Independent applicants

Postgraduate (PG) and doctoral (PhD) students who are not enrolled at any of our partner universities (or who are but their university has already selected a maximum number of students via Erasmus or Exchange) can apply independently (fee-paying) to spend a period of 3 to 12 months undertaking research which is complementary to their master programme or doctorate project at home university.

Placements can be undertaken at any time of calendar year, including summer holidays. 

Information about tuition fees can be found on the UCL Fees website or by contacting UCL Fees office directly.

Please note the following restrictions for independent applicants:
• This option is not available to undergraduate (UG) students  
• We do not offer any funding towards tuition fees  
• We do not offer any taught courses 
• We do not offer any practical training for licensing purposes  
• We do not participate in the Erasmus Traineeship scheme

Application procedure

Before submitting your application, it is essential to identify a member of our Academic Staff who is available to become your supervisor. When you contact them with information about yourself, you should specify that your entry route would be as an independent applicant. You will also be expected to confirm with the potential supervisor that you are able to settle the UCL tuition fees and to specify whether you intending on doing this self-funded or have a sponsor or scholarship to cover the tuition fees in full.

After finding a supervisor and securing their invitation, please inform sop.studyabroad@ucl.ac.uk and follow the application instructions, which can be found on the Graduate Affiliate website for PG students or on the Visiting Research Student page for PhD (doctoral) students.