As the university with a student body in North America second only to the State University of New York, it has a current enrollment of 420,700 undergraduate students and 78,000 graduate students, or 224,880 full-time equivalent students.

The university has more than 200 campuses worldwide and confers degrees in over 100 degree programs at the associate's, bachelor's, master's and doctoral levels.

University of Phoenix has an open enrollment admission policy other than requiring a high-school diploma, GED, or its equivalent. The school also provides associate's or bachelor's degree applicants opportunity for advanced placement through its Prior Learning Assessment, which, aside from previous coursework, college credit can come from experiential learning essays, corporate training, and certificates or Licenses.

The University of Phoenix is frequently cited as the most prominent example of for-profit colleges that operate primarily for the purpose of exploiting the government for educational subsidies. Students of such schools often find their degrees to be worthless when they are not useful to get the jobs they had hoped for, and as a result, many such students default on their educational loans.

In the early 1970s, at San Jose State University in California, John Sperling and several associates conducted field-based research in adult education. The focus of the research was to explore teaching/learning systems for the delivery of educational programs and services to working adult students who wished to complete or further their education in ways that considered their experience and current professional responsibilities. At that time, colleges and universities were organized primarily around serving the needs of the 18- to 22-year-old undergraduate students because the majority of those enrolled were residential students of traditional college age. “According to Sperling, working adult students were often invisible on traditional campuses and treated as second-class citizens.” John Sperling once stated that the University of Phoenix was, "a corporation, not a social entity. Coming here is not a rite of passage. We are not trying to develop . . . [students'] value systems or go in for that 'expand their minds' bullshit."

The first class consisted of only eight students. Sperling founded the university in 1976 in Phoenix, Arizona. In 1980, the school expanded to San Jose, California. By 1989, the university was among the first providing an online program for students.

University of Phoenix is a wholly owned subsidiary of Apollo Group, a S&P 500 corporation based in Phoenix, Arizona. The school was the top recipient of student financial aid funds for the 2008 fiscal year, receiving nearly $2.48 billion for students enrolled. In 2006, due largely to the efforts attributed to the Apollo group, the 50-percent rule (requiring colleges and universities to conduct at least half of its instruction in person in order to receive federal aid or collect federal student loans) was modified. It no longer classifies students receiving instruction through telecommunications methods as correspondence students. As such, these students now qualify for federal student aid. The Department of Education requires that this method must include a significant amount of interactivity to prevent correspondence programs from skirting the rule by using minor e-mails or just posting course materials such as syllabi on its Web sites.

In May 2008, the school announced the formation of the University of Phoenix National Research Center. It is designed to study which teaching methods work best for nontraditional students. The development of the research center is under advisement by a board composed of a former dean of education at the University of Virginia; a consultant on learning; and a former official with the College Board, president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education.

The University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, is a municipal sports arena, best known as the home of the NFL's Arizona Cardinals and the site of the NCAA's Tostitos Fiesta Bowl. The University paid $154.5 million for 20-year naming rights for advertising purposes, although does not itself participate in intercollegiate sports. Instead of spending money on a sports program to increase name recognition, it simply linked its name to sports by buying the naming rights of a football stadium.

The University of Phoenix abbreviates its name as UOPX.