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The article presents a study on the development of intercultural competences in students involved in two Intensive Programs (IPs) supported by the European Commission for Education and Training within the framework of Lifelong Learning Programs. Data show the extent to which, according to EHEA priorities, an educational model based on international mobility may foster the acquisition of intercultural awareness and global competences. The study was conducted over a six-year time-span on 196 students who attended two consecutive lifelong learning Intensive Programs involving eleven Universities from eight European countries. The two IPs aimed at developing inter­cultural competences in undergraduate students attending different degree courses. The longitudinal study, based on self-evaluative questionnaires submitted to the participants at the end of each edition, worked out a pattern of indicators describing the holistic, multidimensional character of intercultural competence, as a developmental process associated with mobility abroad. The emerging factorial pattern shows the social infrastructure of intercultural competence as a process of competence gaining about contexts, going hand-in-hand with the development of an inclusive sociability. Mobility, engendering a bridging social background, works as a crucial external factor influencing the process of competence development. Anyway the study shows that, though crucial, mobility does not act either directly or alone: it appears to be connected to the appreciation of Web 2.0 as a learning tool and to the relevance attributed to informal and experiential learning as privileged ways to the development of key competences, in accordance with ECVET.