Why Indian students are rethinking the American dream

For decades, the middle-class Indian family had a fairly straightforward overseas education playbook. Crack the standard exams, get into a top American university, board a long-haul flight and land a well-paying job after graduation. The salary would take care of the education loan and, hopefully, set the career rolling.

That playbook is now being put to the test.

An acceptance letter from an Ivy League university is still a big deal. But somewhere between getting that coveted admit and actually packing the bags, the decision is becoming a lot less straightforward.

And that hesitation is now showing up in the numbers. Applications from Indian students to US colleges fell by 15 per cent in the 2025–26 admissions cycle.

It’s not just a trend on paper. Independent study-abroad consultancies are seeing the shift first-hand too. Take Delhi-based education consultancy run by veteran mentor Jitin Chawla, for instance. “For us, US applications are down by at least 30 per cent,” Chawla tells Firstpost.

Interestingly, students are now second-guessing concerns they would not have thought twice about a few years ago.

‘Will I get the visa?’

Not long ago, an acceptance email from an American university meant celebration. Now, for some, it brings anxiety. The question is no longer just where they got in, but whether they can get there.

Take 23-year-old Aanand Sridharan from Delhi. He spent months building his profile for a master’s programme in the US, assuming that getting into a good university would be the biggest hurdle.

Now, his attention has shifted to what comes next.

“I always thought the difficult part would be getting into a good university. Now I feel getting the F-1 student visa could be just as difficult,” Sridharan tells Firstpost. “I don’t want to reject a good US university, but I also don’t want to lose a year waiting for a visa appointment.”

Turns out, Sridharan is not alone in this bind. “Getting a US visa appointment slot now is genuinely hard. This year, we’ve had several students who applied for the September 2026 intake and still don’t have a visa slot. They’re now pushing their plans to January 2027 instead,” says Abhishek Trivedi, Founder and CEO of Eduler Study Abroad, a Noida-based education consultancy. “Visas issued to Indian students are down by around 60 per cent compared to 2025,” he tells Firstpost.

That essentially means 6 in 10 Indian applicants were refused a student visa in 2025.

The degree is only half the deal

The visa is only the first hurdle.

For students considering a two-year degree that could cost Rs 50 lakh or more, the question of what comes after graduation is becoming equally important.

For Meera K Nair, 22, a prospective graduate student from Bengaluru, post-study employment prospects are now a major part of the decision.

“My concern isn’t just the visa. It’s what happens two years later. If I spend Rs 50 lakh or more on a degree, I need to know that I have a realistic chance of working there afterwards. I don’t want to graduate and immediately have to figure out how to get back to India.”

For some students, that uncertainty is enough to make them reconsider their plans, even after arriving in the US.

But not every Indian student goes to the US with the same end goal. Kriti Shroff, founder of Careerswitkriti, a boutique career-counselling consultancy, says her 15 years of counselling have shown her two distinct groups.

“I’ve seen two fairly distinct categories of students head to the US. The first goes with the classic ‘American dream’ in mind, settling down long-term. The second is the Ivy League-bound student who never intended to stay, they want the pedigree, the exposure, the network, maybe an internship, and then a return to India with that experience behind them.”

The uncertainty around jobs and long-term prospects is now making both groups reassess what they want from a US degree. As Shroff puts it, “So, it’s not just a decline in demand, it’s a redefinition of what ‘worth it’ means for two very different sets of students.”

For students hoping to work in the US after graduation, the choice of course is becoming more strategic. Trivedi of Eduler says Indian students are increasingly opting for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (Stem) programmes because of their stronger job prospects and longer Optional Practical Training (OPT) pathway.

At the same time, he says interest in non-Stem master’s programmes has dropped sharply, with applications in some categories “now close to zero.”

There is a clear reason Stem courses are attractive. According to the US Department of Homeland Security, eligible F-1 students can receive up to 12 months of post-completion OPT, while those with qualifying Stem degrees can apply for a further 24-month Stem OPT extension.

But even a Stem degree is no guarantee of a job or a longer stay in the US. “I had a student pursuing a technology master’s at a university in Texas who approached me to explore European options midway through the degree. That’s how deep this worry runs,” Trivedi tells Firstpost.

The rupee problem

For parents, the US education equation has always involved more than university rankings. There is the loan, the property that may have to be mortgaged, the savings that may have to be liquidated and, increasingly, the currency conversion that can make an already expensive degree even more expensive.

The rupee-dollar equation has added another layer of uncertainty. When tuition and living expenses are paid in dollars but family incomes are earned in rupees, even a small movement in the exchange rate can substantially alter the final bill.

“Every time we calculate the cost in rupees, the number looks different,” says Vijaya Sridharan, mother of Aanand Sridharan, who was quoted earlier. “Tuition may not have changed, but the dollar has. When you are paying several instalments over two years, that makes a real difference,” she adds.

And that is changing what parents want to know before they sign off on the investment.

Hello, Plan B

Perhaps the biggest change is happening on the application spreadsheet.

The old strategy was simple: apply to American universities, wait and hope. Now, students are spreading their bets across countries.

Germany, Ireland and the UK are increasingly emerging as alternatives, along with Australia, France and Asian destinations such as Hong Kong and Japan, according to all the educational consultancies Firstpost spoke to. Malta, too, is making its way onto students’ priority lists, says Budhesh Chopra, Founder and Director at Edumigrants, a study-abroad consultancy based out of Delhi-NCR.

Germany, in particular, is hard to ignore on cost. According to Shroff, a Master’s in Computer Science or Engineering at a public US university typically costs $20,000 to $40,000 a year in tuition, rising above $55,000 at top private schools. At today’s exchange rate, that works out to roughly Rs 19-38 lakh a year before living costs, health insurance and flights.

By comparison, public German universities such as TU Munich and RWTH Aachen often charge no tuition, only a semester contribution. Even after factoring in living costs, Shroff says, the total cost of a two-year German Master’s can come in at a fraction of even one year of US tuition.

Germany also offers an 18-month post-study period to look for work without employer sponsorship during the job search, along with a clearer route to permanent residency.

“It’s no longer just ‘cheaper,’ it’s cheaper and less currency-exposed and less risky on the stay-back question, which used to be the US’s biggest selling point,” notes Shroff.

But don’t mistake this shift for a mass Indian exit from American universities. The US still has plenty going for it. “Students still want to study and work in the US,” notes Chopra from Edumigrants, albeit with less confidence about staying on after graduation.

The destination hasn’t changed altogether. The risk-reward equation has.