Kabul University (KU; د کابل پوهنتون/ دانشگاه کابل) is one of the major and oldest institutions of higher education in Afghanistan. It is in the 3rd District of the capital Kabul near the Ministry of Higher Education. It was founded in 1931 by King Mohammed Nadir Shah, whose prime minister at the time was his younger brother, Sardar Mohammad Hashim Khan. Approximately 22,000 students attend Kabul University. In August 2021, before the Taliban takeover, nearly half were female.

Kabul University was established in 1932 during the reign of King Mohammed Nadir Shah and during the government of Prime Minister Mohammad Hashim Khan, opening its doors one year later to students from across the country. It benefitted from partnerships with the governments of Turkey, France, Germany, and the United States.

The first Faculty of Medicine in Kabul was established by a group of Turkish professors of Medicine and Surgery led by Kamil Rıfkı Urga in 1932 in the region of Aliabad. The first teaching-university hospital, the Aliabad Hospital, was also built here on the campus under the guidance and supervision of Turkish architects and teaching physicians. In 1936, the Faculty of Law & Political Sciences on the same campus was established by Turkish Mehmed Ali Dağpınar. The Faculty of Law started to enroll students of law.

The first attending Turkish professors of medicine and surgery who had gone to Afghanistan under an official agreement between the governments of Afghanistan and the Turkish Republic served at Kabul University between 1932 and 1952. The first president (rector) of Kabul University and dean of the Faculty of Medicine was a Turkish surgeon and anatomist, Urga, who taught medicine and surgery for a period of 17 years with 15 other Turkish physicians. Later on, some additional teaching staff, including French professor Pierre Bolange, attended as the dean of the Faculty of Medicine after the previous Turkish dean, Zuhtu Bey, left Kabul for Ankara in 1952. The first nine graduates of the Faculty of Medicine played significant roles in Afghanistan's university community reforms; two of them were Muhammad Yusuf (the prime minister) and Fattah Najeem.

Initially, the university accepted only male students, but in 1950, it was opened to women as well.

In the 1960s, foreign-educated scholars populated the campus. Notable students influenced during this era included Ahmad Shah Massoud, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Dr. Faiz Ahmad, and Saydal Sokhandan. Many different political groups were influenced by the university, such as Khalqists, Parchamites, Sholayees, and Ikhwanists. In a clash between Ikhwanis and Sholayees, a poet named Saydal Sokhandan was killed by Hekmatyar in June 1972. Saydal was fired upon and shot by Gulbuddin during an argument.

During the governance of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA), Kabul University lost several lecturers and staff. The majority of the university's faculty left during the ten-year period of unrest or civil war that followed the fall of the PDPA government in 1992. The area around the university and Karte Char was a major battleground in the Afghan Civil War (1992–1996).

After the removal of the Taliban government in late 2001, the international community focused on rebuilding the educational institutions in Afghanistan. By January 2004 the campus had only 24 computers. As part of its recovery program, the university has established partnerships with four foreign universities, including Purdue University and the University of Arizona. Furthermore, the Information Technology Center was founded in 2002 with the cooperation of German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and Technische Universität Berlin. The number of students in higher education had increased across the country from 22,717 in 2002 to 56,451 in 2008. By 2008, Kabul University was attended by 9,660 students, 2,336 (24%) of them being women.