Study at Oxford
The University of Oxford stands as a global beacon of academic distinction, celebrated for its exceptional teaching, groundbreaking research, and profound societal contributions. It masterfully blends a rich historical legacy with the forward-thinking dynamism of a contemporary institution.
A Global Leader in Higher Education
For an unparalleled nine consecutive years, the University of Oxford has been recognized as the world’s premier university by the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings (2025). This prestigious accolade is a testament to its sustained excellence across a multitude of disciplines. In 2024, THE also ranked Oxford first in the world for both clinical and health studies and computer science. Furthermore, the university secured top-five placements in social sciences, life sciences, business and economics, arts and humanities, and engineering. The QS World University Rankings 2025 further solidifies Oxford’s standing, placing it among the top three universities globally.
graduate studies at oxford
With a graduate student population exceeding 13,000, which constitutes half of the university’s total student body, Oxford fosters a vibrant and integral graduate community. These students are at the heart of the university’s academic life, collaborating with world-renowned academics to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time.
The admissions process for graduate programs at Oxford is highly competitive, with specific requirements varying by course. However, a common thread across all departments is the search for students who possess the intellectual capacity, passion, curiosity, and dedication required for advanced study. Oxford is committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive environment, welcoming applications from individuals of all ages, nationalities, and backgrounds.
Oxford holds its graduate students to high standards while providing a supportive and intellectually stimulating environment to help them achieve their full potential. This includes access to state-of-the-art research facilities, unparalleled resources across all disciplines, and comprehensive personal and welfare support. A strong sense of community and dedicated academic guidance are hallmarks of the Oxford graduate experience.
Graduate students at Oxford benefit from an extraordinary array of resources, including over 100 libraries, cutting-edge experimental laboratories, and world-renowned museums and collections. This guide will delve deeper into these exceptional offerings.
A Hub of Research Excellence
As one of the world’s leading research universities, Oxford is renowned for its exceptional research facilities and its commitment to innovation. It is home to some of the most brilliant and talented researchers globally.
The 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF) highlighted Oxford’s submission as having the highest volume of
“world-leading” (4*) research among all UK institutions. Oxford submitted over 3,600 researchers (3,405 full-time equivalent) across 29 subject areas, produced over 8,500 research outputs ranging from journal articles to musical compositions, and documented 220 case studies illustrating the broader impact of Oxford research beyond academia. In the 2021-22 academic year, the University of Oxford secured an impressive £711.4 million in external research funding.
The University is at the forefront of addressing issues of national, regional, and global significance. Its research is characterized by its groundbreaking nature, collaborative spirit, and interdisciplinary approach. Oxford is deeply committed to building global research partnerships — working closely with universities, funding organizations, industry leaders, sponsors, and supporters around the world.
The Graduate Researcher Experience
Graduate students are integral to the University’s research endeavors. They work alongside academic staff, contributing to the exploration of fundamental questions and the resolution of major global challenges. Oxford actively seeks out the most promising students to join its outstanding departments and faculties.
As a graduate student at Oxford, you will have the unique opportunity to collaborate with peers and leading experts in your field, who will provide inspiration and support throughout your academic journey. You will gain access to world-class facilities and resources tailored to your subject area, and you will be encouraged to actively participate in the intellectual life of your department and the broader academic community.
An Oxford research degree offers an unparalleled chance to delve deeply into your chosen area, pursue your own innovative ideas, and make a significant and original contribution to knowledge. The university provides a nurturing environment where researchers at every stage of their career can thrive. Many current and former students share their research experiences at Oxford, covering diverse topics from advanced cooling technologies for jet engines to the intricate processes of blood stem cell formation. Further details on graduate research courses are available on the university’s official course selection pages.
World-Class Facilities
Over the past decade, the University has invested more than £400 million in its science facilities and infrastructure, resulting in some truly cutting-edge research environments. Here are a few examples of Oxford’s newest world-class facilities:
- The Beecroft Building: This state-of-the-art laboratory and teaching facility for experimental and theoretical physics accommodates approximately 200 physicists. Its high-specification laboratories are designed to house extremely environmentally sensitive atomic-level experiments, ranking among the best globally. They maintain temperature control within a tenth of a degree and reduce vibration to the width of a few atoms, ensuring optimal conditions for precise research.
