Guides · Updated 3 November 2026

When Do Oxford Offers Come Out? Decision Day 2027 and What Happens Next

Oxford undergraduate admissions decisions for 2027 entry come out on 12 January 2027 via UCAS, according to the University of Oxford's undergraduate admissions Decisions page. Colleges follow up directly later that same day. AdmitMock is an AI mock interview app for Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial, UCL and US college alumni interviews: an AI interviewer asks the questions out loud, follows up, and shows you what to fix.

How decisions arrive on 12 January 2027

If you were shortlisted and completed your December 2026 online interviews (see our guide to Oxford interview dates for how the December window runs), your outcome is released on 12 January 2027 via UCAS. The college that considered your application follows up directly later that day.

Tutors make their decision after careful consideration of all aspects of your application: your interview, any required admissions tests or written work, your prior academic attainment and predicted grades, your UCAS personal statement, and your academic reference. As Merton College notes on its undergraduate admissions feedback page, Oxford makes its selection on published selection criteria alone, and interview performance is only one of the elements which tutors take into account when evaluating an application.

Because UCAS updates before every college finishes sending direct messages, you do not need to worry if your UCAS Hub status changes before an email from your college arrives. Keep your UCAS sign-in details ready before the morning of 12 January 2027, and check both your main inbox and your junk or spam folder throughout the day.

Genuine communications from the University of Oxford are sent from undergraduate.admissions@mailgb.custhelp.com or an ox.ac.uk email address. Oxford warns applicants about bogus letters claiming to be from the University offering a place or scholarship funding and requesting payment to secure the offer. The University never asks for money to secure a scholarship. If you have concerns about the legitimacy of any document sent by the University or one of its departments, faculties, or colleges, contact the University directly.

How competitive are Oxford offers: applications and places

Oxford states on its Decisions page that it typically receives more than 23,000 applications for around 3,300 places each year, receiving applications from many more brilliant candidates than it has places for. By our calculation from those University of Oxford figures, that is roughly 6.97 applications per place across the University (23,000 divided by 3,300 equals 6.97, or about 14.3% places relative to 23,000 applications).

At individual college level, Merton College states on its undergraduate admissions feedback page that it made 102 offers to undergraduate candidates for 2026/27 entry, including open offers and offers under the Opportunity Oxford scheme.

Oxford's Common Framework for Admissions sets out the principles and coordinated procedures that faculties and colleges use to ensure a fair and consistent admissions process across all subjects and colleges. Where possible, Oxford also uses contextual information on socio-economic disadvantage and school performance to better understand each applicant's achievements within the context of their individual circumstances.

As Merton College explains to applicants, the vast majority of candidates are very talented with exemplary academic backgrounds, and the most common reason for non-selection is simply that it is an exceptionally competitive process. Oxford notes on its Decisions page that many candidates who do not receive an undergraduate offer go on to have a great time at another university, and some even come to Oxford for postgraduate study.

Types of Oxford offers: conditional, open, and Opportunity Oxford

An Oxford offer takes one of three forms depending on whether you have completed your qualifications, whether your college is confirmed immediately, and whether your offer includes the Opportunity Oxford programme.

• Conditional offer: If you have not yet completed your current qualifications, your offer will likely be conditional on achieving specific examination results (standard offers are listed under the Admissions requirements tab on each course page). It may also include a requirement for evidence of proficiency in the English language. Providing you meet all conditions by the UCAS deadline, your place is confirmed wherever you are studying in the world.
• Open conditional offer: Your place at Oxford is guaranteed as long as you meet the attached conditions and complete the administrative steps, but your specific college is not decided until after you have produced evidence that you have met the conditions of your offer and when your place is confirmed.
• Opportunity Oxford offer: Each year, over 250 offers include a place on Opportunity Oxford for candidates who have demonstrated outstanding potential and would benefit from additional academic support in preparation for their course. These offers are made on the same rigorous basis as all others and aim to smooth the transition from school or college to Oxford so participants have the best possible start to their undergraduate career.

Your Decision Day checklist: what to do on 12 January 2027

Over the months after Decision Day, Oxford keeps in touch via offer holder newsletters with tips and insights into student life at Oxford and guidance on how to prepare for arrival in October. Offer holders can also consult the Oxford Students website before arrival. Use this checklist written by our team on 12 January 2027 and in the weeks that follow to stay organised.

• 1. Check UCAS first, then your email: Outcomes appear on UCAS on 12 January 2027, and colleges follow up directly later that day. Save a copy of your college offer message for your records.
• 2. Verify the sender address: Confirm messages come from undergraduate.admissions@mailgb.custhelp.com or an ox.ac.uk address. Oxford never asks for payment to secure a scholarship.
• 3. Read your contractual documents before accepting: Accepting a formal offer creates a contract with the University. Read the University Terms and Conditions (for matriculated students), the University Student Handbook (Undergraduate Student Handbook), and where applicable the Course Information Sheet for your course and year of entry. The University seeks to deliver each course in accordance with the Course Information Sheet, though there may be situations where it is desirable or necessary to make changes.
• 4. Complete your college Financial Declaration form: Offer holders must complete a Financial Declaration form for their college to meet the financial condition of admission, ensuring you are aware of expected fees and living costs and can plan your finances before arrival.
• 5. Check any English language requirement: Conditional offers may also include a requirement for evidence of proficiency in the English language, which must be met along with your academic conditions.

