Evacuation in university gymnasiums is a critical issue for campus safety. Human factors play an important role in the evacuation process. In order to explore the human factors that influence evacuation performance in university gymnasiums, this study conducted a questionnaire survey to 1287 participants. The data from the questionnaire survey were analysed by factor analysis, multiple linear regression analysis and T-test. The results showed that there were four human factors that affected evacuation performance in university gymnasiums: crowdedness, familiarity, attention and subjective physical condition. Among which familiarity and subjective physical condition had positive effects, while crowdedness and attention had negative impacts. Gender differences in participants’ evacuation performance were observed as well. The findings will help researchers to understand the evacuation in university gymnasiums comprehensively, and provide instructions for the prevention of evacuation accidents. •A questionnaire survey is conducted to study human factors in university gymnasium evacuation.•Crowdedness, familiarity, attention and subjective physical condition have major impacts on evacuation performance.•Familiarity and subjective physical condition have positive effects, while crowdedness and attention have negative effects.•Gender differences also play a role in participants’ evacuation performance.