The University of Klagenfurt (or Universität Klagenfurt or Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt) in Austria is the largest research and higher education institution in the state of Carinthia.

Starting out as an Educational Science College in 1970, it then became the Universität für Bildungswissenschaften (University for Educational Sciences) in 1975. It became the Universität Klagenfurt in 1993 and the Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt in 2004.

It has faculties of humanities, management and economics, technical sciences and interdisciplinary studies. The university has two areas of research excellence - in networked and autonomous systems and social ecology and it will be launching an excellence initiative Humans in the Digital Age (HDA) in 2019.

There are more than 11,600 students and 1,500 academic staff members.

There are also a number of central facilities like the Robert Musil Institute, the Karl Popper Kolleg, the University Cultural Centre (UNIKUM), the build! Gründerzentrum (a start-up incubation centre), the University Sports Centre (USI), and the Klagenfurt University Library.

The campus is near Lake Wörthersee, in the city of Klagenfurt, which has a population of about 100,000 and is one of the safest cities in Austria.

A captivating city, it has plenty of cafes, bars and restaurants with a Mediterranean feel.

The AAU motto is "per aspera ad astra" or "through hardships to the stars".

It is located 30km from the Slovenian border and 60km from the Italian border, the university is a big supporter of bi- and multilingualism, especially in the context of the Slovenian minority in Carinthia.

Alongside the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano (Italy) and the University of Fribourg (Switzerland), it’s among the three most southern universities in the German-speaking world.