What happens when you receive your examination results

Providing you meet all the conditions of your offer with Oxford by the deadline stipulated by UCAS, your place will be confirmed and you will be accepted by the University, wherever you are currently studying in the world. If you hold an open conditional offer, the college you will go to is decided after you have produced evidence that you have met the conditions of your offer and when your place is confirmed.

If you do not meet all the conditions of your offer (for example, if you have not achieved the required grades), your college will take into account all information available to them at the point they receive your academic results and make a final decision regarding your offer. There is no subsequent appeal process on this decision.

Candidates should ensure that details of any extenuating circumstances are provided to the Tutor for Admissions at the college where they hold an offer in advance of the receipt of their examination results. Provide this ideally with supporting documentation from your academic referee, or relevant medical evidence. Colleges will not reconsider information that has already been considered by an examination board.

What to do if you do not get an offer: requesting feedback by 15 February

If your application is unsuccessful, you can request feedback in writing from the Tutor for Admissions at the college that considered your application on or before 15 February in the year after the application was made. Even if you were interviewed by more than one college, outcome feedback comes only from the college to which you initially applied or to which you were subsequently assigned. For Law and Biomedical Sciences, where initial shortlisting is carried out centrally, requests for feedback on an application that was not shortlisted should go in the first instance to the Admissions Coordinator of the appropriate programme (for Law, undergraduate.enquiries@law.ox.ac.uk), whereas post-interview feedback requests go to the college Tutor for Admissions with the admissions office copied in.

Colleges and departments are not required to provide individual feedback to applicants, and colleges will not normally provide feedback if requested after 15 February. Where provided, feedback is generally sent by letter or email within 20 working days of receipt (requests received before 31 December are treated as received when colleges and departments reopen after the New Year). A parent, guardian, or academic referee may only request individual feedback or initiate a complaint with the explicit written consent of the applicant, such as an email from the applicant copied to the third party. General summary feedback on course applicant selection may be provided to a referee or school Head or Principal without individual consent.

Before writing, check your course's departmental website and your considering college's undergraduate admissions page to see what they publish automatically. For example, Merton College states that it does not provide individual performance feedback, but candidates who took admissions tests are sent their test results once final decisions are relayed, and Merton publishes subject feedback reports (for courses such as PPE, Law, Mathematics, History, and Physics). Schools Liaison and Access Officers and the University's Regional Outreach Scheme can also advise referees supporting future applicants.

• Worked example written by our team (email to the Tutor for Admissions on or before 15 February): Subject: Undergraduate Admissions Feedback Request - [Course Name] - UCAS Personal ID [Your UCAS ID]
• Dear Tutor for Admissions, I am writing to request feedback on my undergraduate application for [Course Name] (UCAS Personal ID: [Your UCAS ID]), considered by [College Name] for 2027 entry following my interviews in December 2026.
• I have checked the published subject information on the website, and if the College is able to provide any further information regarding my application outcome, I would be very grateful. Thank you to the tutors and admissions staff for considering my application. Yours sincerely, [Your Full Name]

Other UCAS choices and preparing for future interviews

For your other UK university choices for 2027 entry, the UCAS equal consideration deadline for most undergraduate courses is 13 January 2027 (the day after Oxford decisions come out). Because UCAS allows five choices in total, if you submitted your Oxford application by the 15 October deadline with fewer than five choices and have not yet accepted any offers, you can still add remaining choices for courses with a 13 January deadline before that cutoff.

If you used all five choices and are not holding any offers, UCAS Extra opens on 25 February and runs until 1 July. Applications received by 30 June are sent to universities and colleges, while applications received after that time are automatically entered into Clearing. UCAS Clearing opens on 2 July for eligible applicants, the last day for undergraduate reply swaps is 22 July, the final date for 2027 entry applications to reach UCAS is 23 September, and the last date to add a Clearing choice is 18 October.

If you plan to apply in a future cycle, read our Oxbridge interview preparation plan, review Oxford interview questions by subject, check the Oxbridge online interview tech setup, or see our guide to the Oxford Physics interview.

Practise your interview out loud on AdmitMock.

Practice question

Question in the style of an Oxford tutorial interview (written by our team): Suppose a university wants to select the strongest candidates using written tests, school grades, and two 25-minute interviews. Where is the biggest source of measurement error in that system, and how would you test whether the interviews add predictive value beyond the written test?

Example written by our team. The applicant is invented. I would start by separating noise in the predictors from noise in what we are trying to predict, which is final degree performance. A 25-minute conversation samples only a tiny slice of a candidate's thinking, so interviewer-to-interviewer variance is likely wider than the variance on a standardised written paper. We could test the interview's incremental value by regressing first-year exam scores on test marks alone versus test marks plus interview scores.

It defines the outcome variable first, identifies why short interviews have higher variance than standardised tests, and proposes a clean empirical check rather than guessing.

AdmitMock is not affiliated with Oxford, Cambridge or any other university.