Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology (XAUAT) is located in the famous historical and cultural city of Xian. To its far south is the world-famous Big Wild Goose Pagoda, built in the Tang Dynasty, adjacent to the north, is the renowned city wall of the Ming Dynasty. The university covers an area of 3,100,000 m2, including a construction area of 900,000 m2. The campus is picturesque and charming and is permeated with a rich academic ambience.

The origin of XAUAT dates back to 1895, the year when Tianjin Beiyang School of Western Learning (Beiyang University) was first established. Over the years, the university pooled together the earliest elites in the disciplines of civil engineering, architecture, and municipal engineering in the history of modern Chinese higher education. In 1956, in the third nation-wide restructuring of universities and colleges, the school was named Xi'an Institute of Construction Engineering after integrating and amalgamating departments of civil engineering, architecture, and municipal engineering at the Northeast Institute of Technology, Northwest Institute of Technology, Qingdao Institute of Technology, and South Jiangsu Technical School. The school was renamed Xi'an Institute of Metallurgy in 1959 and subsequently Xi'an Institute of Metallurgy and Construction Engineering in 1963. On March 8, 1994, approved by the Ministry of Education, the school adopted its present name, Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology. It is now widely recognized as one of China's most influential universities in the field of civil engineering and architecture.