26 Notable alumni of Nankai University

Ma Siju was a Chinese pianist, cellist.

Yang Shixian was a Chinese chemist. He was a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Xiaowen Zeng is a Chinese-Canadian author living in Toronto, Canada.

Wang Jialing was a Chinese theoretical linguist specializing in phonology.

Ma Jiantang is a Chinese economist and politician. He was director of the National Bureau of Statistics from 2008 to 2015, executive vice-president of Academy of Governance (minister-level rank) from 2015 to 2018, and party branch secretary of Development Research Center of the State Council from 2018 to 2022.

Yuefan Deng is a computational scientist, academic, and author serving as a Professor in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics at Stony Brook University. His research centers on developing parallel computing and machine learning algorithms for supercomputers, with a particular focus on modeling human platelet dynamics and optimizing Markov Chain Monte Carlo techniques for various applications.

Wen Yang is a Chinese chess player. In 2008, he became China's 25th Grandmaster. He achieved the norms required for the grandmaster title at the 2006 World Junior Chess Championship and the 2007 Asian Chess Championship.

Jerome Chih-jang Ch'en FRSC was a Chinese-Canadian historian.

Zhi Shuping is a Chinese politician currently serving as vice chairperson of Proposal Committee of the National Committee of the Chinese people's Political Consultative Conference. Previously he served as director of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine. He is a member of the 13th Standing Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and a delegate to...

Imre Galambos is a Hungarian sinologist and Tangutologist who specialises in the study of medieval Chinese and Tangut manuscripts from Dunhuang. He is Professor Emeritus of Chinese at the University of Cambridge, and Qiushi Chair Professor at the School of Literature, Zhejiang University.

Wu Ta-You was a Chinese physicist and writer who worked in the United States, Canada, mainland China and Taiwan. He has been called the Father of Chinese physics.

Wang Anshun is a Chinese politician who served as Mayor of Beijing between 2012 and 2016, the 15th person to hold the office under Communist Party rule. Wang began his career in geological exploration, then made the transition into politics, serving in Gansu, Shanghai, and Beijing through his career.

Yu Zaiqing is a Chinese sports administrator, a member of the executive board of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) since 2000, and a vice-president from 2008 to 2012, and since February 2014.

Xu Shaoshi is a Chinese politician, and former chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission of the People's Republic of China.

Yang Zhenwu is a Chinese politician who served as president of the People's Daily from 2014 to 2018. He joined the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in April 1975, and entered the workforce in September 1978. He is a member of the 19th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. He was a representative of the 17th and 18th National Congress...

Yu Yongfu is a Chinese entrepreneur and chief executive of UCWeb Inc., a Chinese mobile Internet and software service best known for its popular UC Browser.

Choe Yong-gon was a North Korean military officer and politician. He served as the Chief Commander of the Korean People's Army from 1948 to 1950, and as defence minister from 1948 to 1957. He also served as Chairman of the Standing Committee of the Supreme People's Assembly of North Korea from 1957 to 1972.

Pu Zhiqiang is a Chinese civil rights lawyer who specialises in press freedom, defamation, and product safety, and other issues. Based in Beijing, he is an executive partner of the Huayi Law Firm. Pu is known for being a prominent member of the Weiquan movement, having advocated for writers and journalists in a number of high-profile cases. Due to the...

Cao Yu was a Chinese playwright, often regarded as one of China's most important playwrights of the 20th century. His best-known works are Thunderstorm (1933), Sunrise (1936) and Peking Man (1940). It is largely through the efforts of Cao Yu that the modern Chinese "spoken theatre" took root in 20th century Chinese literature.

Guo Shuqing is a Chinese politician, banker, and financial regulator. He was the chairman of the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission from 2018 to 2023.

Yang Chen-Ning also known as C.N. Yang and Franklin Yang, was a Chinese-American theoretical physicist who made significant contributions to statistical mechanics, integrable systems, gauge theory, particle physics and condensed matter physics.

Zhang Yiming is a Chinese Internet entrepreneur. He founded ByteDance in 2012, developed the news aggregator Toutiao and the video sharing platform Douyin (internationally known as TikTok). Zhang is one of the richest individuals in the world, with an estimated net worth of US$65.5 billion as of May 2025, according to Forbes. On 4 November 2021, Zhang stepped down as...

Tsung-Dao Lee was a Chinese-American physicist known for his work on parity violation, the Lee–Yang theorem, particle physics, relativistic heavy ion (RHIC) physics, nontopological solitons, and soliton stars. He was a university professor emeritus at Columbia University in New York City, where he taught from 1953 until his retirement in 2012.

Miles Maochun Yu is an American historian and strategist who served as the principal China policy and planning adviser to former United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Zhou Enlai was a Chinese statesman, diplomat, and revolutionary who served as the first Premier of the People's Republic of China from October 1949 until his death in January 1976. Zhou served under Chairman Mao Zedong and aided the Communist Party in rising to power, later helping consolidate its control, form its foreign policy, and develop the Chinese economy.