The StudentPulse Index
A living index of the student experience.
One continuously-updated measure, built from millions of student answers and comments across 268 institutions since 2020. This is what the data says about wellbeing, teaching, and belonging.
- Answers
- ~3M
- Comments
- ~1M
- Institutions
- 268
- Collected since
- 2020
The index softens toward the December and April exam windows, then recovers. The pattern repeats every year.
Rolling 30-day window, a snapshot refreshed at each publish, not a real-time feed. The two "in focus" tiles surface the topics students are finding hardest right now.
What the data keeps showing
Belonging is a buffer.
Students with a strong sense of belonging score close to two points higher on stress and wellbeing than those without that connection. Belonging is not a nice-to-have.
Read the analysis → 4.2pt gapThe institution decides.
On managing stress, the strongest institutions score 8.9 and the weakest 4.7, on the same scale. The experience is a gap you can close.
See the gap → 7.4→5.4The exam cliff is predictable.
Exam confidence falls every December and April, then recovers. The dip repeats every academic year, so it can be planned for.
Read the analysis →Every topic, one map
The student experience, in 38 topics.
We measure the whole experience, not a satisfaction score. Every framework topic, coloured by how students rate it right now. Most of it is strong. A few things stand out.
Personal
11 topicsHow students cope, stay motivated, and balance their lives.
Social
6 topicsBelonging, relationships, and the climate students learn in.
Academic
21 topicsTeaching, workload, feedback, and the relevance of study.
Mean student rating per topic, 0–10, last 12 months. Colour is relative to the 6.9–9.1 range across all 38 topics. Open the full Framework →
The institution matters
Same topic. Different school. Points apart.
On managing stress, the strongest institutions score 8.9 and the weakest 4.7, a 4.2-point gap on the same 10-point scale. The student experience isn't luck. It's a gap institutions can close.
Backed by independent research
The four factors that move student success
The Danish Evaluation Institute (EVA), Denmark's independent national body for evaluating education, identified four factors that drive completion, grades and wellbeing. StudentPulse measures all four, continuously. Academic engagement is the strongest lever.
Explore the four factors →Insights for your team
Quality & Learning
What students reveal about teaching, feedback, curriculum and assessment. The longitudinal evidence quality teams can act on, and defend in review.
View insights → For wellbeing and student-services teamsWellbeing & Support
Early signals of stress, belonging and support needs, so help reaches students before problems escalate.
View insights → For senior leaders and managementLeadership & Strategy
The portfolio view: where to invest, what drives retention and reputation, and how the student experience connects to institutional health.
View insights →Featured insight
Students who feel they belong cope far better with academic pressure
Across thousands of paired student responses, students with a strong sense of belonging score close to two points higher on stress and wellbeing than students who feel they don't belong. Belonging is not a nice-to-have. It is a buffer.
Read the analysis →Latest insights
All insights →Students rate almost everything well. One thing stands out: academic stress
Across millions of student check-ins, scores cluster between 7 and 9 out of 10. One thing students rate sits well below the rest at 6.0: managing the stress of studying.
AllWhere students thrive and where they struggle: the student experience scorecard
Three million datapoints, one map of the student experience. For leaders deciding where to focus, the shape is clear: the strengths are people and relationships, the gaps are pressure, communication and equity.
AllWhat makes students recommend their institution
The students who would recommend their institution aren't the ones with the nicest facilities, or even the lowest stress. They're the ones for whom study feels relevant, who feel they belong, and who stay motivated.
AllWhat students reach for help with, and when
Belonging triggers 22% of all in-the-moment help nudges, and February is the single biggest month for them. The topics that trigger that help, and the months it spikes, are a map of where student pressure actually lands.
AllWhat keeps students engaged through their studies
Students arrive wanting to finish. Whether they stay engaged is shaped by a handful of experience factors we can measure continuously: belonging, relevance, confidence, and the pressures that wear them down. Exam-readiness confidence runs around 7.4 out of 10 at term start and falls to 5.4 by April.
AcademicAcademic engagement is the strongest lever on student success
EVA's research names academic engagement the factor with the greatest effect on completion, grades and wellbeing. In StudentPulse data, the most engaged students report wellbeing 1.3 points higher than the least. Here is how to measure and move it.
Read the State of the Student Experience 2026
Our annual report: what more than three million student datapoints reveal about wellbeing, teaching and belonging, and what actually moves recommendation and retention. Free, for a work email.