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General requirements

Students must meet specific requirements for admission to an Italian University.

To be eligible for enrolment in the Italian university system, you must be at least 17 years old and have completed 12 years of schooling.

Students with Italian nationality or of another EU country or permanent residence in Italy may apply directly to their chosen university or institution of higher education.

Students can enrol to Italian Universities through an online registration procedure at each University. Information about the enrolment procedures must be sourced at each University.

Once you have selected your Italian degree program, verify if it requires an admission test. Entry to undergraduate degree programs can either be restricted or open, or can be subject to a motivational test or entry examination.

The calendar of admission tests can be found on the Universities’ websites.

Once the registration is completed, each student will receive an identification number (matricola) which will be required to pay university taxes and to register for exams.

Access to 1st cycle programme

Your foreign qualification provides access to 1st cycle programmes if:

  1. it is an official final secondary school leaving certificate from the relevant foreign system;
  2. it provides access to comparable first-cycle programmes (e.g. academic) in the relevant foreign system;
  3. it was obtained after at least 12 years of schooling.

In case in the relevant foreign system a national test or final examination is required to enter a higher education institution, this requirement is also compulsory to access the Italian programme.

IF YOU HAVE LESS THAN 12 YEARS OF EDUCATION

If you obtained your qualification after 11 or 10 years of schooling, you can’t access Italian Universities unless you satisfy one of the following additional conditions:

  • you attended 1 or 2 years of University studies. In this case you must provide a transcript of the exams translated into Italian and legalized by the Italian competent Consulate (if not issued by the University directly in English, French or Spanish);
  • you obtained a post-secondary qualification to compensate for any missing years of secondary education;
  • you attended a preparatory course (Foundation Year) at an Italian/foreign institution, to make up for the missing years of schooling.

IF YOU DO NOT HOLD A REGULAR HIGH SCHOOL DIPLOMA

In case your diploma is from a High School in the USA or in the UK, additional documentation may be required (i.e. additional APs or SATs).

The International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma will be accepted for enrollment without any additional documentation only if issued from one of the schools listed here > https://www.studiare-in-italia.it/studentistranieri/ (Click on Allegato 1, Allegato 2).

In case the diploma was issued by a school not mentioned in the list, it will be necessary to provide the usual set of documents required for enrolment.

For certain final secondary school qualifications, specific requirements may be needed (please check the Attachment 1 of the Procedures for entry of foreign students requiring visas to courses of higher education in 2022-2023).

Access to 2nd/3rd cycle programmes

Your foreign qualification provides access to 2nd and 3rd cycle programmes if:

  1. it is an official first or second cycle qualification awarded by an official institution of the foreign higher education system;
  2. it allows entry to equivalent second or third cycle programme in the relevant foreign system;
  3. it is coherent with the academic discipline chosen (i.e. it shares the same academic nature or research elements).

These requirements apply for all students holding a foreign qualification, regardless of their nationality (qualifications earned both in EU and non-EU countries).