Guangxi University

广西大学
Former names	National Guangxi University
Motto	勤恳朴诚，厚学致新
Motto in English	Diligent Simplicity and Honest Sincerity, Deep Learning and New Knowledge[citation needed]
Type	Public
Established	October 1928; 97 years ago (1928-10)
Affiliation	Project 211,Double First Class University Plan
Academic affiliation	Greater Mekong Sub-region Academic and Research Network
President	Han Linhai (韩林海)
Undergraduates	26,459
Postgraduates	15,190
Location	Nanning , Guangxi , China 22°50′20″N108°17′04″E / 22.8389°N 108.2845°E /22.8389; 108.2845
Campus	Urban, 14.27 km2 (5.51 sq mi)
Colours
Website	gxu.edu.cn english.gxu.edu.cn
Chinese name
Simplified Chinese	广西大学
Traditional Chinese	廣西大學
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Guǎngxī Dàxué Yue: Cantonese Jyutping Gwong2sai1 Daai6hok6 IPA [kʷɔŋ˧˥.sɐj˥ taj˨.hɔk̚˨]

Guangxi University (广西大学) is a provincial public university inNanning,Guangxi,China. It is affiliated with the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and co-funded by the regional government and theMinistry of Education. The university is part ofProject 211 and theDouble First-Class Construction.

The university helped pioneer higher education in central and southwestern China, where its faculty, students, and resources contributed to the creation of over 20 universities and academic departments during the mid 20th century. The university grants bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees across 27 colleges and departments and 98 undergraduate majors.^[1]

Established in 1928, the university was broken up during national education reforms in the 1950s. Its departments were relocated across China to create or bolster numerous other institutions including then Wuhan University, then Sun Yat-sen University, and then Guangxi Normal University.

As early as 1925, the Guangxi provincial government began drafting plans to create Guangxi University. In the winter of 1927, the authorities invited scientist and educatorMa Junwu, a native of Guilin, Guangxi, to return to his homeland and help found the first modern university in the province. In October 1928, Guangxi University was established on Butterfly Mountain in the Hexi District ofWuzhou.^[2]

University operations were briefly suspended from 1929 to 1931 due to armed conflict in Guangxi and the neighboring Guizhou region.

In 1932, the provincial government established the Guangxi Provincial Teacher's College, an independentnormal school in Guilin, Guangxi. However, in 1936, the government reorganized institutions of higher education. The Teacher's College was ordered to merge into Guangxi University, where it became part of the colleges of literature and law. The university also absorbed the Guangxi Provincial Medical College which became the Guangxi University School of Medicine.^[2] However, the authorities separated the university from its science and engineering faculties, which consolidated and became the independent Guangxi University of Science and Technology. Through these acquisitions and divestments, Guangxi University influenced the development of many institutions of higher education across Guangxi, a role it would retain during the education reorganization of the 1950s.

In 1936 Guangxi University relocated to a campus in the city ofGuilin. There, the university established an Institute of Botany, several agricultural research facilities, and its Economic Research Institute.

In 1939, theNationalist government expanded the university, adding several faculties including engineering and agriculture. As a result, the university was renamed National Guangxi University. The 40s and 50s would prove to be a difficult period of "great contributions and sacrifices" made by the newly named university,^[1] while also establishing its modern identity and impact as a contributor to the effort to establish higher education in central and southwestern China.

By the mid-1940s, theSecond Sino-Japanese War, which had begun in 1931 with theJapanese invasion of Manchuria in northeast China, had reached southern China. In the summer of 1944, an imminent Japanese invasion of Guangxi forced National Guangxi University to evacuate its Guilin campus and move south toRong County. The university began conducting classes out of eight conference halls.^[3] By November, the nearby city ofLiuzhou had begun wartime preparations. The university was forced to leave Guangxi entirely, relocating a second time to neighboringGuizhou province.^[3]

During this temporary relocation, the university decided to continue its educational mission with a particular focus on nearby ethnic minority populations in Guangxi and southwest Guizhou provinces, including theZhuang andMiao peoples. While moored in Rong County, faculty lectured on agriculture for local farmers and the university recruited a group of minority students into the colleges of agriculture, law, and business.^[3]

With thesurrender of Japan in September 1945, National Guangxi University moved back to its home province, temporarily taking up residence at a campus by the Lijiang river in Liuzhou. In early 1946, the student body initiated a movement that brought the university back to its original campus on Butterfly Mountain in Wuzhou. Subsequently, in September 1946, National Guangxi University moved back to Guilin.^[3]

The 1950s began with several acquisitions of other institutions. In 1950 the National Nanning Teacher's College merged into the university and became the Guangxi University College of Teacher Education. In 1951, the undergraduate programs of the provincialXijiang College were absorbed.^[2] The university created the independent, but affiliated Guangxi Agricultural College in 1952.^[2]

At the beginning of 1952, ChairmanMao Zedong personally inscribed the name "Guangxi University" inChinese calligraphy. The university continues to use this name, and his calligraphy, today.^[1]

The year 1953 marked the beginning of a period of reorganization, dissolution, and eventual suspension of Guangxi University. That year, the nascentPeople's Republic of China began an unprecedented reorganization of Chinese higher education institutions on a national scale, with the goal of expanding access to higher education through the establishment of new colleges and universities.

