Admissions · 13 min read

Medicine cutoff marks in Spain: how your score is built and what to do if you fall short

Medicine has the highest cutoff marks in the Spanish university system. Almost every public faculty asks for more than 13 out of 14. This is what that figure means, how yours is built if you are coming from abroad, and which routes remain when the number does not add up.

The first time I saw a table of Medicine cutoff marks I thought there had been a mistake. Thirteen point something, out of ten. It took me a while to understand that the scale does not stop at ten but at fourteen, and that those extra points are exactly the ground where it is decided who gets in.

If you are coming from Syria, Oman, Morocco or any country outside the European Union, that ground works in a very specific way that almost nobody explains to you in full. Let us go through it.

What a cutoff mark actually is

Let us start by clearing up the most widespread misunderstanding. The cutoff mark is not a prior requirement. Nobody sits in an office and decides that this year Medicine will ask for 13.2.

The cutoff mark is the result of the allocation of places. It works like this: everyone who applies is ranked from highest to lowest score, the available places are assigned from the top down, and when they run out, the score of the last person admitted becomes that year's cutoff mark.

That has two practical consequences worth internalising:

• It changes every year. If more candidates with high scores apply one year, the cutoff mark rises without anyone having changed a single rule.
• Last year's figure is guidance, not a guarantee. It is there to help you calculate, not to reassure you. Anyone who lands exactly on the previous year's number is playing heads or tails.

The real figures from last year

Medicine has been the hardest degree to reach in Spain for years, and the gap with the rest is not narrowing. In the 2025/2026 academic year, cutoff marks at public universities moved roughly between 12.60 at the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and 13.71 at the University of Barcelona.

Behind those numbers lies one figure that explains everything: every year more than 40,000 applications are submitted for around 7,000 places across the whole public system. It is not that the examiners are harsh. It is that there are six candidates per place.

A difference of five tenths between Barcelona and Las Palmas looks small written down, but on this scale it is hundreds of positions in the ranking. That is why choosing well which universities you apply to matters almost as much as the score you bring.

How your score is built: the scale up to 14

Here is the heart of the matter. Your admission score has two blocks.

The base block: up to 10 points

If you come from a foreign education system, your school record is assessed by UNEDasiss, which converts it to the Spanish scale and gives you an access mark between 5 and 10 points. That accreditation is digital and valid for two years.

This is the block most people underestimate. If your record converts to a 7, you already start three points behind someone arriving with a 10, and those three points cannot be recovered by any exam. That is why the work you do at school, back in your country, matters far more than it seems from there.

The PCE block: up to 4 more points

The other four points come from the Specific Competence Tests, the PCE exams organised by UNED. They are subject by subject, and each subject carries a weighting coefficient for each degree and each university.

The maximum coefficient is 0.2. The arithmetic is simple: a 10 in a subject weighted at 0.2 adds 2 points. Two such subjects add 4. Ten plus four is fourteen. That is the ceiling.

And here comes the detail that changes many people's strategy: only your two best weighted subjects count. Sitting eight does not multiply by eight. Sitting more subjects serves a different purpose, which we will get to shortly.

Why so many international students stop at 11

This is the pattern I see most often in sessions, and it is almost always for the same three reasons.

The first is not knowing the PCE exams exist. There are students who apply with their UNEDasiss accreditation alone, that is, with a maximum of 10 points, when the cutoff mark is 13. Getting into a public faculty that way is mathematically impossible, and they find out when the lists come out.

The second is choosing subjects that are not weighted. Scoring a 10 in a subject weighted at 0.1 adds one point, not two. Anyone who sits two such subjects has a ceiling of 12, not 14. They studied just as hard and lost two points to a decision made months earlier, without information.

The third is ignoring that weightings change by region. Biology and Chemistry are weighted at 0.2 for Medicine in practically all of Spain, but Physics and Maths are not. In Valencia, Murcia or Extremadura they tend to weight high, while in the Basque Country or Navarre the list is narrower. Preparing Physics expecting it to count and discovering that it is not weighted at your target university is a hard blow.

How many subjects to sit, and why

If only the two best count, the logical question is why anyone would recommend four, five or six. The answer is not accumulation, it is probability.

An exam can go badly for a thousand reasons that have nothing to do with what you know: nerves, an odd question, a bad night. If you sit exactly two subjects and one goes wrong, your ceiling drops from 14 to 12 with no safety net. If you sit five, it is enough for two of them to go well.

