About 4.38 million college graduates entered exam rooms across China on Saturday morning to sit for the annual graduate entrance exam. 

The estimated number of university graduates across China in 2024 is expected to reach 11.79 million, an increase of 210,000 compared to the previous year, according to the Ministry of Education (MOE). The number of 2024 graduate entrance exam applications reached 4.38 million. In contrast to the 4.74 million candidates registered for the 2023 exam, the number in 2024 has decreased by 360,000 people. 

Since 2015, the number of exam applications has consistently grown each year, from 1.649 million for 2015's exam to 4.38 million for 2024's exam. Notably, the number of exam applicants showed a downward trend for the first time this year after eight consecutive years of incremental increase. 

In 2022, national spending on education totaled 6.13 trillion yuan, marking an increase of 5.97 percent on the previous year, while funds channeled into education using the national budget reached 4.85 trillion yuan, a 5.75 percent increase over 2021, and accounted for 4.01 percent of China's GDP.

China's government budgetary spending on education remained above 4 percent of national GDP in 2022, for the 11th consecutive year. 

China has established the world's largest higher education system with 240 million people having received higher education, it was mentioned in an MOE press conference in 2022.  

The total number of students in higher education reached more than 44.3 million in 2022. More than 3.5 million students in China pursued a graduate degree in 2022, a significant rise from 629 in 1949.

The enrollment rate to higher education increased from 30 percent in 2012 to 57.8 percent in 2021, an increase of 27.8 percentage points, a historic leap marking the entrance of higher education in China to the popularization stage recognized by the world, the ministry said.