Firstly, please let me apologise to the Americans using Google.com who found this article whilst looking for the cheapest American University; this article is focussed primarily on UK universities, however some do offer distance learning and online courses to International students and who knows.... a few of you may be up for a cheap few years in the rainy UK!

I have chosen to leave American Universities off of the list because, quite frankly, I never have a clue whether the American Universities I find are genuinely accredited or give valuable degree's at all. All of the universities and courses that I have discussed on here are from reputable British institutes. Don't get me wrong, were not talking Oxford or Cambridge, but.... well I think you now what I am saying.

The primary inspiration behind this piece was a degree course that I had stumbled upon, I could not believe how cheap it was and believe it to be the cheapest possible way to obtain a British University degree. The degree is a BA in eCommunications which is run entirely online, taking three years to complete online. The price of this course is just £860 per year for UK or EU residents, equating to just £2,580 for the entire course. It is currently being run by The Sheffield College in conjunction with Sheffield Hallam University, so although the course is provided by Sheffield College.... you will actually be graduating with a Sheffield Hallam degree. That is a slightly bitter pill to swallow for somebody that has recently graduated from Hallam with circa £14,000 of student loan debts! 

Many UK residents may even be able to get the course cheaper, with full fees paid if your household income is below £16,510 a year. Partial grants are available for people in households which earn less than £27,506 a year. Unfortunately this course is not available for International students. So, whats the catch? Basically your £2,580 will buy you a BA without honours, and you will need to do a top up year with Sheffield Hallam University in order to gain your honours. This can also be online, but you may need to check how much Hallam would want to charge you for that extra year!

This is no means a definite answer, but having done a little research myself I have managed to find a particularly cheap university for both domestic and international students (this is not an online course, you will have to move to in or around Leeds!). One of the cheapest for International students is Leeds Metropolitan University which typically charges just £2,000 per year for undergraduate courses for EU nationals; this is against the standard £3,200+ charged by most universities for undergraduate students. Their fees for international students, non EU, start at £7,000 per year. Believe it or not, that is pretty cheap, UK universities seem to sting any international student; its a big money maker for them.

For many, the cheapest way to obtain most degrees or postgraduate qualifications is to do an Open University course. The major benefit of OU courses is that the whole thing is distance learning, you can do many of the courses at your own pace, they are widely well respected and highly valued and most importantly... They are generally very cheap. I would like to give you a few examples:-

The BA (Hons) English Language and Literature will cost you a grand total of just £3,780 for the whole course and can be done at your own pace or full time. That is slightly higher than the cost of 1 year on a standard undergraduate course at a UK university. The BA (Hons) in History and the BA (Hons) Literature are the same price,

Again, The Open University is amongst the cheapest for Masters Courses. Many of their Masters degrees cost £4,020 which is at least £2,000 lower than the average cost of a masters degree in the UK. The cheapest Masters I have managed to find is the MA in Social Sciences from the Open University which costs a total of just £2,390 to completion. There are a few institutions (attendance) that offer Masters courses at the same cost of their undergraduate courses (circa £3,290), I haven't done too much research into this area just yet however I am aware that York University is one of those that offer some of their courses at this price. York is of course also a prestigious university.