What Replaced the BMAT, and What to Do Now

The BMAT was withdrawn after its autumn 2023 sitting. Every university that used it now uses the UCAT, and the UCAT itself changed in 2025 when Abstract Reasoning was removed, cutting the maximum cognitive total from 3,600 to 2,700. For 2027 entry, booking closes on 16 September 2026. This page sets out what replaced what, and what the new numbers mean.

When exactly was the BMAT withdrawn, and what happened to it?

The BioMedical Admissions Test ran its final sitting in the autumn of 2023, used for applications for entry in 2024. It has not been sat since. For anybody applying for 2027 entry, the BMAT is not part of the process in any form: there is no paper, no registration, and no university requiring it.

The test itself had three sections. Section 1 assessed thinking skills, problem solving and critical analysis. Section 2 assessed scientific knowledge and applications drawn from GCSE-level biology, chemistry, physics and maths. Section 3 was a handwritten essay, marked for content and for quality of written English. That combination made it unusual: it was the only widely used UK medicine admissions test that examined subject knowledge and extended writing as well as reasoning.

The practical significance of the withdrawal is that the knowledge and writing halves of the assessment disappeared with it. Nothing in the current process replaces Section 2 or Section 3. A candidate who spent the summer revising GCSE physics for a medicine admissions test would, for 2027 entry, be revising for nothing.

Which universities used the BMAT, and what do they use now?

All of them moved to the UCAT, and it is worth being concrete about that because a great deal of older advice still implies a split. The UCAT Consortium publishes its list of UK universities with their UCAS institution codes; for the 2026 test cycle that list runs to 50 entries and includes every former BMAT school.

Oxford leaves no room for doubt on its own course page: all applicants must take the UCAT. That single sentence does more work than any amount of commentary, because the most common residual confusion is the belief that Oxford or Cambridge medicine still carries a separate written paper. Neither does. The one place extended writing still appears in an Oxford application is in courses that ask for submitted written work, and medicine is not one of them.

What did not change is that these universities interview. Oxford, Cambridge and Imperial all shortlist for interview, and the UCAT is used to help decide who is shortlisted rather than who is offered a place. That shifts where preparation effort belongs: the test buys the interview, and the interview decides the offer. Our admissions test preparation pages cover both halves.

What changed in the UCAT itself in 2025?

This is the part most guides written in 2024 get wrong, including several still ranking for BMAT queries. Abstract Reasoning was removed from the UCAT in 2025. The cognitive test is now three subtests rather than four, and the Situational Judgement Test continues alongside them as a separately banded assessment.

The headline totals look like a collapse and are not. Removing a subtest scored out of 900 cut the maximum cognitive total from 3,600 to 2,700. Expressed as a share of the maximum, the mean was 2523 out of 3,600 in 2024 and 1891 out of 2,700 in 2025 — both a shade over 70 per cent. Candidate performance relative to the test did not move; the scale did.

The subtest means tell a slightly different story. Verbal Reasoning was flat at 602 against 601. Decision Making rose from 620 to 628 and Quantitative Reasoning from 649 to 661. Quantitative Reasoning remains, as it has for years, the subtest on which candidates score highest, and Verbal Reasoning the one on which they score lowest — a gap of 59 scaled marks in 2025. If you are deciding where to put revision time, that gap is the most useful single number on this page.

Entries also rose. 41,354 tests were taken in 2025 against 37,913 in 2024, an increase of 3,441 or 9.1 per cent, with no corresponding increase in medical school places. Competition for the same intake is measurably tighter than it was the year before.

What counts as a good UCAT score on the new scale?

Because the scale changed, any target inherited from an older guide is wrong. The UCAT Consortium publishes deciles, and deciles are what most universities actually use.

Read that table as a set of thresholds rather than as a ladder. A total of 1880 is the 5th decile, meaning half the field scored below it. 2010 puts a candidate in the top 30 per cent, 2100 in the top 20 per cent and 2220 in the top 10 per cent. Because universities weight the test so differently — some rank purely on total, some apply a threshold and then look at everything else, some use deciles directly — the sensible way to use a score is to check it against each school's published approach before finalising four UCAS choices, which is exactly why results arrive well before the 15 October deadline.

The Situational Judgement Test is banded separately and the band distribution moved sharply in 2025. Band 1 went from 13 per cent of candidates to 21 per cent, Band 2 from 36 to 39 per cent, Band 3 from 38 down to 29 per cent, and Band 4 from 13 down to 10 per cent. A Band 1 is now considerably more common than it was, which matters at the schools that use the SJT as a hard filter rather than as a tie-break.

What are the deadlines for 2027 entry?

The UCAT timetable is unforgiving and the dates that catch people out are not the ones they remember. The UCAS deadline is in October; the deadline that actually ends the application is in September.

Two of those rows deserve emphasis. The access arrangement deadline on 10 September 2026 falls before the booking deadline, so a candidate who needs extra time must have applied for it before they can sensibly book. And 16 September 2026 closes registration altogether: a candidate who has not booked by 15:00 that day cannot sit the test, and without a test result cannot apply to any consortium university for 2027 entry, regardless of the 15 October UCAS deadline still being four weeks away.

Should you still use BMAT past papers?

Partly, and with a clear rule. The BMAT's Section 1 material — problem solving, spatial and logical reasoning, critical analysis of arguments — overlaps genuinely with UCAT Decision Making and, to a lesser extent, Quantitative Reasoning. It is well written, freely available, and there is a lot of it. Used as extra reasoning practice it is worth having.

Section 2 and Section 3 are a different matter. Section 2 tested scientific knowledge and the UCAT tests none. Section 3 was a handwritten essay and the UCAT contains no writing at all. Time spent on either is time not spent on the timing problem that actually decides UCAT scores, which is that almost nobody finishes comfortably.

The one caveat is interviews. The reasoning and ethical judgement that Section 3 rewarded still matter at Oxford, Cambridge and Imperial, but they are assessed in the interview rather than on paper. A BMAT essay question makes a reasonable interview discussion prompt. It does not make useful written practice for a test with no written component.

If you want a plan built around the test as it now is, rather than around guidance written before 2025, our subject and admissions support pages set out how we work, and you can book a free consultation before the 16 September booking deadline.

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