US study enquiries down 46%, Canada 75% in 2 years: IDP
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New Delhi: Enquiries from Indian students aspiring to study in the United States have plunged by more than 46% over the past year, while interest in Canada has dropped by about 75% in the last two years, according to IDP Education, a leading international education services provider.
Founded by the Australian government in 1969, IDP Education helps students realise their overseas education goals through free expert guidance on course and university selection, application submissions, visa processing, and pre-departure planning. The company operates across popular destinations such as Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Ireland, the United Kingdom, and the US, and also conducts the IELTS English language proficiency test.
Piyush Kumar, Regional Director for South Asia, Canada and Latin America at IDP Education, attributed the downturn in enquiries primarily to the geopolitical climate. “If we talk about the geopolitical situation, I think primarily it concerns the US and we have seen that in the last six to twelve months the situation has obviously impacted the plans of students who are planning to go to the US. It started actually before President Trump (came in), so we saw that after June onwards, we did see the visa approval rates go down,” Kumar told PTI.
“Typically, what happens is that during the election year, every time we see that visa approval rates go down for whatever reasons. But after President Trump has come, I think he is planning, or there is a lot of noise about some changes which are going to happen, which obviously is acting as a dampener,” he added.
According to official data cited by Kumar, enquiries for the US in May 2025 fell by 46.4% compared with May 2024. Canadian enquiries have also recorded a steep decline of 70–75% over the past two years.
“In Canada, there have been a lot of changes in the last two years. It started when (former Canadian prime minister) Justin Trudeau and the Indian government got into a dispute. But over time, what has happened is that Canada has also been hit by the US tariffs and 80% of Canadian exports are to the US, so they are very badly hit.
“People think that this is not the right time to go to Canada because they have limited the post-study work right also to only six streams and that is where a lot of students think that if they go and study something else, there is no post-study work and they will have to come back,” Kumar said.
He noted that the Canadian government has stated the measures will remain in place until 2027, after which the policy will be reviewed. “So, the next two years are likely to be soft for Canada also,” he explained.
Kumar said demand for the UK and Australia has remained steady. “If you look at other destinations, big ones, which is the UK and Australia, by and large the demand remains intact, the number of students who are going is absolutely intact. Australia in fact formally announced that this year they are going to increase the number of students by nine percent over last year, so they are talking about managed growth, so they will allow more students but in a managed way,” he said.
Currently, nearly 1,00,000 IDP students are studying at over 800 universities worldwide. The organisation has partnerships with more than 800 top educational institutions across Australia, the UK, the US, Canada, Ireland, and New Zealand. In India, IDP operates 73 offices across 63 cities, guiding students and their families through the entire overseas education process – from course selection and application submission to visa assistance and pre-departure planning.
Kumar added that IDP is investing in technology to enhance its services. “Currently, we are working on strengthening our technology stack because we think that tech can play a big role in terms of running our operations. We are also building some AI tools which will actually help the student. Also our counsellors will be able to provide an even better service with the help of these tools,” he said.
