Founded in 1949, Zhengzhou University of Aeronautics (ZUA) is an institution of higher learning co-administrated by Henan Province and Civil Aviation Administration of China. In 1984, it was qualified as an undergraduate institution, as one of the six universities affiliated with Aviation Industry Corporation of China. In 1999, it began to be under the joint jurisdiction of both central and local government, with its daily operation being administered by Henan Provincial Government. In 2013, it obtained authority to confer master’s degree.

ZUA covers a floor area of over 1,900mu, a building area of over 990,000 square meters and the area of its labs stands at 75,000 square meters. Its asset value totals over RMB 1.5 billion, in which the teaching and research equipment values RMB 295 million. It has a library with a collection of 2.51 million books, 1,166 kinds of Chinese and foreign periodicals and magazines as well as 59 databases of various professions. The sports field in ZUA accounts for over 80,000 square meters.

The university now has 7 disciplines, including management, engineering, economics, law, literature, science and art, with 15 majors schools and departments, 3 departments of public instruction, 1 Academy, 1 Sino-foreign cooperative school - Southern Ural college and 1 School of Continuing Education. There are 6 master programs of first-level disciplines, 4 granting units of professional master degree, 3 Provincial Key Disciplines under the Grade 1 Disciplines, 4 Provincial Key Disciplines under the Grade 1 Disciplines and 1 Provincial Characteristic Discipline Cluster. The university has 63 undergraduate majors, 3 of which are listed as special majors at the state level and 9 provincial level ;7 national first-class professional construction sites and 18 provincial first-class professional construction sites. Targeting 28 provinces (cites, districts) for admission, ZUA embraces over 30,000 full-time students including undergraduates, graduates and international students. The university has more than 2000 teaching staff, including 600 professors and associate professors, and 551 teachers with doctoral degrees. At the same time, 221 part-time professors or visiting professors are employed.

The university now has 42 technology research platforms, including 23 platforms above the provincial-level, 1 National and Local Joint Engineering Research Center, 1 provincial Collaborative Innovation Center, 1 provincial key lab, 2 provincial and international joint lab, 4 provincial engineering research centers, 5 provincial engineering labs, 5 provincial engineering technology research centers, 2 provincial research centers , 1 soft science research base, 1 provincial industrial design center, 1 provincial excellent innovation team and 13 provincial innovation teams. It has established interdisciplinary scientific research platforms such as UAV Research Institute and big data Science Research Institute.

The university attaches great importance to exchanges and cooperation at home and abroad. It cooperates with more than 70 foreign universities such as University of Southern California, Florida Institute of Technology, Northwestern University and Ottawa University of Canada to carry out many kinds of in-depth exchanges of students and teachers, scientific research cooperation, etc. ZUA co-established a Confucius Institute at the University of Dodoma, Tanzania and won the title of “2014 Advanced Confucius Institute”, “Advanced Unit of Public Diplomacy” and “China- Tanzania Friendly Ambassador Award”. It works with the University of Highlands and Islands and Warsaw Humanities and Social Sciences University in terms of undergraduate projects, signed a strategic contract with China Aviation Industry Corporation, co-trained student pilots with Beihang University. The university has built the first French-language alliance base in Henan province, ICAO / FIATA air dangerous goods training sub center and the first Henan base of the China University of Political Science and Law's hard cases research center.