Washington, August 27, 2026 (Yes Punjab News)
The number of students from India seeking first-year undergraduate admission to US colleges through the Common Application fell 15 per cent during the 2025-26 admissions cycle, reversing several years of rapid growth, according to the platform’s latest end-of-season report.
Common App recorded 14,424 applicants from India during the cycle, down from about 16,900 a year earlier. The report, released on August 20, said the decline in India was sharper than the two per cent fall recorded for China, which remained the largest source of international applicants on the platform with 18,435.
China therefore had 4,011 more applicants than India. The gap had narrowed to about 1,000 during the 2023-24 admissions cycle as applications from India rose while those from China declined.
Common App did not specify a reason for the decline in Indian applications. International applicants overall fell 10 per cent, while applicants from Asia, the largest source region outside the US, declined 11 per cent to 79,287. The report said the Asian decline was driven by the drop in applications from India.
The overall Common App pool, however, expanded. A total of 1,527,328 first-year applicants used the platform in 2025-26, up two per cent from 2024-25. They submitted about 10.79 million applications to 1,146 member institutions, with total applications rising six per cent.
Applicants submitted an average of 7.06 applications each, compared with 6.79 in the previous cycle.
India’s latest decline follows years of growth. Common App recorded about 7,900 first-year applicants from India in 2016-17, compared with nearly 29,700 from China. Indian applications subsequently increased, reaching about 16,900 in 2021-22 and remaining around that level for the next three cycles.
The latest figure of 14,424 has erased a substantial portion of those gains. China, meanwhile, has declined from nearly 29,700 applicants in 2016-17 to 18,435 in the latest cycle.
A contrasting trend was seen among applicants already residing in the US. The number of domestic applicants identifying with an Indian background rose six per cent to 40,949, more than double the nearly 18,500 recorded in 2016-17. Domestic applicants identifying with a Chinese background increased one per cent to 26,296.
The Common App figures cover applicants to member institutions and do not represent every undergraduate applicant or university in the US.
India nevertheless remains the leading source of international students in the US. Open Doors data show that 363,019 Indian students studied in the US during the 2024-25 academic year, up 9.5 per cent from 331,602 the previous year.
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