Like Tamil Nadu engineering colleges having a maximum number of undergraduate engineering seats in the country, the Deemed-to-be universities located in the State have more than 60 per cent of undergraduate engineering seats available across the country. According to the Approval Process Handbook 2019-20 released by the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), there are 76,605 UG seats and 29,288 seats available in 84 Deemed-to-be Universities. Out of these, 46,895 UG seats (61.22 per cent) and 12,115 PG seats (41.37 per cent) are available in 28 Deemed-to-be universities located in Tamil Nadu alone.

On an average, each Deemed-to-be university in Tamil Nadu has 1,675 UG seats and 433 PG seats, which is way ahead of the country's average of 912 UG seats 349 PG seats per private university. In the 2018-19 academic year, Tamil Nadu has 593 institutions with an intake of 3,04,138 undergraduate seats, which is just over 20 per cent of the 15.16 lakh UG seats available across the country. 

After Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh has 5,440 UG seats and 1,170 PG seats offered in two Deemed to be Universities, Karnataka has 4,810 UG seats and 5,332 PG seats offered in 13 Deemed-to-be universities and Maharashtra has 2,990 UG seats and 4,478 PG seats offered in nine Deemed to be Universities. All India Federation of Self Financing Technical Institutions secretary TD Eswaramoorthy said, "Only from the last academic year, the AICTE is collecting the intake and admission details from the private universities. In Tamil Nadu, four to five private universities have thousands of seats. The AICTE has started regularising the intake to private universities only recently. This year, the seats may reduce and it will take two to three years to bring them under control."