List of universities in India

• Central universities, or Union universities, are established by an Act of Parliament and are under the purview of the Department of Higher Education in the Ministry of Education. the list of central universities published by the UGC includes 56 central universities.
• State universities are run by the state government of each of the states and territories of India and are usually established by a local legislative assembly act., the UGC lists 479 active state universities. The oldest establishment date listed by the UGC is 1857, shared by the University of Calcutta, the University of Madras and the University of Mumbai. Most State Universities are affiliating universities administering many affiliated colleges that typically offer a range of undergraduate courses, but may also offer post-graduate courses. More established colleges may even offer PhD programs in some departments with the approval of the affiliating university.
• Deemed university, or "Deemed to be University", is a status of autonomy granted by the Department of Higher Education on the advice of the UGC, under Section 3 of the UGC Act., the UGC lists 124 institutes which were granted the deemed to be university status. According to this list, the first institute to be granted deemed university status was Indian Institute of Science, which was granted this status on 12 May 1958. In many cases, the same listing by the UGC covers several institutes. For example, the listing for Homi Bhabha National Institute covers the Institute of Mathematical Sciences, the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research and other institutes.
• Private universities are established by an Act of a State Legislative Assembly and approved by the UGC., the UGC consolidated list of universities lists 455 state private universities.

• Institutes of National Importance Apart from the above universities, other institutions are granted the permission to autonomously award degrees. However, they do not affiliate colleges and are not officially called "universities" but "autonomous organizations" or "autonomous institutes". They fall under the administrative control of the Department of Higher Education. These organisations include the Indian Institutes of Information Technology, Indian Institutes of Technology, the National Institutes of Technology, the All India Institutes of Medical Sciences, the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research, the Indian Institutes of Management and other autonomous institutes. These institutes are not listed below.

Universities by state and type