As a relatively well-developed university with comprehensive academic departments, a large student body, and extensive materials, Guangxi University was called upon to sacrifice a significant portion of its resources in support of this national project.^[1] In the reallocation, a large portion of Guangxi University faculty, students, and equipment were sent away to 19 newly created institutions across central and southwestern China. The university underwent significant downsizing as a result.

On October 17, 1953, a total of 53 professors across the departments of history, foreign language, physics, chemistry, and mathematics, as well as 256 professors and instructors of the College of Teacher Education were separated from the university to form the new Guangxi Teacher's College (nowGuangxi Normal University). Subsequently, the majority of academic departments at Guangxi University were relocated. The university gave up itsmechanical engineering department, which was one of the earliest in China, as well as itselectrical engineering department. The faculty, students, and resources of these two departments were reallocated to the newly created Huazhong Institute of Technology (now theHuazhong University of Science and Technology) and other institutions. The university transferred itschemical engineering department to theSouth China University of Technology, and its highly regardedcivil engineering department to the Central South Civil Engineering Institute (nowHunan University). The department of mining and metallurgy was sent toCentral South University. The agricultural departments were relocated toHubei province and renamed theHuazhong Agricultural University. BothWuhan University andSun Yat-sen University split the personnel and resources of several departments.

Having sacrificed the majority of its faculty and students, the remnants of Guangxi University discontinued operations. The depleted university entered a dormant stage until 1958, awaiting reconstruction of its faculty and student body.

In 1958, theCentral People's Government approved a plan to reconstruct and reopen Guangxi University at a new campus in Nanning. The first step was to rebuild the engineering departments. In 1961, Guangxi University absorbed the Guangxi Institute of Technology and the Guangxi University of Science and Technology. Ironically, the latter university was composed of former departments of engineering that had been split from Guangxi University two decades ago. The university absorbed the Guangxi Forestry College in 1962, which became the basis for a new college of agriculture within the university.

In 1970, theGuangxi Labor University was merged into Guangxi Agricultural College, a separate institution affiliated with Guangxi University. The former college later changed its name to Guangxi Agricultural University.

In 1978, Guangxi University awarded its first master's degree.

In March 1997, the Ministry of Education approved the merger of Guangxi Agricultural University into Guangxi University, significantly strengthening its formerly depleted agricultural departments.

In 1998, the university awarded its first doctoral degree and was approved to establish three additional doctoral programs.

In 1999, Guangxi University was chosen to participate inProject 211, a national initiative to elevate research standards and faculty hiring resources for a select group of rising universities.^[4]

With university-wide improvements as a result of increased government funding from Project 211, and the absorption of Guangxi Agricultural University bolstering its key agricultural departments, Guangxi University entered the 21st century.

In 2001, Guangxi University and theSouth China University of Technology, who had received the former university's chemical engineering department in 1953, entered into a counterpart agreement to support innovation at Guangxi University.^[5]

In 2004, the Ministry of Education approved Guangxi University to establish a new university in Guangxi with the aim of serving ethnic minority groups.

In December 2006, Guangxi University andSuan Dusit University [th] co-founded the Confucius Institute inSuphanburi, Thailand. In September 2007, Guangxi University established the School of International Education, which enrolls and manages international students in university programs, teaches Chinese as a foreign language, and administers international collaboration partnerships and the university's overseas Confucius Institutes.

Guangxi University has 26 colleges and schools:

• College of Mechanical Engineering
• College of Electric Engineering
• College of Civil Engineering and Architecture
• College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering
• College of Resources, Environment and Materials
• College of Light Industry and Food Engineering
• College of Computer, Electronics and Information
• College of Marine Sciences
• College of Life Science and Technology
• College of Agriculture
• College of Animal Science and Technology
• College of Forestry
• College of Mathematics and Information Science
• College of Physical Science and Technology
• College of Liberal Arts
• College of Journalism and Communication
• College of Foreign Languages
• College of Arts
• College of Public Policy and Management
• Business School
• Law School
• School of Marxism
• College of Physical Education
• International College
• College of Continuing Education
• Medical College

Guangxi University is consistently ranked the best in theGuangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, one of the highly ranked universities in theSouth China region outsideGuangdong Province, and among the top 100 nationwide.^[6]

As of 2025, Guangxi University was ranked 346th globally by thePerformance Ranking of Scientific Papers for World Universities,^[7] and 288th in the world by theUniversity Ranking by Academic Performance (URAP).^[8] TheAcademic Ranking of World Universities, also known asShanghaiRanking, ranked Guangxi University in the top 301-400th in the world.^[9]

Generally, Guangxi University was ranked in the top 500 universities in the world by several major international universities rankings, including theAcademic Ranking of World Universities, and theCWTS Leiden Ranking.^{[10][8][11][12]}

As of 2025. theCWTS Leiden Ranking ranked Guangxi University at #183 in the world based on their publications for the period 2020–2023.^[13] TheNature Index Annual Table 2025 byNature Research ranked Guangxi University among the top 250 leading universities globally for the high quality of research publications in natural science.^[14] TheU.S. News & World Report ranked Guangxi University among the top 400 best global universities inEngineering.^[15]

• China-ASEAN Research Institute

• Guangxi Normal University, at one point the Guangxi University Liberal Arts Institute

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• Official website(in English)

• Guangxi University
• Universities and colleges established in 1928
• Universities and colleges in Guangxi
• Project 211
• 1928 establishments in China

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