The Li Ka Shing Centre for Health Information and Discovery: A new £115 million interdisciplinary research center, this facility stands as the world’s largest health data institute. It houses both the Targeted Discovery Institute (TDI) and the Big Data Institute (BDI), providing space for 600 scientists across various research areas. Their collective work aims to define diseases more accurately, identify targets for new drugs, and enhance understanding of disease response to treatment.
The Earth Sciences Building: Equipped with a comprehensive range of specialized laboratories, this building boasts the largest suite of mass spectrometers of any earth science department worldwide. Its metal-free labs enable contamination-free analysis of trace metals, and its basement labs have been specifically modified to eliminate any trace of the Earth’s magnetic field, facilitating highly sensitive geological research.
Oxford’s Legendary Libraries
Oxford is renowned for its extensive library system, and for good reason. The University possesses an extraordinary collection of books, manuscripts, and other materials, many of which are housed in magnificent, historically significant buildings. These unparalleled resources attract scholars from across the globe.
The Bodleian Libraries
Established in 1602, the Bodleian Library serves as the principal university library and is one of Europe’s oldest. For over 400 years, it has maintained its status as a legal deposit library, receiving a copy of every item, whether digital or online, published in the UK.
The Bodleian Libraries make up the largest library network in the UK. This vast network includes the main Bodleian Library and numerous other libraries throughout Oxford, encompassing major research libraries, faculty-specific libraries, departmental libraries, and institute libraries. Together, these libraries hold more than 13 million printed items, over 80,000 e-journals, and exceptional special collections, including rare books, manuscripts, classical papyri, maps, music, and printed ephemera.
As a graduate student, you will be issued a Bodleian Reader Card (commonly known as a ‘Bod card’), granting you access to the Bodleian Libraries and their world-class resources. To help you maximize your use of Oxford’s libraries, the Bodleian offers workshops designed to enhance your research skills, keep you abreast of emerging research in your field, facilitate access to essential scholarly materials, and assist with research data management.
Department and Faculty Libraries
The Bodleian Libraries are seamlessly integrated with approximately 30 department and faculty libraries. These specialized libraries not only offer extensive holdings of books and journals pertinent to their respective fields but also serve as invaluable resource hubs for students engaged in focused study or research within a particular subject area.
For instance, the Radcliffe Science Library, the University’s primary science library, houses approximately 1 million printed items spanning various scientific disciplines. It conducts training workshops on topics such as handling sensitive research data and open-access scholarship, and provides inductions for graduate students in science subjects. The library also offers innovative services like 3D printing and scanning, virtual reality (VR) equipment, and a 360° camera, with drop-in sessions available for students to explore these resources and learn about their application in research.
College Libraries
Oxford’s colleges also boast impressive libraries. Most college libraries maintain substantial collections across a wide range of disciplines, with some also offering specialized collections in specific subject areas. A selection of these incredible books, manuscripts, and other ephemera can be viewed digitally through Digital Bodleian.
Many college libraries operate 24 hours a day, providing graduate students with access to excellent resources and a quiet, comfortable environment conducive to study. Detailed information about each college’s library can be found in the university’s College listing.
Digital Resources
Oxford seamlessly combines its rich heritage with modern infrastructure and facilities designed to meet the evolving needs of today’s students and scholars. Across the University, digital technologies are revolutionizing research and learning, from computational approaches to drug discovery to immersive virtual reality explorations of historical sites like the Colosseum. Oxford has long been a center of excellence in computing and engineering and remains at the forefront of research in fields such as artificial intelligence and quantum computing.
Regardless of your chosen subject, the university is committed to empowering you to leverage technology for enhanced study and research. Oxford operates one of the largest private networks in the UK, providing high-speed internet access and excellent IT facilities and support, including hundreds of computers available throughout the university. Its virtual learning environments (VLEs) enable students to access course materials and collaborate effectively, and many lectures are captured as audio or video podcasts for flexible learning.
Enhanced Research Access
At Oxford, access to invaluable research materials is often just a few clicks away. SOLO, the University’s primary search engine for library collections, allows students to search almost all holdings within the Bodleian Libraries, as well as departmental, faculty, and college libraries across Oxford You’ll get instant access to millions of books, e-books, journals, articles, reports, and online databases all at your fingertips.
