News: eduroam continues to break records

eduroam continues to break records

Following on from 2024’s record 8.4 billion national and international authentications, eduroam has reached new heights with 9.2 billion authentications in 2025 in over 100 countries. Initiatives increasing eduroam access off-campus have had a major impact in supporting global roaming – and eduroam is becoming a vital component of student access services around the world.

eduroam (education roaming) is the secure, worldwide Wi-Fi roaming access service developed for the international research and education community. It allows students, researchers and staff from participating institutions to obtain internet connectivity across campus and when visiting other participating institutions by simply opening their laptop, mobile phone or other device.

Recently, eduroam has been named by the Dutch Research Council (NWO, Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek) as one of the thirteen Dutch brilliant breakthroughs of the past 75 years that have helped both the Netherlands and the rest of the world to move forward. Created in 2002 by Klaas Wierenga, eduroam started as a simple idea: make Wi-Fi secure, easy, and free for students and researchers, wherever they go. Today, eduroam connects people at almost 40,000 locations in 106 countries all over the world – from universities, schools and research centres to hospitals, libraries, museums, airports, buses and trains, city centres and public spaces.

Opportunities for students, researchers and educators

• Thanks to global agreement, the eduroam Wi-Fi roaming service is free-of-charge to end-users;
• eduroam’s secure and privacy-preserving technology means that there is no need to enter usernames and passwords through insecure web browser forms. Your device will identify a valid eduroam access point and log-in automatically. Your password is never shared with any of the access points;
• Your password for your online identity is provided to you by your ‘home’ institution, where you are enrolled in study or are employed.

Benefits for universities, research institutes and schools

• eduroam provides a single solution that accommodates all the mobile connectivity requirements of an institution, supporting local users connecting to the local network, visitors connecting to the local network and local users connecting to other participating networks;
• With eduroam, your campus becomes a more attractive venue for meetings and conferences, as it allows participants to access the network without assistance, and without tying up your facilities;
• By connecting to eduroam you provide your researchers, staff and students with access to thousands of participating hotspots worldwide when they are travelling either in your country or globally.

As the national research and education network, RENAM develops modern electronic communications infrastructure and provides high-speed internet access and advanced digital services to academic institutions across the country.

eduroam is one of RENAM’s most popular services. During the last years, RENAM extended the eduroam service across the Republic of Moldova – with 304 access points and 41 locations – at universities (Moldova State University; Ion Creangă State Pedagogical University in Chisinau; Academy of Economic Studies of Moldova; Academy of Music, Theater and Fine Arts; Comrat State University) and their student dormitories, as well as Research Institute for Mother and Child Health Care and Municipal Clinical Hospital “St. Archangel Michael”. As part of the rollout, modern Wi-Fi infrastructure was deployed across these organisations. This improves local network performance and enables full access to eduroam in line with internationally recognised research and education networking standards.

eduroam users from Moldova can also freely access the internet abroad – whether they are participating in the Erasmus+ international exchange programme, a scientific conference or a collaboration.

Joining new institutions to the eduroam network contributes to their transformation into more convenient places, so that eduroam users benefit from uninterrupted service, accessing the content they need, increasing their mobility and improving their digital access.

RENAM provides to all Moldovan research and education institutions the necessary assistance in implementation of the eduroam service. For more details please contact us via email eduroam@renam.md.