HEU has major personnel training and scientific research in the field of shipbuilding engineering, ocean exploration and nuclear energy application. There are 14 post doctor stations, 12 Doctoral first-class disciplines, 29 Masters first-class disciplines, and 34 undergraduate programs. HEU has 3006 staff at HEU, including 8 academicians, 477 doctoral tutors, 1062 professors and associate professors, and about 28278 students, including 15124 undergraduate students, 7759 postgraduate students and 1453 international     

    HEU has top-ranking in the fields of shipbuilding engineering and nuclear power sciences in China, such as underwater robots, ship anti-rolling, marine power, integrated navigation, underwater acoustic positioning, nuclear power simulation, simulation of large ship etc, in domestic or abroad. HEU has become national base and application research institute of the areas of naval architecture and ocean engineering. HEU also has more than 40 scientific research institutions and 150 scientific research and teaching laboratories, among them there are 2 national defense science and technology key laboratories, 2 key discipline laboratory of national defense, 1 national science innovation talent-exchange base, and 1 national electrical and electronic teaching base, 6 state-level experimental teaching demonstration center, 1 national university students' cultural quality education base. The library has more than 2,260,900 books.

    Adhering to the policies of internationalization and open-running, HEU has established wide and substantial partnerships with more than 100 well-known universities and research institutions, such as California University, Berkeley (U.S.A), the University of Sydney (Australia), Far Eastern State Technical University (Russia), Seoul National University (Korea), Hokkaido University (Japan), world top five Marine & Offshore classification societies, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) etc. HEU has set up “Confucius Institution in Ukraine Southern Normal University.

    HEU is one of the key universities to enter the National Excellent Engineers Plan in the first batch, and also the Chinese Government Scholarship institution and CSC Scholarship for Chinese Students Go-abroad, and provides HEU scholarship and Confucius Institute Scholarship for international students. HEU 70% Master and Doctoral Programs can be taught in English. Opening Harbin Engineering University is stepping forward to the grand goal of a worldwide high-level of Research University with distinctive characteristics.