<p>The rapid development of artificial intelligence technology has ushered higher education in the intelligent era. To accurately evaluate the level of intelligent construction of colleges and universities, this paper incorporates the hesitant fuzzy multi-attribute decision-making (MADM) theory into the evaluation system of intelligent level of universities and proposes the hesitant fuzzy VIKOR MADM model based on credibility to improve the scientificity and rationality of evaluation. First, we define the score and variance functions of hesitant fuzzy elements (HFEs) with credibility, providing a robust framework for their computation. Utilizing these functions, a comparative rule for ranking HFEs with credibility is established. Furthermore, we develop an improved Hamming distance measure for HFEs with credibility, rigorously proving its mathematical properties. Building on these advancements, we construct the hesitant fuzzy VIKOR MADM method with credibility, thereby advancing the theoretical foundation of hesitant fuzzy decision-making. Finally, the proposed method is applied to evaluate the intelligent construction levels of universities. Through comprehensive calculations and sensitivity analyses using real-world data, the results demonstrate strong consistency with field survey findings, underscoring the model’s effectiveness and practicality.</p>