From the Wikipedia page for the examination required to get into Universities in HK, the number of test takers in 2020 is:
52,687 [0].
This doesn’t include students using international exams to get in, but that seems to be a fraction of this number.
Still very challenging but not 1 billion challenging.
[0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong_Diploma_of_Seconda...
There are 14 universities in Hong Kong of which 4 are well ranked. I would say the chances of getting into a decent university for HKers is actually much easier than for Mainland Chinese students.
There are some traditional families who feel the need to do a lot of extra curricular activities and tuition just so that there kid can go into the three prestigious subjects of law, medicine and finance but that's not all families.
>> Because this is Hong Kong, and if you want to get into a good high school, and then a good university later in life, this is what you do here, unless either A) your kid has really high IQ and would skip years or B) you are rich and don't mind just paying your way through international schools.
Sounds like the plot of GATTACA. Maybe people who don't live there should not hand out advice too easily?