The Russell Group unis where the most private school students are lurking in 2025

Surprise, surprise, Russell Group unis are posh. An alarmingly high percentage of students at Russell Group unis were spawned by private schools. Seriously, at one uni, almost 40 per cent of the students originated in a private school?

Oxbridge is still stuffed with private school students in 2025. 31.4 per cent of Oxford students and 28.2 per cent of Cambridge students came from private schools. Er, I guess all those spenny Oxbridge admissions tutors are earning their keep.

The nation relentlessly mocks the University of Exetaaaaah for being excessively posh, but it’s actually now got fewer private school students than Imperial College London or the University of Edinburgh. The most private school non-Russell Group unis, by the way, are the Royal Agricultural University and the University of St Andrews. Makes sense.

To put all these numbers into perspective,  Government data says 6.5 per cent of UK schoolchildren went to private schools in January 2024. So, 23 out of 24 Russell Group unis have far more than their fair share of private school students.

This data comes from The Times and Sunday Times‘s UK University Rankings 2025.

Without further faff, here is the exact percentage of private school students at each of the Russell Group unis right now.

24. Queen’s University, Belfast – 2.0 per cent

23. Queen Mary University of London – 7.7 per cent

22. University of Sheffield – 10.3 per cent

21. University of Liverpool – 12.1 per cent

Liverpool students being Liverpool students

20. Cardiff University – 12.2 per cent

19. University of Southampton – 12.5 per cent

18. University of Glasgow – 13.2 per cent

17. University of York – 13.4 per cent

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16. University of Birmingham – 14.2 per cent

15. University of Manchester – 16.3 per cent

14. University of Leeds – 17.4 per cent

=12. University of Nottingham – 18.0 per cent

=12. King’s College London – 18.0 per cent

11. University of Warwick – 19.8 per cent

10. Newcastle University – 22.3 per cent

An unbelievably vibey pic of Warwick Uni

9. University of Bristol – 24.6 per cent

8. London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) – 26.0 per cent

7. University of Cambridge – 28.2 per cent

6. University College London (UCL) – 29.5 per cent

5. University of Exeter – 30.3 per cent

4. University of Oxford – 31.4 per cent

3. University of Edinburgh – 31.8 per cent

2. Imperial College London – 33.0 per cent

1. Durham University – 39.1 per cent

Featured image credit: Violet Kennerk