Getting an Australian student visa is becoming difficult for Indians
What's the story
Australia has drastically cut down on student visa approvals, with a 75% decline in grants to Indian applicants in June 2026 from the previous year. The data was revealed by Times Higher Education based on statistics from the Department of Home Affairs. The overall higher education visa approvals also fell by 16% in 2025-26 despite applications staying above pre-pandemic levels.
Application drop
Around 3% drop in offshore student visa applications
The financial year also witnessed a 3% drop in offshore student visa applications.
This decline was mainly due to a 26% fall in applications from China, Australia's top source of international students.
Other countries like India, Vietnam, and Sri Lanka also contributed to this decline with smaller decreases in their application numbers.
Rising demand
Nepal, Bangladesh see increase in demand
Interestingly, Nepal and Bangladesh were the only major source markets to see an increase in demand.
Applications from these countries rose by 58% and 37%, respectively.
However, despite this increase, visa approvals still fell across all six of Australia's biggest student source countries as per the Times Higher Education's report.
Approval rates
Significant drop in visa grants
The most significant drop in visa grants came in June 2026 when Australia issued less than half as many offshore higher education visas as it did a year ago.
Visa grants to Indian applicants fell by 75% year-on-year during this period.
Approvals for Bangladesh and Nepal also witnessed a sharp decline of 89% and 94%, respectively, indicating that authorities are slowing processing and rejecting more applications from South Asian countries.