Nearly 18,000 foreign students apply for Dutch residency, up 7.5%

The number of international students from outside the European Union applying for a residency permit to study in the Netherlands continues to rise. Up to and including July, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (IND) received 17,870 such applications this year, 7.5 percent more than the same period last year. Approximately 14,000 of them have been granted so far.

These only involve international students from outside Europe. Residents of EU countries, Liechtenstein, Norway, Iceland, and Switzerland, don’t require a residency permit to study in the Netherlands. They must still have a valid passport or travel document.

“Most of the students who opt for the Netherlands come from China, India, the United States, Turkey, and Indonesia,” said IND in its review. “Up to and including July, the IND received approximately 1,200 more applications than the year before.”

It means that 17,870 residency applications were filed by potential students located outside the European Union, up from 16,630 in 2022 and 14,970 in 2021. More applications are still expected, said Rhodia Mass, the head of IND. “We know when the peak in study applications occurs, so we can organize our work accordingly. Despite that, it remains a tough job to process all requests in such a short period of time, especially with the increasing number of students.“

On average, the IND approves 98 percent of such applications. The high approval rate is because applications for a residency permit to study can only be made by a recognized sponsor – the educational institution that the student has applied to, which does the initial assessment on whether the student meets the residency conditions.

Due to the large number of granted residency permits, the IND organized central pickup times. “Students can collect their residency permit on Saturday, September 2, or Sunday, October 7, at the Jaarbeurs in Utrecht,” the IND said. “Students from various educational institutions in the Groningen and Maastricht region do not have to come to Utrecht; they will receive their residence document in the region.”