A total of 34, 700 applicants participated in the autumn joint application to higher education in Finland this year, said the Finnish National Agency For Education in a press release on Friday.
The application period to the programmes starting in January 2026 ended on Thursday.
There were 44,900 applicants in the corresponding joint application in 2024, and the number of applicants decreased by 23 % in autumn this year compared to the autumn previous year.
The share of international applicants was 31%; of them, 97% were from outside of the European Union (EU) and European Economic Area (EEA).
The decline is largely due to the new application fee charged from international applicants after January 1, 2025, said the agency in the press release.
There are more than 10 900 study places available in the autumn joint application, offered mostly by universities of applied sciences (Polytechnic Institutes)-UAS.
About 98 % of the applicants only applied to UAS, 1 % only applied to university studies and 1 % to both university and UAS programmes.
The most popular fields by number of applicants were business, administration and law, health and welfare as well as engineering, manufacturing and construction.
Applicants could select six applications options on the application form, and the average number of study programmed applied to was 3,1 per applicant.
Most of the study programmes available were Bachelor’s level studies, and there were 29 500 applicants to these study programmers. In addition to this, there are nearly 2 100 study places available for Master’s level studies in both universities and UAS.
The majority of the available study programmes were in Finnish while the share of English-language programmes was 10%.
In autumn 2025 applications, 88% of applicants were Finnish citizens. The share of international applicants was 12%, of whom 90% were from outside the EU/EEA area.
During the next few months, higher education institutions will inspect applications and organize entrance exams.
The first results of the autumn joint application will be published in October, and all results will be published on Studyinfo on the 20th of November 2025 at the latest.
Applicants who are offered admission will be automatically informed by Studyinfo via e-mail.
Number of applicants to the first joint application for higher institutions in spring 2025 also reduced due to imposing application fee on international applicants.
- Applicants
- Higher education
- Drop
- Autumn
Source: www.dailyfinland.fi
