The majority of the faculties have been located in southwest Moscow on Sparrow Hills since 1953. Like many of Stalin's Great Construction Projects in Russia, it was constructed with labor from the Gulag. The main building houses the university's administration as well as the faculties of geography, geology, mechanics and mathematics, fine and performing arts, and the Museum of Earth Sciences. The Institute of Asian and African Countries, the Faculty of Journalism, and the Faculty of Psychology are all housed at the structure on Mokhovaya Street. There are numerous campuses overseas in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, as well as several faculty buildings close to Manege Square in the heart of Moscow. In 1996, MSU's Ulyanovsk branch was renamed Ulyanovsk State University.

There are around 40000 students in the university.