The basic human right to education does not start and end with school education. Higher education is an integral part of the right to education throughout life, from pre-school to lifelong learning. Participation in higher education has rapidly increased around the world and in some countries, higher education is now accessed by over half the population. Yet the right to quality higher education is far from universal. A wide range of structural inequalities persist, many of which have been put under the spotlight during the Covid-19 pandemic. Societal discrimination, financial restrictions, limited flexibility and relevance of higher education provision, uneven quality of providers, and population displacement are among the pressures impeding the right to higher education today. Despite the barriers higher education has faced, especially regarding teaching and learning, global examples of resilience, resistance, and innovation show how the right to higher education is an imperative to support the work and advocacy for more socially just societies.