Transition into higher education (HE) remains at the forefront of policy and practice in education worldwide (Gale & Parker, 2014). Transition as a process (Nicholson, 1990) in which individuals move from one stage to another may cause stress and discomfort that possibly lead to negative outcomes. Transition into HE is a particularly challenging process for the student due to a large variety of difficulties and requirements which could impede study success (Trautwein & Bosse, 2017). Moreover, increasing student numbers and diversity in European HE have reinforced concerns about study success in general and the successful transition to university in particular (Abbott-Chapmann, 2006, 2011; Vossensteyn et al., 2015; Wolter, 2013). Consequently, it is important to further develop our understanding of factors that can contribute to a successful and less stressful transitions into higher education for a diverse student body. In this special issue, the authors go beyond considering individual factors, such as student characteristics (micro level). In addition to student diversity, the authors investigate the impact of the learning environment/ institution (meso level) and national educational policies (macro level). Each study contributes to this endeavour by connecting two of the three levels of higher education. To overcome the limitations of the existing literature in the field of HE, this special issue aims at entering a novel pathway to investigate diversity to HE by: (1) further investigating the role of diversity at different levels of HE; (2) connecting previously unconnected investigations of diversity in the transition into HE at micro, meso and macro level; and (3) developing methodological designs that can tackle this broadened perspective of diversity in the transition into HE.