University: some non-European foreigners students will pay more from the start of the 2026 academic year

Since April 2019, differentiated tuition fees have been introduced for non-French students enrolled in a higher education institution to obtain a national bachelor's or master's degree. This means that foreigners students have to pay a different amount of tuition fees than French nationals.

As part of the Launch of the « Choose France for Higher Education » plan, which aims to increase France's attractiveness, the Ministry of Higher Education and Research said that currently « institutions apply differentiated rights in a very variable way ». The board of directors of each institution has the possibility of defining criteria for exemption from differentiated duties, which are in addition to the criteria laid down in the national framework.

A decree of 19 May 2026 restricts the possibilities of exemption from differentiated registration fees.

It is now planned thatin the long term, each university will be able to exempt from these registration fees up to 20% of the foreigner students enrolled in the institution. Certain foreigners students are excluded from this limit, for example those covered by an agreement with a foreigners institution granting an exemption from registration fees to French students. The maximum level of foreigner students that can be exempted from tuition fees by a university is set at 30% for the 2026-2027 academic year, and to 25% for the 2027-2028 academic year.

Exemption from registration fees may be total or partial.

What amounts for the registration fees of foreigner students?

For the academic year 2026-2027, differentiated tuition fees are:

• €2,902 per year for a license or a national diploma awarded during studies leading to the degree of bachelor (compared to €178 for other students);
• 3 950 € per year for a master or a national diploma awarded during studies leading to the master's degree (compared to €255 for other students).

As part of the « Choose France for Higher Education » plan, the Ministry of Higher Education and Research stated that the amounts of differentiated training costs represent « less than one third of the actual cost of training, the rest being borne by the State ».

Foreigner students who have been granted an exemption from tuition fees for the 2025-2026 academic year will continue to benefit from this exemption until the end of the university cycle in which they are enrolled (bachelor's or master's degree). In order to continue to benefit from this, they must continue a « corresponding » training at the institution that granted them this exemption.

In addition, students who obtained an exemption from tuition fees for the 2026-2027 academic year before the date of entry into force of the decree (May 21, 2026) retain the benefit.