PurposeThe purpose of the paper is to ascertain students' perceptions on quality of services provided by private universities in Thailand and Japan and how these affected decisions selecting a university. A comparative study aims to focus on how cultural and economic factors affected their decisions.Design/methodology/approachResearch design sought students' perceptions through empirical surveys on the type of factors which influenced their decisions in selecting a university. As the students needed to form their views on personal experience on services categorized into ten factors, the research sample included students with one‐four years of campus experience. The research instrument was a well validated questionnaire developed on a review of literature and a pilot study. For the main study, 1,900 Thai students from nine private universities and 703 Japanese students from two private colleges were invited to participate.FindingsFindings suggest that in selecting a university campus the university's reputation, academic staff, quality of the programs and job‐placement were the most important factors that influenced student decisions. The comparative analyses reveal many similarities and some differences between the two groups while Thai students had a higher degree of satisfaction than Japanese counterparts which may perhaps be attributed to economic disparities.ImplicationsFindings may not be generally applicable as the sample was limited and cultural contexts were somewhat similar. Yet, there were generic factors applicable to most universities.Originality/valueThese findings are valuable to university administrators and academics to improve the quality of services which are most important in influencing student perceptions in selecting a university.

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