Medicine: Shortlisting Process and Admissions Statistics

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Please note that the Medical School is only able to provide basic feedback to candidates who were not shortlisted for interview. For interviewed candidates, any such requests should be directed to the Tutor for Admissions of the college to which you applied or to which you were subsequently assigned, whether as a result of making an open application or through reallocation. To find out more, read the University’s policy concerning feedback on admissions decisions.

Neither the Medical School nor the colleges are legally allowed to discuss individual applicants with third parties, including parents, without the applicant’s express written permission via the email address listed on their UCAS form. This is to protect both our staff and individual applicants.

general Statistics from the 2024 admissions round (for 2025 entry)

In 2024 we received 1,164 UCAS applications (1,500 in 2023). Of these applicants:

• 1,069 successfully registered for and sat the UCAT.
• 65 did not meet our requirements for entry (most often because they were too young, did not submit explanation through our extenuating circumstances process as to why they were applying on the basis of a resit, did not possess suitable academic credentials or did not meet our academic entry requirements for the qualifications taken). (69 in 2023)
• 13 withdrew from the application process before shortlisting.

The data below, unless otherwise stated, refer to the subset of 1,006 applicants (86.4%) who were eligible to apply and had sat the UCAT and had not withdrawn their application by the time of shortlisting.

38 eligible applicants applied for deferred entry (21 in 2023). Of these, 18 were shortlisted and interviewed, and 2 received an offer of a place for 2026 (compared to 2 last year who were offered deferred places for 2024).

• 61.6% of eligible applicants were female (63.8% in 2023).
• 75.2% of eligible applicants offered A-levels.
• 26.6% of eligible applicants resided outside the UK; of these, 4.8% resided inside the EU and 21.8% outside the EU.
• 5 graduates submitted eligible applications.

Overall, approximately 42.2% of applicants who made complete applications were shortlisted (31.8% in 2023).

how SHORTLISTING worked in 2024 & relevant 2024 statistics

Initial shortlisting was based on a combined UCAT and GCSE score (the latter only if available and if the candidate had not sat their GCSEs between summer 2020-summer 2021).  This is the first year that the UCAT has been used in shortlisting, instead of the BMAT.

 GCSE performance data for schools in Great Britain and Northern Ireland were used, where available, to assess whether an applicant’s grades at GCSE reflected an under- or over-performance within the context of the school at which they were taken.

 As the 2020 and 2021 GCSE results were teacher-assessed grades rather than examined grades, these data are not robustly comparable between schools across England and Wales; the Department for Education were also unable to provide school performance data for this cohort. GCSE performance was therefore not used systematically in the 2024 admissions round for those applicants who completed their GCSEs between summer 2020 – summer 2021. Instead, their UCAT score was double-weighted. For applicants who did not complete the majority of their GCSEs between summer 2020-summer 2021, any individual GCSEs that were taken in this period were discounted from our measure of overall GCSEs taken, number of A*/9/8 and mean proportion of A*/9/8 used in the automatic shortlisting stage.

 Where we had received annotations from Pearson Vue pertaining to factors affecting the UCAT test or had received information detailing extenuating circumstances at the time of GCSEs, it was noted at the appropriate stage of shortlisting. Please note that candidates who attend the UCAT are declaring they are fit to test. Candidates who were aware of anything that might have affected their performance on the day should not have attempted the test. Full details can be found on the UCAT Consortium's Fitness to Test policy page. 

 All non-shortlisted applicants were then reviewed by tutors to identify any candidates whose applications gave us cause to believe that the algorithmic process underestimated their academic potential. At this stage tutors had access to these candidates’ individual GCSE grades (including for those who had taken GCSEs in 2020 and 2021). Those applications nominated by tutors were scrutinised further along with the 80 applicants just below the cut-off point by the Shortlisting Committee for A100 Medicine. As a result of this process, 81 additional applicants were added to the shortlist.

• For those shortlisted the mean overall UCAT score was 3092.8.
• 33 international fee-status applicants were shortlisted.

how interviews and offers work & relevant 2024 statistics

Each applicant was interviewed by two colleges: the college of preference (where possible), or allocation if an open application was made, and one other randomly assigned by computer so as to equalise as far as possible the strength of the applicant field at each college (as measured by the numerical ranking produced by the shortlisting algorithm). The number of applicants called for interview is usually fixed at around 425, in other words about 2.5 applicants per place available.

Interviewers assessed each candidate against our explicit list of selection criteria. To find out more, read our selection criteria. The composition of interview panels was arranged such that every candidate was interviewed by at least one practising clinician. To get a sense of what interviews are like, watch our demonstration interview with one of our current students and two college tutors, recorded for the 2020 Virtual Open Days, on YouTube.

Following interviews, colleges ranked all the candidates they had seen, on the basis of all information available to them at that time. After disclosure of the candidate rank from the second college and UCAT score (including the situational judgement test band), colleges reviewed their ranking and submitted a final version. On the basis of this final ranking, candidates were provisionally assigned offers at a particular college, taking into account the preferences of the college the applicant had chosen (or had been allocated to). As part of this process, the Medical Sciences Office also consulted with colleges to ensure that, where possible, those candidates who had performed strongly overall could be placed. Admissions decisions were confirmed by correspondence between colleges and the Medical Sciences Office. 

