Responding to your offers

So, you’ve applied and started receiving offers; now you need to decide on which one you want to go to. This is ultimately the most important decision yet, as you’re committing yourself to a university for potentially three years.

And take a moment to congratulate yourself on making it this far! You’ve put in the hard-work and had to make some careful considerations about your future. In the next few weeks, you’re going to be responding to your offers and making some final decisions. (Don’t worry if you haven’t received all your offers yet, they may not respond at the same time).

There's some great information on our website about replying to UCAS offers for a real insight into what to expect. We’ve also got a step-by-step guide in this article, so hopefully it can make it clear for you on how responding to your offers works.

Once I have received my offers, what do I do?

• UCAS Track is the place to find your offers and how you can respond, learn more about how this works.
• You can start responding to your offers once all of the universities you’ve applied to have responded. (If you receive an offer from the university you’re set on, you can withdraw any withstanding applications but it is always a good idea to wait to receive them all in case you change your mind.)
• Universities have until 14 May to make you an offer if you’ve applied before 29 Jan deadline.
• You will then have a deadline for replying and make decisions by 5 June or your application will be ‘declined by default’, so make sure you respond before then. This can be found at the top of the ‘Reply to your offers’ page in UCAS Track.
• All of the dates above apply to 2025 entry, if you are applying for 2026 entry, check the UCAS website for deadlines.

Different types of offers

There are five decisions you may see on your Track:

• Unconditional offer. This means you have guaranteed your place on the course, it doesn’t matter what grades you get at the end of your course, as you already have sufficient grades, qualifications or experience.
• Conditional offer. The place is all yours as long as you meet their conditions, usually dependent on your exam results and/or language requirements for overseas students.
• Invitation received. You’ve been invited for an additional selection such as portfolio viewing or audition. After this, you may be offered an unconditional or conditional offer.
• Unsuccessful. The university has decided not to offer you a place, this may be due to not meeting their entry requirements or other factors.
• Withdrawn. The course choice has been withdrawn, the university will clarify the reason why for this.

Your options – what do they mean?

Once you've received your offers, you don’t have to just choose one course or university, you can make different options - this gives you some flexibility if you don’t get your grades, or change your mind on what you have already applied for.

• Firm acceptance. You can only make one choice for this - it is your first choice. Once you’ve done this, your choice status will be changed to either UF (Unconditional Firm) or CF (Conditional Firm).
• Insurance acceptance. This is essentially your second choice in case you miss out on the conditions of your firm choice. This will become either UI, (Unconditional Insurance), or CI, (Conditional Insurance).
• Decline. Once you've made your firm and insurance choices, you must then decline all your other offers. Of course, if, for some reason you've changed your mind completely, you can decline all your offers. If you don’t decline the offers and just leave them, your application will automatically be declined by the unis you haven’t confirmed a decision with by 5 June - this is known as ‘decline by default’.

Our article Hit or missed the UCAS deadline? What's next? also explains what UF, CF, UI, CI, means and what your options are if you miss any deadlines.

What if I change my mind or I applied later?

If you've changed your mind on what you want to study, or not received any offers, that's not a problem. UCAS Extra is another option - this is only if you’ve used five choices on your application and you're not holding any offers, either because you were not offered a place, or you changed your mind and declined all your offers. Learn more about this in our article UCAS Extra opens.

If you’ve applied through UCAS Extra or submitted a later application but before 30 June, universities need to respond by 17 July, otherwise you will be rejected by default (RBD).

If you receive all decisions by 15 July, you must reply by 23 July, otherwise your application will be declined by default (DBD), including those in Extra.

If you didn't get round to replying to your offers or if you are applying from 5 July, there's always Clearing. Read more about clearing in our two articles The ultimate Clearing guide: part one andThe ultimate Clearing guide: part two where you can get some top tips and advice.

Of course, if you've changed your mind on university altogether, that's fine too. Simply decline any offers you've received or, if you've already accepted one, you can contact the university to cancel.

For more information about the application deadlines, UCAS have all the key dates on their website and if you need any more help an advice, you can always talk to our admissions team who will always be happy to help. Good luck!