About Us
Ural Federal University, named after the first President of Russia, Boris Yeltsin, (Уральский федеральный университет имени первого Президента России Б.Н. Ельцина, Uralʹskiĭ federalʹnyĭ universitet imeni pervogo Prezidenta Rossii B.N. Yelʹtsina, often shortened to UrFU, УрФУ) is an educational institution in the Ural region of Russia. The Ural Federal University was formed by a merger of the Ural State Technical University and Ural State University. It is one of 10 Russian Federal Universities. The university cooperates with the Russian Academy of Sciences and serves as a research and innovation center for the Ural region. UrFU offers educational programs in four areas of knowledge and 108 academic majors. UrFU also has the right to independently award academic degrees.
In 2024 UrFU was ranked 516 in the world by QS World University Rankings, 601-700 in the Academic Ranking of World Universities, 1001-1200 by World University Rankings by Times Higher Education. In 2023, it was ranked 959 in the Best Global Universities Rankings by U.S. News & World Report.
20th century
The Ural University was established in the town of Ekaterinburg in 1920 by a decree of the head of Soviet revolutionary government Vladimir Lenin. However, the university underwent a number of changes due to the lack of resources in such circumstances as revolution and civil war.
Finally, the university split into two: Ural State University (USU), a smaller university responsible for education in natural sciences, social sciences and humanities, and Ural Polytechnic Institute (USTU-UPI), a larger one focused on training engineers in areas such as metallurgy, machine-building, civil engineering and power engineering. At the same time, UPI was developing several new (for the time) areas of knowledge like nuclear energetics, organic chemistry and synthesis, and telecommunications. Despite such partition, both universities were connected closely with each other.The first international students arrived at Ural University in the 1940s. During almost 100 years of the university's history, it has produced more than 2,500 specialists from Europe, Asia and Africa.
21st century
Since 2008, the university has been bearing the name of Boris Yeltsin, who graduated the Department of Civil Engineering in 1955 and became the first President of Russian Federation in 1991.[citation needed] The merger process of USTU-UPI and USU to create Ural Federal University (UrFU) began in 2009 and was completed by the spring of 2011. The number of full-time students studying at UrFU exceeded 45,000 in 2024. The foreign students come from more than 100 countries, and are taught by more than 4,400 faculty members. 358 educational programs were provided by 13 institutes. More than 400,000 people have graduated from Ural Federal University over the years.
In 2024, more than 4,400 international students study at UrFU. During the last ten years, the university was attended by more than 20 international delegations. Among them are the ambassadors of the US, France, United Kingdom, Sweden, The Republic of South Africa, and Mongolia
