Although its main campus and head office is located in Ultuna, Uppsala, the university has several campuses in different parts of Sweden; the other main facilities being Alnarp in Lomma Municipality, Skara, and Umeå.

[5] SLU is a founding member of the Euroleague for Life Sciences (ELLS), established in 2001.

The university was formed in 1977 by combining three existing separate colleges for veterinary medicine, forestry and agriculture, as well as some smaller units into one organisation in order to improve the efficiency by sharing resources between departments.

These institutes, and the experimental activities conducted by the academy from 1814, were the basis of the Agricultural College, which was created in 1932.

SLU is organized into four faculties: SLU is a small and highly specialized research university ranking among the world's top universities in many of its areas of focus, most notably in agricultural and veterinary sciences, as well as ecology: