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Welsh speaking ability of higher education students from Wales

See what variables and values are shown in your table

Variable	Visibility	Selected values	Action
Data description	Shown in table	All 17 values	Change values
Academic year	Shown in table	All 8 values	Change values
Provider	Shown in table	All 21 values	Change values
Mode of study	Shown in table	All 3 values	Change values
Level of study	Shown in table	All 7 values	Change values
Entrant marker	Shown in table	All 2 values	Change values

Table

Standard shorthand is used in this table: [c] = confidential information, [t] = total.

Data values	Data description	Academic year	Provider	Mode of study	Level of study	Entrant marker
9,905 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	All levels	All enrolments
4,580 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	All levels	Entrants only
1,575 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Postgraduate	All enrolments
910 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Postgraduate	Entrants only
8,335 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Undergraduate	All enrolments
3,670 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Undergraduate	Entrants only
6,435 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	First degree	All enrolments
2,235 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	First degree	Entrants only
1,900 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Other undergraduate	All enrolments
1,435 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Other undergraduate	Entrants only
250 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Postgraduate research	All enrolments
95 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Postgraduate research	Entrants only
1,325 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Postgraduate taught	All enrolments
815 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	All modes	Postgraduate taught	Entrants only
6,970 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	All levels	All enrolments
2,870 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	All levels	Entrants only
700 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	Postgraduate	All enrolments
535 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	Postgraduate	Entrants only
6,270 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	Undergraduate	All enrolments
2,335 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	Undergraduate	Entrants only
5,895 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	First degree	All enrolments
2,100 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	First degree	Entrants only
375 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	Other undergraduate	All enrolments
230 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	Other undergraduate	Entrants only
170 [t]	Number of enrolments: Fluent Welsh speakers	2016/17	All providers	Full-time	Postgraduate research	All enrolments

Showing 1 to 25 of 59,034 rows

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Metadata

The metadata for this dataset is not included when you download the data. You can download this separately. This contains all the information from the 'About this dataset' tab.

Next update expected:July 2026

Updates

• 27th November 2025: Dataset first published.

Main information

• Designation: Official statistics
• Data provider: Higher Education Statistics Agency
• Data source: Student record

Overview

• Summary of dataset and variables:

  The data looks at the Welsh speaking ability of students from Wales studying at Welsh higher education providers. The data includes the number and proportion of enrolments from students of various Welsh language abilities.

  The data can be broken down by:

  • Academic year - 1 August to 31 July, e.g. 2023/24 is 1 August 2023 to 31 July 2024.

  • Entrant marker - all enrolments or those in the first year of their studies.

  • Level of study

  • Mode of study - full-time or part-time

  • Provider

• Data collection or calculation:

  The Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) collects data from higher education providers about students enrolled at their institution. For Welsh higher education providers, this includes collecting data about the students' Welsh language ability.

  Population included The enrolments included are those in the HESA standard registration population at Welsh HE providers (and the student's permanent address prior to enrolment was in Wales). A student may have more than one enrolment in an academic year, if this is a case then each enrolment is counted separately.

  To be included in the HESA standard population, an enrolment needs to be active in study at least two weeks after their engagement start date or subsequent anniversaries of. Students who are writing-up (and have no active study) after this anniversary date are excluded from the population, as are students expected to study for two weeks or less and who don’t complete their studies or gain a qualification. Dormant students, incoming visiting and exchange students from overseas and students studying for the whole of their programme of study outside of the UK are also excluded.

  Welsh speaking ability* A student's Welsh language ability is self-reported.

  Up to 2021/22, the categories that could be used were: fluent Welsh speaker, non-fluent Welsh speaker and not a Welsh speaker. There is also an unknown category for where this information is refused or could not be collected.

  From 2022/23, additional categories replaced the non-fluent Welsh speaker category. These were 'can speak a fair amount', 'can only speak a little' or 'can just say a few words' and have been grouped to create a non-fluent category. Therefore students are counted in both the non-fluent and more detailed categories when these are provided.

• Statistical quality:

  Totals code Data values with a [t] code are either totals or sub-totals. Data values with a [c] code have been suppressed as they are percentages calculated where the denominator is less than 22.5.

  Welsh speaking ability

  A change in how Welsh language ability was collected in 2022/23 resulted in some data quality issues.

  One issue is that the change may affect the consistency in how data was recorded. For example, before 2022/23 a student who knows limited Welsh may have felt their ability wasn't good enough to be a non-fluent Welsh speaker, while in 2022/23 onwards the Welsh speaker: just knows a few words, category may be more appropriate. It doesn't appear that this has had a considerable impact but is something that will be monitored in upcoming years.

  There were also a couple of provider specific issues:

  Open University has had an increased proportion of students of unknown Welsh language ability since 2022/23, with no distinction between unknowns and not being a Welsh speaker as had been the case in 2021/22 and earlier.

  University of South Wales had issues implementing the new data structure, resulting in the following issues:

  • In 2022/23, a larger than expected number of students were returned as being non-fluent speakers, or Welsh speakers of unknown proficiency. This doesn't appear to reflect reality as the numbers fell to more usual levels in 2023/24.
  • In 2023/24, the number of students with an unknown Welsh speaking ability increased due to software issues.

  These provider quality issues also affect sector wide figures, resulting in increased levels of unknowns in both years, and a higher than usual number of non-fluent students in 2022/23.

• Rounding applied:

  Numbers of enrolments have been rounded to the nearest 5.

  Percentages have been calculated using unrounded figures and rounded to the nearest 1%. If the denominator for a percentage is less than 22.5 then the percentage has been suppressed.

• Related reports:
  • HESA Student record: definitions
  • Welsh language in higher education, 2023/24 (Welsh)
  • Welsh language in higher education, 2023/24 (English)

Published by

• Organisation: Medr
• Contact email: HEStats@medr.cymru