How To Choose The Best Vet School For You

Check the GCSE and A Level requirements first, and apply mainly where you comfortably meet, and ideally exceed, them, because this is the first thing schools filter on. The bar varies more than people expect. If your GCSE profile is on the lower side, some schools are much more flexible than others, which we cover in our guides to GCSE requirements and A Level requirements. Being realistic here is one of the highest impact decisions you will make.

Different schools ask for different amounts and types of work experience, and some, such as Liverpool, Edinburgh and Glasgow, require you to record it on a specific form as part of applying, while Bristol asks about relevant experience through its Supplementary Assessment Questionnaire instead. Look honestly at the experience you have, or can realistically get, and favour schools whose expectations you can meet well. Our work experience guide sets out what each school is looking for.

Think about whether you want to stay close to home or move away, and whether a city campus or a more rural setting suits you. Many vet schools are split across two sites, with preclinical years in or near a city and clinical years on a rural campus, so look at where you would actually be living in each year. Cost of living, travel to placements and how settled you would feel all matter over a five year course.

Consider how each course is taught, from traditional lecture based and integrated courses to problem based and case based learning, and how early you get hands on clinical exposure. Think too about whether you would like the option to intercalate an extra degree, and the balance of small animal, farm and equine work on offer. To get a feel for the day to day, read our honest account of life at vet school.

Read the detailed admissions information for each school and match it to your own profile. If your academic record is particularly strong, favour schools that weight grades most heavily. If your wider experience and personal qualities are your strength, favour schools that value those. Each school also interviews differently, mostly multiple mini interviews, with Glasgow using a staged process and Bristol using a written assessment rather than an interview, so consider which format would show you at your best. Our vet school interview tips explain how each one works.

UCAS gives you only four veterinary choices, so treat them as a portfolio rather than four shots at the same target. A common mistake is to apply to four of the most selective schools, or four that all weight grades heavily, which leaves you exposed if one element of your application is weaker than the rest. A more sensible spread mixes schools that suit different strengths, perhaps one or two that reward your strongest area and others where your overall profile is comfortably competitive.

Think about realism as much as ambition. There is nothing wrong with including an aspirational choice, but all four being aspirational is a risk when there are only twelve schools and around ten applicants per place. Spreading your choices across selection styles, grade requirements and interview formats genuinely improves your odds of holding an offer at the end of the cycle.

You can only apply to four veterinary courses, which leaves a fifth UCAS slot. Many applicants use it for a related degree such as bioveterinary science, animal science or a biological science, as a considered back up that keeps a science pathway open. This does not weaken your veterinary application, because schools do not see your other choices, and it can be reassuring to have a plan you would genuinely be happy with. Some students instead leave the fifth choice empty, which is also fine.

Wherever possible, go to open days or applicant days, because a campus can feel very different in person from how it looks online. If travel or cost makes that difficult, virtual open days, current student videos and online tours give you a real sense of the place. You are choosing where you will live and learn for five years, so how a school feels to you matters alongside the facts and figures.

The errors that cost applicants most often are applying where you do not meet the published grade or GCSE requirements, choosing schools purely on league table position, overlooking the work experience or admissions test demands of a particular school, and clustering all four choices at the same level of selectivity. Choosing well, with a clear eye on fit and realism, is one of the highest impact things you can do, and it is exactly the kind of strategy we work through with students in our application programme.