“Oldest university” depends on how you define a university. Use the medieval European model — degree-granting, charter, faculties — and Bologna (1088) wins. Use the broader UNESCO and Guinness definition of a continuously operating institution of higher learning, and the title goes to Al-Qarawiyyin in Fez, Morocco, founded in 859 AD by a Tunisian woman named Fatima al-Fihri. Below are the world’s oldest universities still teaching today, in chronological order.
1. University of Al-Qarawiyyin (859) — Fez, Morocco
Founded: 859 AD
Founder: Fatima al-Fihri
Location: Fez, Morocco
UNESCO and the Guinness World Records both list Al-Qarawiyyin as the world’s oldest existing, continually operating educational institution. It began as a mosque-school complex funded by Fatima al-Fihri using her inherited wealth and grew into one of the leading centres of Islamic scholarship in the medieval Mediterranean. It was integrated into Morocco’s modern university system in 1963, but teaching has never stopped on the original site. Sources: Daily Sabah, Fox News on the Guinness record.
2. Al-Azhar University (970–972) — Cairo, Egypt
Founded: 970–972 AD
Location: Cairo, Egypt
Established as a mosque and madrasa under the Fatimid Caliphate, Al-Azhar became the leading centre for Sunni Islamic learning in the medieval Arab world. It taught law, theology, Arabic grammar, and astronomy for nearly a thousand years before secular faculties — engineering, medicine, business — were added when it was reorganised as a modern university in 1961.
3. University of Bologna (1088) — Bologna, Italy
Founded: 1088
Location: Bologna, Italy
Bologna is the oldest university in the European sense of the word — the institution that gave us the term universitas, the doctorate, and the faculty system. It was organised by students themselves, who hired professors and set the syllabus, and quickly became the model that Paris, Oxford, and Salamanca followed. It still leads Italian rankings in law, medicine, and engineering.
4. University of Oxford (c. 1096) — Oxford, United Kingdom
Founded: teaching attested by 1096
Location: Oxford, United Kingdom
The oldest English-speaking university and the second-oldest in continuous operation in Europe. It expanded fast after Henry II banned English scholars from Paris in 1167, and a 1209 town-and-gown riot pushed some scholars to found Cambridge.
Today Oxford is a federation of 39 semi-autonomous colleges plus permanent private halls. It has no single campus — its buildings are spread across the city centre — and houses the largest academic library system in the United Kingdom (the Bodleian) and the world’s oldest university museum (the Ashmolean). Notable alumni include 30 British prime ministers and dozens of other heads of state.
5. University of Cambridge (1209) — Cambridge, United Kingdom
Founded: 1209
Location: Cambridge, United Kingdom
Founded by scholars who fled Oxford during the 1209 riots. Cambridge is a collegiate university like Oxford — 31 self-governing colleges, no single campus — and sits inside the United Kingdom’s “Golden Triangle” research cluster.
The university is associated with more Nobel laureates than any other institution in the world (more than 120 across all sciences, literature, and economics) and remains the third-largest landowner in the United Kingdom.
6. University of Salamanca (1218) — Salamanca, Spain
Founded: 1218 (chartered as a “studium generale” in 1254)
Location: Salamanca, Spain
Founded by King Alfonso IX of León and the oldest university in the Spanish-speaking world. Salamanca was the first institution in Europe to receive the title Universitas by papal bull and trained generations of administrators for the Spanish empire, including theologians who debated the legal status of indigenous peoples in the Americas (the School of Salamanca).
7. University of Padua (1222) — Padua, Italy
Founded: 1222
Location: Padua, Italy
Founded by scholars who left Bologna in search of greater academic freedom. Padua became the leading European centre for medicine and astronomy in the Renaissance — Galileo taught here from 1592 to 1610, and the university’s Anatomical Theatre (1594) is the oldest permanent dissection theatre in the world.
8. University of Naples Federico II (1224) — Naples, Italy
Founded: 1224
Location: Naples, Italy
Created by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II as the first European university chartered by a head of state — deliberately outside papal control. It was renamed Federico II in 1987 in his honour. Saint Thomas Aquinas studied and later taught here. Modern alumni include three Italian presidents (Giovanni Leone, Enrico De Nicola, Giorgio Napolitano), Estée Lauder CEO Fabrizio Freda, and astronauts Samantha Cristoforetti and Luca Parmitano.
9. University of Siena (1240) — Siena, Italy
Founded: 1240
Location: Siena, Italy
One of Italy’s oldest public universities, set in the heart of Tuscany. Siena is known today for law, biotechnology, and an active programme of English-language degrees aimed at international students.
10. University of Valladolid (1241) — Valladolid, Spain
Founded: 1241
Location: Valladolid, Spain
The successor to the older Studium Generale of Palencia and the largest university in the Castile and León region today. Its Plaza de Santa María features a Baroque façade designed by the Franciscan Fray Pedro de la Visitación in 1715 — one of the most photographed university entrances in Spain.
11. University of Coimbra (1290) — Coimbra, Portugal
Founded: 1290 (originally chartered in Lisbon, moved permanently to Coimbra in 1537)
Location: Coimbra, Portugal
The oldest university in Portugal and a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2013. Coimbra hosts more than 21,000 students across eight faculties on three campuses and remains Portugal’s most prestigious university for law, classics, and the humanities.
12. University of Perugia (1308) — Perugia, Italy
Founded: 1308
Location: Perugia, Italy
A mid-sized public university with about 23,000 students and 16 departments. Past lecturers include Luca Pacioli — the Renaissance friar credited with codifying double-entry bookkeeping — and the future Pope Sixtus IV.
13. Charles University (1348) — Prague, Czechia
Founded: 1348
Location: Prague, Czechia
The oldest university in Central Europe and the first founded north of the Alps with a full set of faculties (theology, law, medicine, arts). Established by Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Bohemia. Today it consists of 17 mostly self-governing faculties and is consistently ranked in the global top 2% of universities.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which is the oldest university in the world?
By UNESCO and Guinness, Al-Qarawiyyin in Fez, Morocco (859 AD). By the European medieval definition of a university — degree-granting institution with faculties — Bologna (1088).
Why is there a debate about the oldest university?
Definitions differ. “University” originally meant a chartered, degree-granting body in medieval Europe. Older institutions in the Islamic world taught at university level for centuries before they were called universities in the European sense.
Is Oxford older than Cambridge?
Yes. Teaching is attested at Oxford by 1096; Cambridge was founded in 1209 by scholars who left Oxford after a riot.
Is the University of Bologna a college or a university?
A full public research university. Its 11 schools and 32 departments offer the complete range of bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral programmes.
Which is the oldest university in Africa?
Al-Qarawiyyin in Fez (859 AD), followed by Al-Azhar in Cairo (970–972 AD). Both predate every European university.
Which is the oldest university in the United Kingdom?
Oxford (c. 1096), followed by Cambridge (1209) and St Andrews in Scotland (1413).
Are the oldest universities still good universities?
Most are. Oxford, Cambridge, Bologna, and Heidelberg routinely place in the world’s top 100 in the QS and Times Higher Education rankings. Coimbra, Salamanca, and Padua remain leading institutions in their own countries.
How can I study at one of these universities?
Each runs its own admissions process. Oxford and Cambridge use the UCAS system. EU and most international applicants apply directly to the Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Czech universities through their international student offices. Many of these universities offer English-taught master’s programmes specifically for international students.
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