Applying

• Applicants must have a Conditional Firm (CF) offer for a Postgraduate degree programme at the University of Edinburgh for September entry.
• Applicants must also have a valid Academic English IELTS for UKVI or PTE Academic UKVI certificate of an appropriate level, which will depend on the entry requirements of their Postgraduate degree programme. Please note, we cannot accept results from more than one certificate.
• The minimum age for applicants is 18.
• Applicants must also provide us with the passport number of the passport with which they intend to travel to the UK. We will not be able to process applications without this information.

Please ensure that your English level meets the requirements below. This will depend on the level of English you are required to achieve for your Postgraduate degree programme.

Please note that the certificate must be a valid Academic English IELTS for UKVI certificate of the appropriate level. We cannot accept results from more than one certificate.  

We do not accept IELTS One Skill Retake to meet our English language requirements.

PLEASE NOTE: the certificate must be a valid PTE Academic UKVI certificate of the appropriate level. We cannot accept results from more than one certificate.  

• If the fees for the Pre-sessional will be paid for by a sponsor, you will need to provide us with a recent letter from your sponsor confirming this. Once you have submitted your application, please send your sponsor letter to: col.admissions@ed.ac.uk
• Please note, due to high demand for places on the Pre-sessional, you will still be required to pay a deposit to secure your place. This deposit will be refunded to you once we receive full payment from your sponsor. PLEASE NOTE: you will be responsible for any payment not covered by your sponsor.

If you are an agent or partner institution applying on behalf of a student, please note that you must:

• Have an active agreement in place with the Centre for Open Learning.
• Have obtained prior permission from the student to act on their behalf, share their personal information with us, and for us to share details of their application with you. You will be asked to agree to a Data Protection Disclaimer on the application form to confirm that the student has given these permissions.
• PLEASE NOTE: Providing the application form has been fully and correctly completed, there is no requirement to provide any documentation by email unless we specifically request this.

The Pre-sessional fees are still tbc for 2025.

If your application is successful, we will ask you to pay a deposit to secure your place on the Pre-sessional. The deposit is 25% of the total course fee, and must be paid within 24 hours of us requesting it. We will provide a payment link and instructions.

After a 14 day cooling off period following payment of your deposit, the fee is non-refundable. Please note, final balance payments made at a later date do not have a separate 14 day cooling off period. See our Terms and Conditions for full details.

We endeavour to process your application as quickly as possible.

Make sure you check your email regularly for communications from us. Our office hours are Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm (UK time) and we will communicate with you within the following timescales:

1. Application Acknowledgement

• Following your application submission, you will receive an automated email confirming we have successfully received it.

2. Application Outcome and Pre-Payment Deposit

• It may take us up to 3 working days to check your application following submission. We will email you to confirm the outcome.
• If we require additional information or documents from you, we will let you know and provide instructions on how to send it to us.
• If we can offer you a place on the Pre-Sessional, we will request payment of the deposit and will provide a payment link. Payment must be made within 24 hours of us requesting it.

3. Final Payment and Booking Confirmation

• Once we have received your deposit, we will email you a booking confirmation within 3 working days. An invoice requesting payment of the final balance will be emailed to you soon afterwards.

• The deadline for applying for the 10 week course tbc
• The deadline for applying for the 6 week course is tbc

Keep in touch - sign up to our mailing list to hear about course information including application open and closing dates.