Yuxi Normal University is a provincial full-time undergraduate college. Yuxi Teachers College 1978 was established with the approval of Yunnan Province, 1983 was transformed into Yuxi Teachers College with the approval of Yunnan Provincial People's Government, and 1992 was renamed as Yuxi Teachers College with the approval of the former State Education Commission, and was established with the approval of the Ministry of Education in 2000. In 2007, the school passed the undergraduate teaching level evaluation of the Ministry of Education, and in 20 17, it passed the undergraduate teaching evaluation of the Ministry of Education. 20 19 became the construction unit of Yunnan province's application-oriented undergraduate talent training demonstration colleges.

The school has made it clear that the development goal is to build a "first-class local applied university", with full-time undergraduate education as the main body, actively develop postgraduate education, strive to carry out education for international students, actively integrate into regional higher vocational and technical education, and gradually build a pre-service and post-service integrated school-running system. Adhering to the motto of "truthfulness, integrity, beauty and practicality", the school is based in central Yunnan, rooted in Yuxi, serving Yunnan, facing the whole country and radiating Southeast Asia, and has trained nearly 65,000 qualified talents for Yuxi and its surrounding areas to serve local basic education and economic and social development, making contributions to regional basic education and economic and social development in central Yunnan.

It has 1 provincial key laboratory, 7 provincial key construction laboratories, 3 provincial university engineering research centers, 4 Yuxi key laboratories, 1 provincial talent training mode innovation experimental zone and 4 Yunnan experimental teaching demonstration centers. There are 23 research institutions, including the Museum of Ethnic and Folk Culture in Mekong Subregion, the Research Center of Endangered Languages, the Research Center of Paleontology, the Research Center of Yuxi Economic and Social Development, and the Research Center of Pollution Control and Ecological Restoration.