Welp, these are the absolute hardest subjects to get into Oxbridge for

Getting into Oxbridge is almost as hard as getting Lana Del Rey tickets. But your chances of worming your way into Oxbridge actually varies loads depending on which course you pick.  You are 16 times more likely to get in for the easiest subject, modern languages at Oxford, than you are for the hardest subject, Mathematics and statistics at Oxford.

If you desperately want to get into Oxbridge to please your parents but you don’t actually care what you do there, you could pick a course a lot more, ahem, strategically. These 40 courses are ones to avoid if you’re trying to maximise your odds.  You can read about the easiest subjects to get into Oxbridge for in 2025.

These stats come from Oxford and Cambridge’s websites, and refer to the current freshers.

Without further faffing, here are the 40 hardest subjects to get into Oxbridge for in 2025, ranked by the percentage of applicants who got in last time:

40. Archaeology and anthropology, Oxford – 20.0 per cent

39. History and politics, Cambridge – 19.6 per cent

38. Philosophy and theology, Oxford – 19.2 per cent

37. Engineering science, Oxford – 19.0 per cent

36. Geography, Cambridge – 18.9 per cent

35. Chemical engineering and biotechnology, Cambridge – 18.0 per cent

34. Education, Cambridge – 17.9 per cent

33. Psychology, philosophy and linguistics, Oxford – 17.5 per cent

32. Biology, Oxford – 17.3 per cent

31. Human sciences, Oxford – 16.6 per cent

30. Philosophy, Cambridge – 16.3 per cent

29. Mathematics, Cambridge – 16.2 per cent

The Cambridge Maths building in all its strangeness
(Credit: Dmitry Tonkonog)

28. Medicine, Cambridge – 15.6 per cent

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27. History of art, Oxford – 15.0 per cent

26. Experimental psychology, Oxford – 14.8 per cent

25. Law, Cambridge – 14.6 per cent

=23. Philosophy, politics and economics, Oxford – 14.2 per cent

=23. History and politics, Oxford – 14.2 per cent

22. Engineering, Cambridge – 13.8 per cent

21. Biochemistry, Oxford – 13.1 per cent

20. Physics, Oxford – 12.7 per cent

19. History and English, Oxford – 12.5 per cent

18. Mathematics and philosophy, Oxford – 12.3 per cent

17. Fine art, Oxford – 12.2 per cent

16. English, Oxford – 12.1 per cent

15. History and economics, Oxford – 12.0 per cent

14. Law, Oxford – 11.8 per cent

It’ll be worth it when you get to put pics of the Bod on your insta story all day long
(Credit: Peter K Burian)

13. Human, social and political sciences (HSPS), Cambridge – 11.6 per cent

12. Architecture, Cambridge – 11.5 per cent

11. Land economy, Cambridge – 11.3 per cent

10. Mathematics and computer science, Oxford – 11.0 per cent

9. Medicine, Oxford – 9.5 per cent

8. Biomedical sciences, Oxford – 9.4 per cent

7. Psychological and behavioural sciences, Cambridge – 9.1 per cent

6. Law Studies in Europe, Oxford – 8.2 per cent

5. Computer science, Cambridge – 7.6 per cent

4. Medicine graduate course, Cambridge – 7.3 per cent

3. Computer science, Oxford – 6.8 per cent

2. Economics and management, Oxford – 5.9 per cent

1. Mathematics and statistics, Oxford – 3.5 per cent

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