Revealed: the best-performing agents for New Zealand

The PIE News has been analysing agent performance data published by Immigration New Zealand that shows overseas application volumes and visa approval rates linked to named study abroad consultancies.

The data includes records where the agent was named on the visa application, and only students who were overseas at the time of application. It does not include students who applied through licensed immigration advisers, and discounts agents with low application rates (fewer than 10).

Our analysis shows applicants from China had a higher average visa approval rate than any other source market, with 95-100% of visas successfully granted.

It is also possible to identify New Oriental Vision Overseas Consulting Co Ltd as the Chinese agent with the largest number of applications 2025, with Bright Can Achieve Limited, EIC Education Group and Jiwei Education following as top recruiters from China within the average range of 101-150 student visa applications submitted.

On a global level, IDP Education is named as one of the biggest and most diversified agent sources for New Zealand, with consistently strong visa approval rates across seven of the nine source countries listed. IDP achieved the highest possible visa success rates in China, Thailand and the Philippines, and achieved the average or above for approval rates in the remaining countries.

Analysis below from Higher Insights suggests annual placement volumes from IDP to NZ of over 1000 students in 2025:

For India, the biggest source market for international students in New Zealand, the picture is more nuanced – with high volume recruiters often experiencing lower than average visa issuance rates. The average visa approval rate for India was just 59%, while agent-linked applications had an average approval rate of 63%.

We have listed the top 12 volume recruiters from India below, along with their visa approval rates.

Niche agents supporting applications for courses such as aviation training in New Zealand had the highest rates of visa issuance (95-100%) from India, while some smaller boutique agents such as Olive Consulting, Estero Education Services, Look Education, Springdale India VAC Global Education stand out for high conversion from a smaller application volume.

The absence of known aggregators such as ApplyBoard in the data is conspicuous given New Zealand is listed as a major study destination on the majority of digital marketplaces.

Three of the top five source countries for New Zealand, namely Japan, US and Germany, are historically not reliant on commission-based agent applications and therefore no agent performance data is available.

A broader analysis across all the available country data reveals a trend of improving visa grant rates in New Zealand, with the overall agent-linked grant rate up to 83% from 75%. This is stark contrast to the rapidly rising visa refusal rates in the US, Canada, Australia and the UK.

The top 10 agents for New Zealand, based on application volume, reveal strong performers from Nepal, Sri Lanka and the Philippines, as listed in the table below: