This documentary research aimed to present the scenario of the expansion of higher education in Brazil and its challenges to the teaching work. For this, we used data source the INEP and MEC virtual site, and the Statistical Synopses of the Higher Education Census. The results indicated that, in the context of the expansion of institutions, enrollments, courses and teaching functions in the last decades, the growth was mainly by the private sector. Along with the disorderly expansion of higher education, impairments to the teaching work were aggregated by virtue of the new functions assigned to it. This brings up challenges to higher education that need to be problematized and implications for the educational system in Brazil.