University of Oxford

Oxford has no single founding date; teaching is recorded there from around 1096, which makes it the oldest university in the English-speaking world. It is a collegiate university: students belong both to a department, which sets the syllabus and the examinations, and to one of the constituent colleges, which handles accommodation, welfare and much of the small-group teaching.

The distinctive feature of undergraduate study is the tutorial — an hour with an academic, alone or with one other student, discussing work submitted in advance. It is demanding in a way lecture-based systems are not, and it is what the degree is built around.

Graduate study is organised by department and is heavily research-led, with taught master's programmes running alongside a large doctoral population.

Oxford is highly selective and the process starts earlier than most UK universities.

• An early UCAS deadline for undergraduate entry — mid-October rather than the ordinary January date — with no exceptions.
• Excellent results in the subjects relevant to the course, and the specific subject prerequisites the course lists.
• An admissions test for most undergraduate courses, sat before interviews and registered for separately.
• Interviews in December for shortlisted candidates, conducted by academics and structured as an academic discussion rather than a personality assessment.
• For graduate entry: a strong bachelor's degree, a research proposal or statement of purpose, academic references and, for many courses, written work.

Every course page states its own requirements, and they differ meaningfully between subjects.

Oxford's cost has two components for most graduate students, which makes it structurally different from almost every other UK university.

• A course fee, set per programme, with international rates differing substantially from home rates.
• A college fee for many graduate courses, charged in addition to the course fee and covering college facilities and support.
• Undergraduate fees are regulated for home students and set independently for international students, again by subject.
• Course-specific extras — laboratory, field trip or studio costs on some programmes.
• A published living cost range for Oxford, which the university expects graduate applicants to demonstrate they can meet.
• Fees are normally fixed for the duration of a course at the rate for your year of entry, which helps with multi-year budgeting.

Oxford and Cambridge are the two UK universities where a college fee sits on top of the university fee for many graduate students. It is a real additional cost and it is easy to miss when comparing against other UK institutions. Work from Oxford's course page, which lists both fees for your specific programme for your specific programme and year of entry — it is the only figure that will be correct for you, and it is republished every year. We will confirm the current cost and what it includes before you commit to an application.

Oxford's funding is administered through the university, its graduate scholarship schemes and its colleges, and a single applicant may be considered by all three. A large share of graduate funding is awarded automatically from the admission application, provided that application arrives by the earlier of the published deadlines.

• Graduate scholarship schemes — many consider you automatically, but only if you apply by the earlier deadline.
• College awards — decided by the individual colleges, with their own criteria.
• Departmental funding — tied to a subject or a research project.
• Externally funded programmes — administered with partner bodies and applied for separately.

The earlier of Oxford's two graduate deadlines is the funding deadline. Applying by the later one is a valid application that has already forfeited most of the money.

There is no single campus. The university is a federation of colleges spread through the city, and your college shapes daily life more than the university does.

• The college is your base — accommodation, dining hall, library, common room, and the people you see every day.
• Teaching is split between college tutorials or supervisions in very small groups, and departmental lectures and labs.
• Terms are short and intense — eight weeks — with a great deal expected in each one and long vacations between.
• An unusually dense club and society scene, from sport and drama to student journalism and debating, much of it college-level as well as university-wide.
• College accommodation is usual for at least the first year and often longer, which removes the private rental problem that affects most UK students.
• The city is small and walkable, and largely organised around the university.

The eight-week term is the thing to prepare for. The workload is compressed rather than reduced, and students who treat the first week as a settling-in period tend to spend the rest of term catching up.