These are the most oversubscribed universities in the UK according to UCAS

UCAS data has revealed that LSE is the university with the most applicants in the UK, followed closely by Scottish rivals Edinburgh and St. Andrews.

Of the 17,660 students who applied to the London School of Economics and Political Science in 2016, only 1,615 managed to secure a place.

As well as world-class social science teaching, LSE prides itself on its “international community”, with around three quarters of students at the university coming from 160 countries around the world.

Manchester received the highest number of applications at 63,570 – but also accepted the highest number: an astonishing 7,640 undergraduates joined the university last autumn.

Prestigious universities such as Durham, Oxford, and Cambridge were notably unpopular. Cambridge had just 4.9 applicants competing for each place, Oxford 6.1, and Durham 6.2.

Only Aberystwyth and Plymouth were less popular than Cambridge, while Edinburgh had more than double the number of applicants per place at 10.5.

The data, published on UCAS’s website, includes the numbers of applicants and entrants at all universities and higher education institutions in the UK, and is available here.