Oxford’s museums and libraries are actively utilizing new technologies to provide digital access to their collections, including many objects and texts that might otherwise be inaccessible. Digital Bodleian, for instance, makes the Bodleian’s unique treasures freely available worldwide. It features over 650,000 digital objects, including images of manuscripts, rare books, maps, and ephemera, ranging from medieval Arabic cosmographies to J.R.R. Tolkien’s annotated maps of Middle-earth, and from classical papyri to drafts of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Similarly, the Ashmolean Museum has undertaken a major digitization project, with over 60,000 object records now available for browsing or searching.
Oxford’s academic community is strongly dedicated to making its world-class research as accessible as possible to everyone. The university maintains an open-access policy for publications resulting from its research. All researchers are encouraged to deposit their research publications in the Oxford Research Archive (ORA), the University’s digital repository, which currently holds over 225,000 works, including datasets.
Skills and Professional Development
Oxford provides numerous opportunities for graduate students to acquire valuable digital research skills and deepen their understanding of data discovery and utilization. The Bodleian iSkills program offers workshops for graduate students in information discovery and scholarly communications, while training in digital research skills is also provided by the university’s graduate schools. The Bodleian Data Library offers guidance on finding data and statistics, managing research data, and facilitates access to restricted data collections, assisting researchers in applying for access to sensitive offsite datasets.
The University’s IT Learning Centre (ITLC) conducts many classroom-based IT courses in state-of-the-art learning rooms. These courses cover a wide array of topics, including programming, digital media and platforms, data analysis, data management, data visualization, and high-performance computing.
Everyone at the University gets free access to a huge collection of video courses on LinkedIn Learning. These courses, taught by industry experts, cover thousands of topics, from Python programming to project management, offering invaluable opportunities for continuous professional development.
Museums and Galleries
As a graduate student, you will have free access to Oxford’s world-famous museums and collections, which serve as astonishing resources for study and research.
The Ashmolean Museum
The Ashmolean Museum, the University’s museum of art and archaeology, holds the distinction of being the oldest public museum in the world, having opened in 1683. It houses significant and diverse collections from across the globe, spanning from ancient Egyptian mummies and classical sculpture to Pre-Raphaelite art and modern works. For graduate students working with historical materials, the Ashmolean offers a uniquely rich resource. Students are often encouraged to explore its collections, both on display and behind the scenes, and may have the opportunity to work directly with museum materials as part of their studies or research.
Oxford Botanic Garden and Arboretum
Nestled in the heart of the city, Oxford’s Botanic Garden is the oldest in the UK and one of the oldest scientific gardens globally. With more than 6,000 plant species, it provides a vital resource for academic research and education. Current research at the Botanic Garden includes studies on the evolution of parasitism, conservation of plant collections from biodiversity hotspots, and the fascinating biology of carnivorous pitcher plants.
History of Science Museum
Housed in the world’s oldest purpose-built museum, the History of Science Museum holds an exceptional collection of around 20,000 scientific instruments and artifacts, spanning from antiquity to the late 20th century. Notable exhibits include 13th-century Islamic astrolabes, Lewis Carroll’s photographic equipment, and a preserved blackboard from Albert Einstein’s second lecture in Oxford in 1931.
Museum of Natural History
Often described as a “cathedral to science,” the Oxford University Museum of Natural History has been a center of world-leading research and scientific discourse since its opening in 1860. The impressive neo-Gothic structure contains a vast collection of over 7 million scientific specimens, along with 20,000 books and 500,000 manuscripts. Its remarkable holdings include the fossilized remains of the first dinosaur discovered by scientists and the only surviving soft tissue remains of a dodo. The museum serves as a major research hub, with its collections actively utilized in research by the Department of Earth Sciences, Department of Zoology, and the School of Archaeology.
The Pitt Rivers Museum
The Pitt Rivers Museum offers a unique curatorial approach. Founded in 1884, it houses over half a million objects from around the world, arranged not by age or origin but by type – a “democracy of things.” Here, visitors can discover both significant cultural treasures and everyday objects that illustrate the diverse solutions humans have devised to fundamental problems. Graduate students in archaeology and anthropology can borrow resources from the Balfour Library, one of the UK’s leading museum research and teaching libraries specializing in anthropology, archaeology, and world music.