What Grades Do You Actually Need for Medicine in Europe?
Only 50 of the 271 programs on this site publish a specific grade threshold, and 48 of those 50 are British. Everywhere else the published requirement is a subject list and an exam, not a number.
Quick Answer
In most of Europe there is no published number to hit, and that is the single most disorienting thing about applying from North America. We recorded the exact admission requirements for 189 of the 271 programs on this site. Only 50 of them name a specific grade threshold — a string like AAA or an IB point total — and 48 of those 50 are in the United Kingdom. The other two are University College Dublin and Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. For 123 programs the published academic prerequisite is nothing more than direct entry from secondary school: a school-leaving qualification that would let you enter university at home, plus the required science subjects. That is not the university being vague. It is the university telling you that your transcript gets you to the door and something else decides the outcome — usually an entrance examination, sometimes an interview, occasionally a ranked file review. If you are searching for the GPA that gets you into medicine in Poland or Romania, the honest answer is that no such number is published, and the exam is the thing to prepare for.
Source Status
Grade thresholds are read from the exact admission requirements recorded per program from each university's own admissions page. 82 programs do not publish requirements at that level of detail and are excluded from the counts.
Quick Take
- 50 programs publish a specific grade threshold; 48 of them are British.
- 123 programs publish nothing beyond direct entry from secondary school.
- Where no grade bar exists, an entrance exam usually decides the outcome.
Where a number actually exists
Of the 189 programs whose exact requirements we recorded, 50 name a grade threshold you can check yourself. The geography of those 50 is the finding:
| Country | Programs publishing a grade threshold |
|---|---|
| United Kingdom | 48 |
| Ireland | 1 |
| Greece | 1 |
The single Irish entry is University College Dublin's undergraduate medicine route, which publishes A-level A*A*A / A*AAD / A*AA plus a D at AS, or IB 39. Its graduate-entry route publishes something else entirely — an upper second class honours degree with a GAMSAT minimum of 57 or an MCAT minimum of 503 — which is a useful reminder that a threshold belongs to a route, not to a university. The single Greek entry is Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, which lists AAB among its accepted academic routes. Everywhere else in Europe, the published requirement is a subject list, a language level and a selection procedure — not a score.
Inside the UK the A-level strings cluster tightly. AAA appears in 25 records, A*AA in 13, AAB in 6, A*A*A in 2 (the University of Cambridge for medicine, alongside University College Dublin), ABB in 2 and BBB in 1. That last one is De Montfort University's pharmacy program, and it is the lowest published academic bar on the whole site.
30 records also carry a GCSE condition on top of the A-levels — usually English and mathematics at a named grade. It is an easy thing to overlook when you hold a North American transcript, because there is no direct equivalent, and it is assessed separately from your final-year grades.
The IB numbers, from highest to lowest
Ten records state an International Baccalaureate point total. The spread runs almost the full width of the diploma:
| University | Program | IB total |
|---|---|---|
| University College Dublin | Medicine | 39 |
| King's College London | Dentistry | 38 |
| Queen's University Belfast | Dentistry | 36 |
| University of Bristol | Dentistry | 36 |
| University of Strathclyde | Pharmacy | 36 |
| Cardiff University | Pharmacy | 34 |
| Newcastle University | Pharmacy | 34 |
| Queen's University Belfast | Pharmacy | 34 |
| King's College London | Pharmacy | 33 |
| Aston University | Pharmacy | 32 |
Read the column on the right and then the one on the left. The 39 and the 38 are medicine and dentistry. Every total at 34 or below is pharmacy. If you hold the IB and your points are in the low thirties, the program that will look at you is not a cheaper medical school — it is a different degree.
Note also that the point total is never the whole condition. Bristol wants IB 36 with required Higher Level sciences; Queen's Belfast wants IB 36 with HL 6,6,6 including biology and chemistry. A 36 built the wrong way does not clear a 36 requirement.
