Some primary schools conduct entrance tests. Most schools cater to one or more expatriate communities. Our Own English High School, Modern High School, and Indian High School offer either a CBSE or an ICSE Indian syllabus. Kings School, the Horizon School, Dubai English Speaking School, Jumeirah Primary School, Jumeirah English Speaking School, and Jebel Ali Primary School all offer British primary education to the age of eleven. Dubai College, English College, and Jumeirah College are all predominantly British eleven-to-eighteen secondary schools which offer GCSE and A-Levels. St. Mary's Catholic High School offers the British curriculum GSCE and A-Level programmes to the local community. The Emirates International School, Wellington School and Cambridge International High School are also secondary schools that offer a combination of GCSE, IGCSE, and IB courses to the expatriate community. The International School of Choueifat and Emirates International School offer both British and American curricula. Jumeirah English Speaking School is the number one primary school of choice for expats, with Dubai College leading the list of secondary schools.

A growing number of K-12 schools offer the American syllabus. The American School of Dubai (ASD), which is located in Jumeirah, and Dubai American Academy (DAA) in Al Barsha have been around the longest. ASD offers an accredited American high school diploma; DAA offers both an American-accredited high school diploma and the International Baccalaureate [IB] diploma. There are also some primary and high schools that offer Canadian and Japanese syllabi.

Many expatriates tend to send their children back to their home country for university education. However, a sizable number of foreign accredited universities have been set up in the city over the last ten years. Some of these universities include the American University in Dubai (AUD),The American College of Dubai, Al Ghurair University, Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Middlesex University, Dubai, the Higher Colleges of Technology (Dubai Women's College and Dubai Men's College campuses,University of Wollongong in Dubai, Dublin's Dubai business school, European University College Brussels, Dubai, Mahatma Gandhi University, MANIPAL Academy of higher education, Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science and Technology, British University of Dubai, SP Jain Institute of Management & Research and Zayed University.

Entertainment and sports

The annual month-long Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF) draws shoppers from the Indian subcontinent and around the world. Attendance at the 2005 Festival topped 3.3 million visitors. Other, smaller shopping festivals, such as "Summer Surprises" are held throughout the year.

The city has many malls such as Mall of the Emirates, City Centre, Lamcy Plaza, Al Ghurair City, Mercato Mall, Oasis Centre and Wafi Centre that have international stores, theaters, gaming arcades, and food courts. Two more shopping malls have recently opened, the Mall of Emirates, one of the largest malls in the world, which also has the world's third largest indoor ski slope, and the Ibn Battuta Mall. Soon to overtake the Mall of Emirates as the world's largest will be the Dubai Mall, part of the Burj development that will be home to the tallest building in the world when completed.

Currently there are waterparks in Wonderland and Wild Wadi with more being planned. Dubailand, an entertainment city vaguely planned off the concept of Disneyland was launched in October 2003. Through subsequent revisions, the master planned development will span over 3 billion square feet (300,000,000 mē) with the 1st phase to be completed in 2008.