Please note that colleges interviewed blind of college of choice (or allocation) and UCAT score.

Colleges made 157 quota offers, 2 deferred offers and 14 open offers (which means the applicant is guaranteed a place at Oxford to study Medicine, but will not be assigned to a college until after A-level results are known).

• The overall success rate for male applicants was 19.2% (16.9% in 2023); the overall success rate for female applicants was 16.0% (10.3% in 2023). Overall success rate for applicants who selected 'I prefer not to say' or 'I use another term' as their gender is not provided due to small numbers in these categories.
• For those with an offer of a place, the mean overall score for UCAT was 3130.6.
• 8 international fee-status applicants received an offer for 2025.
• 45.7% of offers were made by colleges other than the college of preference (or allocation). This compares with 39.4% in 2023. 15.5% of eligible applicants submitted an open application, meaning they did not specify a college of preference on their application and were allocated one.

relevant 2024 statistics for UCAT

Male applicants did slightly better on UCAT than female applicants (mean 2948.8 vs mean 2849.8).

The following chart shows distribution of UCAT scores for the 2024 cohort.  The test was scored out of 3600.

Read the text equivalent to this chart.

The mean overall UCAT score for all applicants was 2888.1 which rose to 3092.8 for those shortlisted and 3130.6 for applicants receiving offers.

The mean overall UCAT score for applicants to the A100 course at the University was higher than the final total cognitive mean scaled score for all UCAT test-takers in 2024, which was 2523.

The average raw score per section was 679.2 for Verbal Reasoning, 714.0 for Decision Making, 749.2 for Quantitative Reasoning and 679.2 for Abstract Reasoning.

These were all higher than the final mean scaled scores of the cognitive subtest for all UCAT test-takers in 2024, which were as follows:

Verbal Reasoning – 601

Decision Making – 620

Quantitative Reasoning – 649

Abstract Reasoning – 653

More information about overall statistics for the UCAT in 2024 can be found on the Test Statistics page of Pearson Vue's UCAT website. 

relevant 2024 statistics for gcse pERFORMANCE

The data on GCSEs below refer to the subset of applicants who did not complete their GCSEs between summer 2020 – summer 2021

Read the text equivalent to these charts.

 The mean number of total GCSE qualifications offered (not including short courses or other GCSE-equivalent qualifications) was 10.2.

The mean number of A*/9/8s at GCSE for all applicants was 9.0; this rose to 10.1 for those shortlisted and 10.3 for applicants receiving offers.

The mean proportion of A*/9/8s at GCSE was 0.88; this rose to 0.96 for those shortlisted and was 0.97 for applicants receiving offers.

relevant 2024 statistics for A-levels and equivalent qualifications

All A-level applicants must take Chemistry. The table below summarises the distribution of other subject choices amongst applicants this year taking A-levels.

With regard to 'Other subjects', the most popular subjects were Psychology (5.8%), English Literature (4.4%) and History (4.3%), followed by Economics (3.6%), Spanish (3.0%), Art and Design (2.0%) and Music (2.0%).

18.2% of applicants taking A-levels were studying Chemistry plus just one more science or maths subject. This compares with 17.2% of shortlisted applicants and 16.1% of those offered places.

10.0% of applicants taking A-levels were studying Chemistry, Biology, Physics AND Mathematics (compared to 7.3% of shortlisted applicants and 8.7% of applicants offered places). 

N.B. Despite the fact that most applicants offering A-levels tend to take Biology (or Human Biology), this subject is NOT required at A2 level (or indeed at AS-level). However, do be aware that not having A-level Biology is associated with a greater risk of having difficulty at the early stages of the course (and other medical courses).

61.3% of applicants taking A-levels were doing/had done 3 A-levels, 32.6% were doing 4 A-levels and approx. 2.1% were doing 5 or more A-levels (though not necessarily all being completed in one academic year).

24.8% of applicants offered alternative qualifications, the most popular of which was the IB (12.3%), with US qualifications (SAT subject tests/AP tests), Canadian qualifications, the Singaporean SIPCAL, and Scottish Advanced Highers representing the next most popular options. 10.1% of applicants who were shortlisted and 6.9% of applicants with an offer studied for qualifications other than A-levels (including the IB). 

relevant 2024 statistics for SCHOOL TYPE

73.2% of applicants attending school in the UK were from state schools (including sixth form and further education colleges), while 26.8% were from independent schools.

The overall success rate in 2024 was 22.9% for state school applicants and 22.6% for independent school applicants. 

relevant 2024 statistics for International applicants

Upwards of 260 applicants identified as international for fee-paying purposes submitted complete applications for 2024 entry. Following shortlisting, which is conducted in line with the quota imposed on the Medical School by the UK Government for the available international places, 33 of these applicants were shortlisted and 8 applicants received an offer for 2025. 

[Prospective candidates are reminded that the Medical School is required by the Higher Education Funding Council to limit the number of international (meaning non-UK/ROI in the most recent admissions round) medical students admitted to a maximum of 7.5% across both the standard (A100) and Graduate Entry (A101) courses - see our advice for international applicants]

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