According to preliminary results, the number of applicants to universities has decreased by 5% compared to last year.

This was announced during a briefing by Oleg Sharov, the General Director of the Directorate of Higher Education and Adult Education at the Ministry of Education.

"When we look at key figures, such as the registration of electronic cabinets for potential applicants and their admissions based on entrance results, it appears that the main figure for this group is a decrease of 5% compared to last year. Sometimes it looks like a decrease of 6%, but there is still a small number of people who will be admitted. Therefore, we estimate the overall trend as a 5% decline from last year in the majority of indicators," said Sharov.

He explained that the admission campaign continues until October 20, and additional enrollments as provided by law are still ongoing. The final results of the admission campaign will be known in the third decade of October.

Sharov noted that the war has a significant impact on the scale and progress of the admission campaign.

"From the perspective of migration: the emigration of people abroad primarily, as well as migration within Ukraine. And from the perspective of state policy, for example, the education system has finally become quite unfriendly to draft evaders. This means that the number of people who enroll in higher education institutions with this goal has become relatively small. This is also a factor in the reduction of the number of learners in educational institutions," said Sharov.

In his opinion, the allowance for men aged 18-22 to leave the country will have a positive impact on higher education.

"It should be understood that this decision was made at a time when those who wanted to leave in 2025 had already left or almost all of them had left. Therefore, we expect a significant positive impact from this decision in the next 2026 year," said Sharov.

He also noted that for several consecutive years, the number of school graduates taking the Unified State Exam abroad has remained stable at 10-12% of the total number of participants each year.

"In principle, taking the Unified State Exam abroad without intending to study at a Ukrainian university seems quite dubious logically. However, it happens that some foreign institutions accept our Unified State Exam. ... But the vast majority of those who take the exam abroad do so to study at Ukrainian universities. Some of them plan to return to Ukraine, while others are waiting for the situation to become safer. There are those who are trying to study online without coming back to Ukraine but maintaining a connection with the Ukrainian education system," said Sharov.

Regarding the most popular universities chosen by applicants, according to him, their ranking has not changed significantly - if previously the leading positions were held by Kyiv Polytechnic Institute and Taras Shevchenko National University, now they are Lviv Polytechnic and Ivan Franko National University. The top universities also include higher educational institutions in Kharkiv.