What the other 123 programs say instead
For 123 of the 271 programs, the entire published academic prerequisite is direct entry from secondary school. They are spread across nineteen countries:
| Country | Programs with no published grade bar |
|---|---|
| United Kingdom | 31 |
| Italy | 21 |
| Poland | 14 |
| Romania | 12 |
| Czechia | 7 |
| Bulgaria | 5 |
| Bosnia and Herzegovina | 4 |
| Croatia | 4 |
| Greece | 4 |
| Hungary | 4 |
| Serbia | 4 |
A further 36 programs use a formula worth reading carefully: an international secondary qualification equivalent to the published A-level or IB science requirements. That is a real requirement with no number attached to it, and the equivalence is decided by the university or a national recognition body rather than by you. 14 more accept school-specific A-level, IB, AP or other recognized qualifications with chemistry and biology conditions — the only place in the data where Advanced Placement is named at all.
The instinct when you see no number is to assume the bar is low. That is the wrong reading. Selection still happens — it just happens somewhere your transcript cannot reach.
So what do you prepare instead?
Work out which of three systems your shortlist belongs to, because they reward completely different preparation.
If it publishes a grade string, your transcript is the application. That is the UK and Ireland, plus the UCAT for most medicine and dentistry there. Your equivalency is assessed against the published A-level or IB bar, so find out early how your qualification converts rather than assuming it does.
If it publishes a subject list and an exam, the exam is the application. This is most of Central and Eastern Europe. Your grades get you registered for the test; the test decides the rest. Several universities publish more than one sitting, which changes how much a single bad day costs you.
If it publishes neither, look at what the selection method says before you pay an application fee. A number of programs decide on academic file alone, and a ranked file review is not a threshold — meeting the stated minimum is the start of the competition, not the end of it.
And in every one of the three, check the subjects before the scores. Chemistry and biology together appear in 141 of the 189 published requirement sets, and a missing science is a harder problem to fix late than a mediocre grade.
FAQs
What GPA do you need for medical school in Europe?
No European program on this site publishes a GPA threshold for North American applicants. Only 50 of 271 publish any specific grade bar at all, and 48 of those are British A-level or IB requirements. Elsewhere the published academic requirement is a school-leaving qualification plus named science subjects, with an entrance exam or interview deciding the outcome.
Which European program has the lowest published grade requirement?
Among programs that publish one, De Montfort University's pharmacy degree at BBB is the lowest recorded A-level string, and Aston University's pharmacy at IB 32 is the lowest recorded IB total. Both are pharmacy, not medicine. The lowest published medicine and dentistry bars are considerably higher.
Do European medical schools accept AP courses?
Advanced Placement is named in only 2 of the 189 exact requirement sets we recorded, both within a formula covering school-specific A-level, IB, AP or other recognized qualifications with chemistry and biology conditions. Most universities instead ask for a secondary qualification judged equivalent to their published requirement, which is assessed case by case rather than listed.
What IB score do you need for medicine in Europe?
Where an IB total is published, the medicine and dentistry figures are 39 at University College Dublin, 38 at King's College London for dentistry, and 36 at Queen's University Belfast and the University of Bristol for dentistry. The pharmacy totals sit lower, between 32 and 36. Every one of them also carries Higher Level science conditions that a raw point total does not satisfy on its own.
If a university publishes no grade requirement, is it easier to get into?
Not necessarily. A missing grade bar usually means selection happens through an entrance examination, an interview or a ranked file review rather than through the transcript. In several countries the exam is the entire competition, so the preparation shifts rather than disappearing.
Do I still need GCSE-equivalent qualifications?
30 of the recorded requirement sets include a GCSE condition, typically English and mathematics at a named grade, on top of the A-level or IB requirement. All of them are British. If you hold a North American transcript there is no direct equivalent, so the university assesses it separately — ask specifically about it rather than assuming your final-year grades cover it.