonal universities are following in the sciences, engineering, economics and international affairs (uzh.ch). Denmark is close behind: the great majority of programmes open to a non-Danish speaker sit at master's level, taught in English, with a smaller set of English-taught bachelor's programmes in engineering, business, IT and international studies. A 2021 political agreement then cut the number of English-taught places nationally, and some institutions, including the Danish college UCL University College (unrelated to London's UCL), now state on their own sites that they no longer admit international students to full degrees at all, so a specific programme is worth checking before relying on it (ufm.dk). Sweden follows a similar shape: almost all master's programmes and a smaller number of bachelor's programmes are taught fully in English, and Swedish itself is not required to study one (universityadmissions.se). France concentrates its English-taught option at master's level and inside the grandes ecoles, the separately admitting engineering, business and political science schools; general French universities teach overwhelmingly in French. The Netherlands is the exception here rather than an example of the pattern: most programmes aimed at international students are taught fully in English at both bachelor's and master's level, alongside separate Dutch-taught programmes at the same institution, with the language stated on every programme page (studyinnl.org).

English as one track inside a larger national system

Germany and Austria sit between the two patterns above. Many bachelor's programmes there are taught in German and ask for a recognised German certificate, while a growing number of bachelor's programmes and most international master's programmes are taught fully in English and ask for IELTS or TOEFL instead, at a level ranging from B2 to C1 depending on subject and set programme by programme, not university-wide (tum.de; studieren.univie.ac.at). China, Japan and South Korea run English-taught tracks as a distinct, separately admitting option alongside a much larger national-language system. Chinese universities teach most bachelor's degrees in Mandarin and expect an HSK certificate, but a growing number, concentrated in economics, engineering, medicine and international relations, run English-taught bachelor's degrees instead and ask for IELTS or TOEFL in place of HSK; graduate study works the same way, Chinese-taught programmes wanting a higher HSK level and English-taught ones setting their own floor (gc.sjtu.edu.cn). Japanese national universities increasingly run dedicated English-taught bachelor's programmes, often styled Global 30 or an international college, admitting once a year in September or October rather than on the mainstream April intake; several, including Kyoto University's iUP, publish no fixed minimum score and instead describe the typical range achieved by admitted students (admissions.g30.nagoya-u.ac.jp). South Korea runs comparable English-medium tracks inside otherwise Korean-taught universities with no nationwide minimum; this site's own sample found stated floors from TOEFL iBT 71 to 100 and IELTS 5.5 to 7.0, and some tracks accept the Korean-language TOPIK test as an alternative instead (admission.kaist.ac.kr). Italy and Spain describe close to the same pattern: a growing number of programmes, concentrated in business, engineering, economics and international studies, are taught entirely in English, while most stay in the national language, generally asking for a B2-level certificate such as IELTS 5.5 to 6.5 or TOEFL iBT 72 to 94 where a fixed figure is published at all (unipd.it; uam.es).

Poland's floor is a law, not a habit

Poland is the one country here with a genuine national minimum rather than a patchwork of institutional choices. A Ministry of Science and Higher Education regulation of 30 July 2025, in force from 1 August 2025, sets the minimum accepted proof of B2-level language proficiency for a non-EU applicant to any Polish institution at IELTS 5.5, TOEFL iBT 72, PTE Academic 59 or an equivalent Cambridge, Trinity, TOEIC, LanguageCert or telc certificate, and no university may accept less, though individual universities and medicine programmes commonly set a higher bar, up to C1 (umk.pl).

Turkey: English at both state and foundation universities, and a fallback year

Many Turkish programmes, particularly in engineering, business and medicine, are taught in English at both state universities and the privately run, non-profit foundation (vakif) universities, with the English or Turkish teaching mix set inside a framework the Council of Higher Education lays down and each university's own rules layered on top. A student who does not clear the English requirement is not usually refused outright; Turkish universities typically place that student in a one-year English preparatory programme before the degree itself begins.

Where a university runs its own English exam instead of IELTS

Several universities in this dataset accept, or require, a test they administer themselves rather than IELTS or TOEFL. Three Turkish universities do this explicitly. Bilkent University lets an applicant sit its own Proficiency in Academic English exam after arrival instead of submitting an external score (bilkent.edu.tr). Bogazici University runs the Bogazici University English Proficiency Test, generally taken after arrival, for anyone without an accepted external score (bogazici.edu.tr). Middle East Technical University does not require English proficiency to apply at all; it instead tests every admitted student who lacks an accepted score with the METU English Proficiency Exam at registration, where 60 is the pass mark for every undergraduate programme except two (metu.edu.tr). In Malaysia, the International Islamic University Malaysia runs its own English Placement Test for applicants who cannot sit IELTS or TOEFL (iium.edu.my), and Multimedia University places students who fall short of its IELTS floor into its own English Proficiency Programme instead of turning them away (mmu.edu.my). The University of Siena in Italy offers a university-run English proficiency interview, for a EUR 30 fee, to any applicant without a recognised certificate (unisi.it), and the Universidad Politecnica de Madrid in Spain runs its own internal SAI exam, held twice a year, as an alternative to IELTS 5.5 or TOEFL iBT 72 (upm.es). In each case the in-house route exists for applicants who have not taken, or could not pass, an external test, not as the primary path.

Where this site's data runs thin

Two gaps are worth naming rather than smoothing over. France's English-taught landscape is real but this site can currently confirm a university-wide test figure for only one institution, Ecole Polytechnique, at IELTS 6.5 or TOEFL iBT 90 (programmes.polytechnique.edu); other French universities, including Sorbonne University, publish English-taught master's programmes without a common score, so a specific programme page is the only reliable check there. Bangladesh sits outside the usual shape of this guide, since studying there is not studying abroad for most readers, but its own private universities do teach in English; the one figure this dataset confirms is North South University's IELTS 6.0 or TOEFL iBT 72 for applicants whose prior schooling was not in English (admissions.northsouth.edu), and that single record should not be read as a sector-wide norm. A country's dominant teaching language is not the same claim as which programmes teach in English; that detail sits with the individual university, which is why this guide names universities rather than only countries wherever the record allows it.