For Medicine, the usual backbone is Biology and Chemistry, which are weighted at 0.2 almost everywhere. From there you add Maths, Physics or something else depending on what is weighted at the specific universities where you will apply. The key word is specific: first you settle the list of universities, then you choose the subjects.

Many people do it the other way round, choosing subjects by preference or by how easy they look and then hunting for universities where they fit. It is the longest road to a mediocre score.

What to do if you fall short

Falling short is not the end of the road. It is a fork with five real exits, and it is worth knowing them before the moment arrives rather than after.

1. Resit the PCE exams next year

Your UNEDasiss accreditation is valid for two years, so you do not have to redo everything: you can sit the specific subjects again to raise your score. It is the most efficient option when the gap is a few tenths and you know exactly which exam let you down.

2. Widen your list of universities

The difference between the most demanding faculty and the least demanding is around a full point. Applying only to Barcelona or Seville without looking at the rest of the map is narrowing your options out of habit. Studying Medicine in Las Palmas or in Castellón is studying exactly the same degree with exactly the same qualification.

3. Private universities

Private faculties run their own admission processes, with their own tests and interviews, and generally do not depend on the public cutoff mark. The trade off is financial and it is not small: between 11,000 and 21,000 euros a year, for six years. It is a real route, but you should enter it with the numbers in front of you.

4. Another health degree, with the option to transfer

Nursing, Physiotherapy, Pharmacy or Dentistry have more accessible cutoff marks. Some students enter there, complete a year, and then apply to transfer into Medicine through partial credit recognition, which requires a minimum of 30 ECTS credits to be recognised.

I say this with a warning attached, because I lived that route: do not take it as a plan A in disguise. It works when the original degree genuinely interests you and the transfer is an added possibility. When it is used only as a back door, you end up losing years and money with your heart somewhere else.

5. Another European country

There are university systems in the European Union with less competitive access, and a medical degree obtained within the Union is recognised across the other member states. It is not what I chose, but it is a legitimate option that deserves to be on the table before writing off the degree entirely.

The mistakes that cost you decimals

1. Looking at general weightings instead of your university's. Every institution publishes its own table. That is the one that counts, not a blog summary.
2. Sitting only two subjects. With no margin for error, one average exam closes the door.
3. Leaving the UNEDasiss accreditation to the end. It is a procedure with its own deadlines, and without it there is no score at all.
4. Preparing the PCE with Spanish domestic exam material. They look similar, but they are not the same exam nor the same format.
5. Not checking your certified baccalaureate track. Without it you can be excluded from the ordinary allocation round, which is where almost all Medicine places are.

When you need to start

The short answer is: a year earlier than most people think.

The PCE exams have fixed sessions and registration closes weeks before the exam. The UNEDasiss accreditation requires gathering documents from your country, which can take months to arrive apostilled or legalised. And preparing two or three science subjects in a language that may not be yours is not something you improvise in six weeks.

A reasonable calendar starts twelve to eighteen months before the academic year you want to enter. Someone starting in March to enter in September may pull it off, but they will be up to their neck on every front at once.

Frequently asked questions

What is the cutoff mark for Medicine in Spain?

In 2025/2026 it ranged approximately from 12.60 at Las Palmas de Gran Canaria to 13.71 at the University of Barcelona, out of 14. It changes every year and each university publishes its own.

What is the highest score I can reach as an international student?

Fourteen points. Up to ten from the UNEDasiss accreditation and up to four from your two best PCE subjects weighted at 0.2 for Medicine at your chosen university.

How many PCE subjects should I sit?

Only the two best count, but sitting four to six greatly raises the odds that two come out high. It is a safety strategy, not an additive one.

Do cutoff marks apply to international students in the same way?

There is a specific quota for students from foreign education systems, and its cutoff mark can differ from the general one. It is worth checking the quota figure at each university, because it does not always match the number shown in general rankings.

Can I study Medicine in Spain in English?

At public universities the degree is taught in Spanish, and in some regions also in the co official language. Some private universities offer programmes in English. Either way, clinical practice from third year onwards happens with Spanish patients, so the language becomes unavoidable.

Does my score still work if I change university later?

The accreditation lets you apply to any university within its validity period. Transferring your file once enrolled is a different matter and follows each institution's own procedure.

And if what you are missing is how your previous studies get recognised, I explain it here: homologación, equivalencia and convalidación are not the same thing.

And before deciding what to sit, read this: which PCE subjects to choose for Medicine. It is the decision that hands out the most points and the one most people make blind.

Published 19 September 2026 · Salam Aiach