Foshan University dates its history to 1958, when the city’s normal college and a branch of South China Agricultural College opened in the same year. Their merger, six decades later, produced a doctoral-granting university that now carries the city’s name: Foshan University.
Six disciplines sit in the ESI global top 1 percent: engineering, materials science, environment and ecology, plant and animal science, chemistry and agricultural science. Seven subjects entered the 2025 list of world-class disciplines, and four ranked in the national top 50 percent. The university runs 20 schools with two doctoral programs, nine master’s programs and 60 undergraduate programs, and enrolled more than 18,400 undergraduates and 2,700 postgraduates on three campuses covering some 147 hectares.
Research clusters around the city’s industries. Foshan hosts a national hydrogen technology standard innovation base, and the university leads a Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao joint laboratory on hydrogen energy as well as a joint laboratory on intelligent micro-nano optoelectronics. Nine provincial key laboratories and 30 engineering research centers back the effort, and the faculty of 1,307 full-time teachers includes 916 with doctorates.
The campus also holds a national university science park and a national institute for advanced manufacturing engineers, while 19 full-time national-level high-end talents and 46 provincial-level ones teach alongside the rest of the staff. In 2025 the university ranked 122nd among mainland Chinese institutions in the U.S. News global ranking.
A Sino-German program in environmental engineering, joint bachelor’s and master’s tracks with universities abroad, and doctoral training with more than ten overseas universities keep the international doors open. Cross-border platforms such as the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao joint laboratory on intelligent micro-nano optoelectronics extend the network further.
Two schools opened in 1958; one university serves the city now. With six disciplines in the ESI top 1 percent and a national hydrogen base on campus, Foshan University is built for the industries its home city will make next, and the next after that.
Data Source: FOSU Official Website (as of 2026)
