University of Electronic Science and Technology of China — guide for international students

The University of Electronic Science and Technology of China (电子科技大学), widely known as UESTC or 成电 (Chengdian), was founded in 1956 as the Chengdu Institute of Radio Engineering (成都电讯工程学院). Its 2026 admission guidebook describes it as founded by merging the electrical departments of three leading Chinese engineering universities. It was named a national key university in 1960, designated one of seven national defence-industry institutions in 1961, and took its present name in 1988. It is a key university under the Ministry of Education, in the first batches of Project 211 and Project 985, and among the first universities in the national Double First-Class initiative.

UESTC has three campuses in Chengdu — Qingshuihe (No. 2006 Xiyuan Avenue, West Hi-Tech Zone), Shahe (No. 4, Section 2, North Jianshe Road) and Jiulidi (No. 8 West Jiulidi Road) — covering more than 3,700 mu (about 247 hectares) in total. The School of International Education is at Qingshuihe, which the new-student guidebook calls the “New Campus”; Shahe is the “Old Campus”. The university also runs a Yongning Park of the Qingshuihe campus, built with the Wenjiang District government, and the UESTC Glasgow Hainan College in the Lingshui Li’an International Education Innovation Pilot Zone in Hainan.

The university describes itself as covering the whole electronic-information family of disciplines, engineering-led, with science, management, humanities and medicine alongside. The university’s Chinese-language introduction (updated July 2026) counts more than 44,000 undergraduate, master’s and doctoral students, more than 3,800 faculty and staff including more than 800 professors, and a teaching force led by 11 academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering. It holds 23 first-level doctoral and 33 first-level master’s degree programs, and more than 1,000 long-term international students from over 100 countries and regions. The 2026 admission guidebook gives slightly different figures: “nearly 800 professors” rather than more than 800, and “around 1,000 international students”; QS’s profile lists 960 international students. None of these pages says which count is more recent.

UESTC admits international students to bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees, to a Chinese Pre-University Program, a Chinese Language Program and an Exchange Program. All applications go through the online system at admission.uestc.edu.cn and follow the same six steps set out in the 2026 guidebook: online submission, initial review, payment of the application fee, academic review, admission confirmation and visa application — so the RMB 420 fee is paid only once your file has passed the initial review. Degree study has an autumn intake only: the guidebook states that UESTC “does not provide Spring Semester Intake” for either undergraduate or graduate programs. The two degree levels close on very different dates: 1 March 2026 for master’s and Ph.D. applicants, 30 June 2026 for bachelor’s applicants. Bachelor’s applicants must also register for and take the China Scholastic Competency Assessment (CSCA) before the application deadline and obtain a valid score report, and meet the nationality rules of Ministry of Education Document Jiao Wai Han [2020] No. 12. One wording issue to be aware of: the English guidebook prints the graduate age limits as “≥35” and “≥40”, which reads as a minimum age; the Chinese edition of the same guidebook states 35岁以下 and 40岁以下 — under 35 for master’s and under 40 for doctoral applicants — which is the limit this guide uses. Confirm with the School of International Education if you are close to either age.

Degree programs

Select a degree level to see tuition, duration and entry requirements.

Non-degree programs

Documents to prepare

Application timeline

These are the dates University of Electronic Science and Technology of China published for the 2026 intake. That cycle has closed. Use them as a guide to when each step falls in the year, and check the official pages for the 2027 dates before you plan around them.

The 2026 guidebook groups UESTC’s scholarships into five headings: the Chinese Government Scholarship (with five channels), the Chengdu Government Scholarship (two schemes), the University Scholarship, the International Chinese Language Teachers Scholarship and the UESTC International Excellent PhD Program. What the guidebook does not do is state amounts or deadlines for any of them — its cost page prints tuition, not scholarship coverage — and the university’s individual English scholarship pages could not be read for this guide. So treat the coverage lines below as the scheme’s general terms where an official source gives them, and confirm the details for the 2026 round with the School of International Education (admission@uestc.edu.cn). Note that the graduate deadline (1 March 2026) comes four months before the undergraduate one, so graduate scholarship applicants must be ready by early spring.

UESTC’s research is built around electronic information science and technology — electronic science, information and communication, computing, optics, instrumentation, control and materials — with management, the humanities and medicine alongside. The university introduction (updated July 2026) credits it with 32 national-level and 93 provincial or ministerial science and technology innovation platforms, including national key laboratories and national engineering technology research centres, as well as 6 innovation research groups funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and 12 national science and technology innovation teams. Its faculty is led by 11 academicians of the two national academies and academicians of developed countries, with more than 420 full-time high-level talents. Two disciplines, Electronic Science and Technology and Information and Communication Engineering, are rated A+ in the national discipline evaluation. For a research-minded international applicant, the graduate major list maps closely onto these strengths.

UESTC’s university introduction states that it has partnerships with more than 200 universities, research institutions and companies in over 70 countries and regions, and that more than 30% of its undergraduates spend part of their studies overseas. Its best-known international venture is Glasgow College, a Ministry of Education-approved partnership with the University of Glasgow: according to Glasgow’s own partnership page, students study at UESTC’s Chengdu (Qingshuihe) or Hainan campus, are taught jointly by staff of both universities, and graduate with two degrees in electronics and electrical engineering specialising in communications, information engineering or microelectronics. UESTC’s Hainan outpost is the UESTC Glasgow Hainan College in the Lingshui Li’an International Education Innovation Pilot Zone. The English site also lists a UESTC–Khalifa University International Outstanding Engineers Program. UESTC’s 2026 International Summer School, reported on the English homepage, brought together 279 international faculty and students from 58 universities in 23 countries.

UESTC’s university introduction states that more than 70% of its undergraduates go on to further study every year — a figure for all students, not specifically for international graduates. The university publishes no employment, placement or salary statistics for international graduates in its 2026 admission guidebook or on the English pages read for this guide, so treat any such number seen elsewhere as unsourced. Note that the “Employment” menu on UESTC’s English website is about working at UESTC — Talent Recruitment and Prospective Language Teachers — not about careers for students. The university’s best-known graduates are in the Chinese technology industry.

UESTC provides on-campus dormitories for international students; family members are not eligible to live in them, and students may live off campus if they can afford the rent, per the 2025 new-student guidebook. Dormitory reservations are made before arrival through the online system at admission.uestc.edu.cn. The same guidebook reminds X1-visa holders that they must register at the university and convert the visa into a residence permit within 30 days of entry — processing takes three to five weeks, during which your passport is held — and that all international students must buy the university’s comprehensive medical insurance. Both the Qingshuihe and Shahe campuses have a campus hospital, libraries, gymnasiums, stadiums and swimming pools.

Accommodation

Dining

The 2025 new-student guidebook lists seven cafeterias on the Qingshuihe campus — Xuezi, Siyuan, Jiayuan, Yinhua, Zijin, Furong and Xibei — and two on the Shahe campus, Sunshine and Guiyuan. It estimates food costs at about RMB 1,500–2,000 a month, depending on your budget.

Facilities

Reach the School of International Education, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China (Qingshuihe Campus) for questions about applications, documents, scholarships and arrival. Type university programs and offices are based on campus in Chengdu.