Academic achievement refers to the capacity of students in studying and is an important index that can be used to predict the beginning salary and salary growth rate. Although there are multiple studies investigating factors that affect academic achievement, the review that summarized the factors is scarce. This review summarized the literature describing academic achievement and investigated the importance of the factors that affected academic achievement described as grade point average (GPA). ScienceDirect, PubMed, Scopus, and CINAHL databases were systematically searched for the literature that investigated the impact of covariates on GPA; was conducted in higher education in Asia; and was published from January 2001 to June 2021. We found 65 studies that met the inclusion criteria. 67.69% of the studies were conducted in Southwest Asia. Factors concerning the academic performances of students could be classified as demographic factors, psychological factors, admission criteria, learning-related daily habits, and learning environment. This review showed that academic achievement was most likely affected by psychological factors. Negative psychological factors impeded academic achievement while positive psychological factors improved academic achievement. Such factors can be incorporated into learning and classroom management to improve the academic achievement of students. Negative factors, when are known, can be avoided or even negated.

academic achievement, demographic, psychology, learning-related daily habits, admission criteria, learning environment