We list 28 International Relations master's programmes in Germany, and 12 of them are in Berlin — four each at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Freie Universität Berlin and Technische Universität Berlin. After that the list thins fast: Leipzig (2), Regensburg (2), Essen (2), then Cologne, Dortmund and Bonn with one apiece.
Why the Berlin concentration is the point
We have found a Berlin third in every German social science we have written up this week — Economics, Political Science and now this. For most subjects that is a fact about where universities happen to be. For International Relations it is a fact about the subject.
Berlin is the seat of the federal government. The ministries are there, so are the party foundations, the policy institutes and a dense layer of NGOs and international organisations — which is where the internships, the research assistantships and the first jobs in this field actually come from. A degree in International Relations is unusually dependent on proximity to the thing it studies, and no ranking column captures that.
The corollary is worth saying too: if you are not going to be in Berlin, pick the remaining sixteen for a specific reason rather than by elimination.
22 of 28 in English — but check
Counted from our listings: 22 are taught in English, three in German and English, and one in English, French and German together.
That is better coverage than Political Science, where only 27 of 38 are fully English, but it is not the near-total coverage of Biology or Economics. Six of 28 need checking, and the trilingual one is almost certainly a joint degree with partner institutions abroad — a feature if you want it, a surprise if you did not read the page.
Durations and entry
Durations: 24 months on 23 programmes, 18 months on 4, 12 months on 1. The German two-year norm, again.
The English requirements are the interesting part. Across the set we see IELTS Academic from 5.5 up to 7.0, with programmes variously accepting TOEFL iBT, UNIcert, TOEIC, PTE Academic and Cambridge qualifications as alternatives — several of them listing four or five accepted tests on one page.
A 5.5 floor on an International Relations master's is low by any international standard, and it is real on this list. If an English score has been the thing stopping you applying, this is a set worth reading properly rather than assuming it matches what you saw for the UK. We have written on reading an English requirement properly, and on which test to sit in the first place.
On fees
We hold no verified tuition figure for any of our published German programmes, this subject included. Each listing links to the page that can answer it for that programme, and we have covered how the German fee structure works separately.
Who it suits
Someone who wants to work in or around European policy, is prepared to be in Berlin, and treats German as part of the plan rather than an optional extra — because the ministries, foundations and institutes that make a Berlin IR degree valuable do not run in English.
It suits you less if you want a one-year degree, or if you are choosing the subject as a general humanities master's rather than a route into a specific field. International Relations rewards knowing what you want from it more than most.
Browse the set: International Relations in Germany, master's only, or the subject across every destination we list.
Catalogue figures counted from our published listings on 6 October 2026. We hold no verified tuition figure for German programmes at the time of writing. Photograph: Freie Universität Berlin by torinberl (CC BY-SA 3.0) via Wikimedia Commons.