Università degli Studi di Firenze

The University of Florence (Università degli Studi di Firenze, 'Unifi') is one of the largest and most prestigious public universities in Italy, located in Florence, Tuscany. Its origins trace back to the Studium Generale established by the Florentine Republic in 1321; it received formal university designation by decree in 1924. Today, Unifi has approximately 51,000 enrolled students, around 1,800 tenured faculty and researchers, over 1,600 technical and administrative staff, and over 1,600 doctoral students and research fellows. The university is organised into 10 Schools and 21 Departments spanning all academic disciplines—from agriculture and architecture to medicine, engineering, law, economics, humanities, and natural sciences. It operates multiple campuses in Florence and beyond, including the scientific campus of Sesto Fiorentino and sites in Empoli, Calenzano, Prato and Pistoia. The institution offers over 150 degree programmes at the bachelor's, master's and single-cycle level, of which 17 are taught entirely in English, as well as doctoral programmes, professional master's courses and specialisation schools. Unifi is a modern research university, ranked in the top 16% globally by the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2027. It is a founding member of the EUniWell European University consortium and maintains over 500 international cooperation agreements in approximately 100 countries and 700 Erasmus agreements. The university is home to renowned research centres including LENS (European Laboratory for Non-linear Spectroscopy) and CERM (Centre for Magnetic Resonance).