The article is devoted to the problem of developing critical thinking of university students by means of a foreign language. The relevance of the development of critical thinking of students in the context of the heterogeneous information environment of the university allowed the authors to develop several approaches to determining critical thinking: activity, reflexive, practical-oriented, cognitive. Critical thinking is considered as a complex-organized cognitive activity that determines the student's readiness to rethink and transform personal experience in the process of communication. The article defines the basic elements of critical thinking of university students: the ability to work with large information flows; divergent thinking and a high level of motivation to know the new; willingness to participate in written and oral communication; cognitive flexibility; reflexivity and evaluation; Establishment of interdisciplinary linkages. Based on the disclosure of the pedagogical potential of a foreign language as a means of developing critical thinking, pedagogical conditions for achieving a high level of critical thinking of university students were revealed: initiating cognitive conflict, stimulating a reflexive position, relying on a variety of cultural contexts for one phenomenon. Taking into account the practice of foreign universities, effective interactive technologies and methods for developing critical thinking of university students were analyzed. The procedure for using these technologies and methods, as well as the logic of building the process of teaching a foreign language, is aimed at developing an active subject position of students, achieving a high level of systemic critical thinking. The identified approaches to the definition of critical thinking and the pedagogical conditions for the development of critical thinking of university students allowed the authors to develop practical recommendations for university teachers to improve critical thinking of students