Goodbye to university entrance exams in September: from 2027 onwards, the resit exams will be held in July

A significant change is coming to the university admissions process in Catalonia. Starting in 2027, the extraordinary sitting of the University Entrance Exams (PAU) – for those who did not pass the June exams or wish to improve their scores – will no longer be held in September but in July. This Friday, the board of the Inter-University Council of Catalonia (CIC) – the coordinating body between the Catalan Government and the twelve Catalan universities – agreed that 2026 will be the last year in which the PAU resits are held in September. With this change, Catalonia aligns itself with the rest of Spain's autonomous communities, as it was the only region that still held the university entrance exams in September. According to a statement from the Department of Research and Universities, the measure follows the same approach already applied to other educational levels (primary, secondary, and upper secondary), where extraordinary exam sessions are not held in September. In fact, nowadays, university degrees don't offer resits in September either. Furthermore, the government also argues that one of the main positive effects of the agreement is that it will allow pre-registration and September course assignments to be brought forward by a few weeks, and therefore, university enrollment can be finalized earlier. In addition, one of the most important changes will be that all students will be able to start university at the same time – in mid-September – regardless of whether they passed the first or second sitting of the university entrance exams. Finally, the CIC also argues that, if students take the resit exams, they will have a much more recent understanding of the subjects because they will have taken the entrance exams just a month before, and "this temporal proximity can contribute to better academic performance." In the last extraordinary sitting of the University Entrance Exams (PAU) in September, 8,237 students registered, representing 18.5% of the total number of students registered in the ordinary sitting in June, in which 44,388 students registered. Peace 2026

Regarding next year's university entrance exams (PAU) – those of 2026 – the regular session will be held on Tuesday, June 9, Wednesday, June 10, and Thursday, June 11, while the resit session will take place on Wednesday, September 2, Thursday, September 3, and Friday, September 4. As for the content and marking criteria, there will be no changes; they will remain the same as those used in the last exams.