How can you find out how many applicants there are for each place for a specific course?

[Lurgano]

And does this tell you anything useful - ie if similar ranking - then best to apply to the least popular course?

Some of the league tables tell you how candidates per place. But it'll be two years out of date, won't tell you anything about the quality of those applicants or where they ranked or whether they were offered or whether the course has expanded or reduced places etc. So it's not much use.

A super popular course with 20 spaces and 200 applicants looks much more difficult to get into than a course with 20 places and 30 applicants. But if the 180 of the applicants for the first course don't really want to go there (maybe it's for Biomedicine - and the 180 actually want a proper Medicine places) it may well be easier to get into than the other course which is a very specialised course and only attracts people who know exactly what they want and have an armful of experience and high grades and all of whom want one of the 20 places on offer.

Bath have the info on each page of their 2016 prospectus but I haven't seen it in any others that have come through the letterbox. We did find the info a few years back, I think there was a thread on it and someone gave a link. Think it may have been to the what uni website but can't be sure.

Someone may well come along with the link later this evening.

I think it maybe some people would use it as a tool for whittling down choices but most people probably consider module choice, placement opportunities, location, accommodation before looking at how competitive it is - then again, it depends on the subject.

I wouldn't want my dc to be put off applying somewhere simply because the course is a popular one and they think as such they are less likely to get an offer. There may well be a reason one is more popular than another.

Lots of the most popular universities and courses will have this information for last year. Bristol definitely do and so do Oxbridge. However, as said above, this does not tell you if the course is 5th choice or 1st choice. Although Oxbridge is probably 1st choice. Best to choose the course and university you actually want I think. Although, if you were equally strong at Languages and History, language courses are easier to get onto more or less everywhere. Definitely less competition as so few students take the subject at A level.

Another way to look at populatrity is to consider the average UCAS points on entry in the Complete University Guide. For more popular subjects there seem to be 3-5 Universities where average UCAS points are significantly higher than entry requirements. Usually this is Oxford and Cambridge, and often UCL, Warwick, Imperial, LSE and Durham. The gap give you some indication of selectivity, eg how many qualified students they are likely to be turning down. Universities are often quite clear how competitive some courses are. Warwick were one. LSE publishes applicant numbers on their website.

There is a book published every year with all this information and what the average offer was everywhere, it exists because I had a copy when I was advising students two years ago. For the life of me I cannot remember the name, just go to your school's or school district's career office and ask them about it. I might suddenly have a brain fart and be back in a mo!

Here it is: HEAP 2015

www.amazon.co.uk/HEAP-2015-University-Essential-Winning/dp/1844556050

I don't think knowing the number of applicants in itself is of much use. Durham publish quite a lot of application data

www.dur.ac.uk/undergraduate/apply/statistics/

The departmental summary tables shows the number of applicants, offers, acceptances and final starters. Taking a subject like History for which Durham is extremely highly regarded. For home applicants : Over 1400 applications, almost 500 get offers, just under 250 firmed or insured, and almost 170 actual started. For Archaeology though over 90% of applicants got offers, with just over 40% firming or insuring.

I do think though that DC as mmm suggests should base their application decisions around course content, type of university (eg city, campus etc). I do think the thing to remember is that, with a few obvious exceptions, the number of offers made will be 3 to 4 times more than the actual number who actually take up a place.

Lurgano,

I am not an admissions person but just from 1 DC experience (applying - offer - not confirmed so far - subject to results) I agree with mm and other PPs , the way round to approach this is what does your DC actually want to do , where and how strong a candidate are they realistically. So I have anecdotal evidence of a DC (not mine) who got into a very good university and is not on track for a really good degree because they chose something that (in their case) was "easy". Also have not enjoyed the course. I also agree with titchy , e.g. there are applicants and there are strong applicants so the bald applicants per acceptances doesn't tell the true story.

I am not suggesting for one moment that you are, but at competitive universities or courses my impression is there is no point trying to "game" the system. However where a DC doesn't have a very specific idea and wants to do something "in that area" then yes it could be worth looking at the competitiveness of the course if a similar course/ university would be of interest to them. Nothing will be as important though as the DC wanting to do the course at a university where they feel they could be happy.

MMM - sad to know that relatively few do languages at A level now. My Ds told me that you don't do lit. at A level languages these days. I was [shock} but then I am v old.

In fact I think I am just agreeing with all the other posters but with less knowledge.

And to suck an egg what you do is this

Hocus

Whatuni website gives stats on applicants to places I think

Thanks everyone for all your insight and feedback. DS is clear on the course and Unis he is interested in -- just wanted to understand if there was any other tactical points to consider.

It is best to have a go at some MFL literature if you are applying to Oxbridge though! Going above and beyond the syllabus gives you a chance and probably elicits offers from other universities.