Care leavers across the UK will no longer be required to pay application fees for university or college, Ucas has confirmed.
It is a significant step aimed at bridging the persistent gap in higher education access for this demographic.
The admissions body announced that those who have experienced the care system and are applying to begin their studies in autumn 2027 will see the current £28.95 fee waived.
In an interview Press Association, Ucas chief executive Dr Jo Saxton emphasised the service’s ambition to “remove a barrier to accessing higher education for the group least likely to go on to higher education.”
“The reason we’re doing this is because care leavers are the group in society least likely to go to university,” Dr Saxton said.
“We can play a small part in trying to do something about this, so that’s why we are removing this barrier.”
Ucas announced in 2024 that it would remove the application fee for students receiving free school meals, which it said had benefited 40,000 young people in its first year.
“A lot of care-experienced people will be served by our (free school meals) waiver, but there is a cohort who aren’t necessarily financially disadvantaged, and so we want to make sure that they’re not missing out,” Dr Saxton said.
In the most recent figures for 2023/24, some 13 per cent of care leavers in England went on to higher education by age 19. This was more than three times lower than the 46 per cent of all other pupils who went on to higher education.
The application fee waiver will apply to care leavers up until their 25th birthday in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and up until their 26th birthday in Scotland, in line with the legal definition.
“What we’ve heard from our university beneficiaries, very loud and clear, is that they often don’t know who the care-leaving or care-experienced students are,” Dr Saxton told the Press Association.
“And this is something I experienced myself when I was an academic. I remember being utterly shocked – I was teaching at Cambridge University, and I only realised as a student was partway through their second year that they were care experienced, and the wider university wasn’t aware, because they hadn’t told them. And this is something we hear all the time.”
Ucas hopes that care leavers will feel comfortable to inform them they have been in care when they apply, so that they can point them in the direction of any extra support available at the universities they are looking at.
The move comes amid increasing student concerns about costs and the cost of living at university.
“We talk to young people all the time at Ucas, and one of the things that’s really surprised me during the time that I’ve been here, is they tell us loud and clear that they are concerned about costs today,” Dr Saxton said.
Many students do not see tuition fees as the barrier to going on to university, she added, but the other costs.
“I had quite a moving conversation with a student at Nottingham Trent who talked about how she’d had to hide the application fee from her mum because of how tight things were in their household,” Dr Saxton said.
“And that’s what this mechanism is about overcoming, so that isn’t the difficult conversation.”
A survey by the National Union of Students (NUS) earlier this week found more than half of parents said they were contributing at least £200 a month towards their child’s living expenses at university, with most saying it was hitting their finances.
The latest data from Ucas also found a record number of 18-year-olds starting university in autumn 2025 intended to live at home while studying, particularly if they were from poorer backgrounds.
The Government has announced it will reintroduce maintenance grants for students studying certain subjects from 2028/29 to help, but the NUS has called for them to go further and reform household income thresholds determining how much support students get.
Asked if she thought income thresholds should be looked at, Dr Saxton said: “Obviously, I would support anything that might help increasing participation by encouraging students to apply.
“I’m delighted that the Government has taken the action it has around maintenance.”
The National Network for the Education of Care Leavers (NNECL) and care charity Become welcomed Ucas waiving the application fee for care leavers.
Chloe Grant, director of services at Become, said: “We know care leavers face multiple challenges in reaching university.
“Many will have been forced to leave care without the support they need, making the financial barriers difficult to overcome.
“Removing the Ucas application fee is an important and welcome step in bringing university within reach of more young people with huge talent and potential.”
