In 2024, a slow recovery from plummeting international enrolments in the COVID-19 pandemic was underway for US Intensive English Programme providers (IEPs). Student numbers were up +2% year-over-year, and weeks (the total number of weeks spent in the US by those students) increased by +1.5%. Compared with 2019, student numbers were off by only 8%, while weeks were down 26% due to students’ average stay in the US declining from 13.4 to 11.1 weeks.

However, that recovery was short-lived. Presenting at the NAFSA conference in Orlando in late-May, Julie Baer, the deputy director of research, evaluation and learning at the Institute of International Education (IIE), shared that both enrolments and weeks decreased in 2025 compared to the year before.

The table below shows that there were 66,033 IEP students in 2025 compared with 69,705 in 2024. Student weeks fell from 768,883 to 709,705.

The nearly -8% drop in student weeks coincides with a decline in the average stay of IEP students, from 11.1 weeks in 2024 to 10.7 in 2025. This is the second-lowest average stay in eight years of tracking.

The current trend in the US is not unique – recent data show that many major English-language training destinations are seeing lower ELT enrolments and/or student weeks in 2025.

Major declines in top markets

The number of students from Japan fell by -22.8% in 2025 compared with 2024. Japan’s representation in the total number of IEP students in the US also fell to 12.5% in 2025 compared with 15.5% in 2024. As we reported recently, increasing English-language provision in Japan is depressing demand for travel for this purpose among Japanese students.

Other key markets also sent fewer students: China (-20.7%), Brazil (-22.6%), Colombia (-29.5%), and Germany (-25.5%).

There have been pronounced shifts in leading markets for IEP providers over the past few years. For example, in 2025, the top 5 markets were:

1. Japan
2. France
3. Italy
4. China
5. Brazil

In 2024, by contrast,

1. Japan
2. China
3. Brazil
4. France
5. Italy

In fact, only three markets in the top 10 posted gains in 2025, and two of them (France and Italy) were European. All Asian markets were down other than Vietnam, as were the important leading Latin American markets of Brazil and Colombia.

For additional background, please see:

• “UK ELT reports challenging enrolment trends continued through last quarter of 2025”
• “Canada’s language training sector reinvents pathway programme model in response to policy settings”
• “Australia: Full-year data for 2025 reveals impact of AUD$2,000 study visa application fee on ELICOS sector”