An Australian professor and his US colleague have been kidnapped at gunpoint from outside a university in Kabul, local police said.

The professors from the American University of Afghanistan were abducted on Sunday, reportedly by gunmen dressed in the uniforms of Afghan security forces.

The university is the country's only private, not-for-profit and co-educational university and teaches more than 1700 students, according to its website.

Kabul police chief Abdel Rahman Rahimi confirmed the abduction to ABC News.