“Under fifteen lakhs” is the most common budget we hear, and most articles answer it with a list of countries and no arithmetic. So we ran it against our own catalogue instead: every published programme we hold with a verified tuition figure, converted at the exchange rates the site itself uses, dated 12 October 2026.
The answer is narrower than you would guess from the listicles, and one country is ruled out completely.
The headline: the UK does not fit, at all
Of 177 UK programmes in our catalogue with a verified fee, the number that come under ₹15 lakhs in tuition is zero. The median is about ₹33.6 lakhs and the cheapest single programme we hold is ₹18.6 lakhs — still over budget, before you have paid for a flight or a month's rent.
That is worth saying plainly because the UK is the most searched destination among Indian students and the one most often recommended to a fifteen-lakh budget. On tuition alone, it does not work. A scholarship can change that, but a scholarship is an outcome, not a plan.
Australia is the same answer: 0 of 29, with the cheapest at ₹25.7 lakhs. Singapore, 0 of 12.
What actually fits
| Destination | Programmes with a verified fee | Under ₹15L | Median |
|---|---|---|---|
| Malaysia | 35 | 34 | ₹9.2L |
| Canada | 42 | 13 | ₹17.8L |
| USA | 36 | 2 | ₹27.0L |
| Ireland | 26 | 2 | ₹24.5L |
| Dubai | 30 | 2 | ₹20.2L |
| New Zealand | 21 | 1 | ₹25.0L |
| UK | 177 | 0 | ₹33.6L |
| Australia | 29 | 0 | ₹28.4L |
Malaysia is the clear winner on tuition — 34 of its 35 programmes land under the budget, with a median around ₹9.2 lakhs and the cheapest near ₹5.9 lakhs. Several Malaysian campuses are branches of British and Australian universities, so the award can carry a UK or Australian name at a fraction of the price.
Canada is the realistic middle. Thirteen of forty-two fit, so it is a question of which programme rather than whether the country works at all.
Germany sits outside the table, and it is the real answer
Germany is missing from those counts for a reason that favours it: public universities in almost every federal state charge no tuition at all, to international students included. You pay a semester contribution of roughly €150–350, which usually includes a regional transport pass. Baden-Württemberg is the main exception, charging non-EU students €1,500 per semester.
So on tuition, Germany is not under fifteen lakhs. It is near zero.
The catch nobody mentions: free tuition still needs money in the bank
Germany requires proof of funds before it issues the visa. The official figure is €11,904 for twelve months, held in a blocked account that releases €992 to you each month. At current rates that is roughly ₹12.9 lakhs you must show — not spend, but demonstrably hold.
Which turns the budget question on its head. A fifteen-lakh budget buys a German degree outright, but you need most of that fifteen lakhs sitting in an account before anyone issues you a visa. A family that can pay fees in instalments but cannot assemble a lump sum may find Malaysia easier than Germany, despite Germany being cheaper.
What these numbers are, and are not
These are tuition figures only, counted from programmes in our own catalogue where we hold a fee verified against the university's own page. They are not a ranking of countries, and they do not include living costs, visa fees, flights or insurance — all of which vary more by city than by country. London and Dublin will cost more to live in than Kuala Lumpur or Leipzig, and that gap can be larger than the tuition gap.
Currency moves too. Everything above is converted at the rates this site held on 12 October 2026; a rupee swing of a few percent moves a programme across the fifteen-lakh line without anything changing at the university.
If you want the current figure for a specific programme rather than a country average, our course catalogue carries the fee and its source for every programme we list, and the education loan checker covers the part of the cost a budget rarely stretches to.
And if the honest answer is that your budget and your preferred country do not meet, that is worth knowing in October rather than in June. The 2027 intakes are the live ones now; the 2026 cycle has closed.