A university system is a set of multiple, affiliated universities and colleges that are usually geographically distributed. Typically, all member universities in a university system share a common component among all of their various names. Usually, all member universities of a university system are governed by a system-wide governing body, such as a board of trustees or a board of regents. In fact, university systems are so common in post-World War II United States that most states have one or two state university systems under which many of their publicly funded universities are aligned, both in name and in governance.^{[citation needed]} Additionally, for-profit universities, such as DeVry University, often have multiple campuses which share the same name; these may be, but are not always, described as a university system (not necessarily accurately, see below).

A university system should not be confused with a multiple-campus university. A university system contains several universities. A multiple-campus university is a single university that has more than one campus. In the United States, a common test of whether institutions comprise a system is whether they are separately accredited by a government-approved regional accreditor (this supersedes per-campus accreditation by national professional accreditors).^{[citation needed]} University marketing departments may emphasize or deemphasize the independence of member institutions.^{[citation needed]}