Benefit from our Welcome Week for international students to familiarize yourself with the University of Oldenburg, your studies and the city of Oldenburg and to get to know your fellow students. You can choose from a diverse program of information sessions and social events.

Welcome Week

The University's Orientation Week takes place annually during the winter semester following the Welcome Week and provides orientation and social events to all new students at the University.

Orientation Week

Do you have questions about your studies, the city or would you like to meet new students? The tutors of the International Office offer you advice and support and organize regular events during the semester.

Tutors

Are you interested in getting to know students from all over the world? Or are you an international student new to Oldenburg? Then come to the Buddy Programme!

The Buddy Programme is designed to promote intercultural exchange between international and local students. It is also intended to make it easier for international students to arrive in Oldenburg and begin their studies.

Buddy programme

Are you an international student in the first semesters of your (specialist) studies? Studying in Germany offers you many opportunities, but also presents you with challenges. You do not have to be alone in this.

Would you like support in overcoming these or other personal and intercultural challenges as well as exchange with other students? Then OrientationPLUS is the right programme for you!

OrientationPLUS

If you have any questions about your degree programme, students from the student councils can help you and share their personal experiences.

Overview of student representatives

Discovering the city on foot or with your phone: The Christian churches in Oldenburg have prepared a short trip through the city centre. Almost 5 kilometres in length, this is a kind of pilgrimage route through Oldenburg's city centre.

Spiritual city walk through Oldenburg (in German)

Oldenburg State Museum of Art and Cultural History

The State Museum of Art and Cultural History presents cultural objects from various eras. In the picture gallery you will find works from old masters to classical modern art. The museum currently offers a virtual exhibition:

Virtual exhibition "Dress fashion changes as social conventions change " (in German)

Horst Janssen Museum

The Horst Janssen Museum is dedicated to the visual arts on paper. It is named after the great North German draughtsman, etcher, woodcutter, poster artist, illustrator, author and graphic artist Horst Janssen. The museum offers an exciting encounter with the work and personality of this unconventional artist. The drawing tables allow you to be creative yourself. Currently, you can get a glimpse of the exhibition online:

Horst Janssen Museum digital (in German)

Edith Russ Haus

With its focus on the art of new media, the Edith Russ Haus is an unusual museum. In a regularly changing exhibition programme, the museum shows innovative and experimental positions of international contemporary art. Presentations, artist talks and workshops promote public discourse on contemporary art and its relationship to the social reality in which it is created. The international scholarship programme for media art of the Foundation of Lower Saxony at the Edith Russ Haus makes it possible to realise three new artistic projects every year. Founded in 2000, the museum owes its existence to an initiative of the late Edith Maria Ruß, a teacher who bequeathed her assets to her home town on the condition that a house "for art in the transition to the new millennium" be created.

Edith Russ Haus

Artothek

Oldenburg's Artothek is an art lending and educational institution founded in 1982. All citizens of the city can borrow works of art at the Arthothek. By purchasing, presenting and lending works of art, the Artothek focuses on promoting regional artists. In addition, it offers many ways of experiencing art. For instance, you can borrow works by famous artists and experience them in the comfort of you home. A wide range of programmes for children, young people and adults allows them to be creative themselves, to talk about art or simply to enjoy art.

• Oldenburg's Artothek

Oldenburg Computer Museum

Home computers, arcade machines, game consoles and pinball machines from the 1970s, 80s and 90s can not only be viewed but also tried out in the Oldenburg Computer Museum (OCM). The exhibition is structured chronologically and includes icons from the years 1972 to 1998. The devices are always ready for use and equipped with software; they can – and should – be used, explored and experienced. In a unique hands-on exhibition, you can experience home computer history by playing old arcade game classics on vintage C64, Atari or Amiga machines, or writing your own programmes.

Oldenburg Computer Museum

Oldenburg State Theatre

Housed in a magnificent historical building, the city's theatre is the meeting place for opera, drama, and ballet in Oldenburg. Here, you can see classics such as Faust by Goethe or listen to symphony concerts or recitals.

State theatre

Discover Bremen

Discover Hamburg

Discover Hannover

The Language Centre offers German courses at different levels during the semester as well as during the lecture-free period.

German courses

The Language Café is an informal way to practice Spanish, French, German, English, Russian, Swedish, Danish, Dutch or any other language. Meet new people, practise your language skills and get to know other cultures.

The Language Café is designed like a carousel: each table has a flag representing the language spoken. Choose the language yourself. Changing is always possible! Help others with your mother tongue and in return you get help from the others.

Language Café

Would you like to improve your German language skills with a native speaker? Then you will enjoy our Sprachtandem programme! You help a native German speaker with your language, and your German partner practices German with you.

Sprachtandem

Deutsch-Uni Online offers online German courses at various levels. The courses do involve a fee.

Deutsch-Uni Online (DUO)

The online language course "Welcome to Studying in Germany" by DUO prepares international students for their start of studies. With the course beginning on March 21, 2025, it offers personal supervision, interactive learning and flexibility for 65.00 EUR.

Further information and registration (until March 17, 2025!)

Deutsche Welle offers free online German courses ranging from level A1 to C1.

Courses offered by Deutsche Welle(in German)