The teaching offered at the four colleges encompasses the full spectrum of the arts and related academic studies in more than 40 courses.

Outstanding professors and students at all its colleges, as well as the steady development of teaching concepts, have publicly defined the university as a high standard of artistic and art-theoretical education.

Thus Berlin University of the Arts gives its students the opportunity to investigate and experiment with other art forms in order to recognise and extend the boundaries of their own discipline, at an early stage of rigorously selected artists and within the protected sphere of a study course.

The two predecessor organisations were Königliche Akademische Hochschule für ausübende Tonkunst (Royal Academy of Musical Performing Art) established in 1869 under Joseph Joachim, which also had adopted the tradition of the famous Stern Conservatory, and the Berlin State School of Fine Arts founded in 1875.

Annually, the university opens its doors to the public in its four colleges (UdK Rundgang), offering one of the most important art fairs in Berlin due to new proposals that highlight its young artists.