Total undergraduate applications to Oxford are up 2.2 per cent on last year, according to figures from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service. Applications to Cambridge are down by 7.4 per cent overall.
Applications from UK residents to medicine, dentistry and veterinary medicine courses nationally are down by 6.2 per cent as a result of Ucas's bringing forward the closing date for applications to October 15 this year. This was a deliberate measure designed to reduce the number of applications for over-subscribed medical places. Overseas applications are down by nearly a fifth.