• 8/16/2017

Almost 50% of a total of 40,000 applications from outside Germany

Record number of applicants seek admission to TUM

Applications from talented young people hoping to study at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) are at record levels. TUM has received around 40,000 applications for the coming winter semester. That matches the total number of students currently enrolled. Foreign applicants account for 46 percent of the total – also a new record. And for the first time, the master’s applicants outnumber those applying to begin a bachelor program.

Students at TUM's Munich campus.
TUM has received 40.000 applications for the coming winter semester – this almost matches the number of students currently enrolled. (image: Heddergott / TUM)

Over the past five years, TUM has experienced an increase of around 50 percent in the number of applicants. The most popular faculty this year, with around 6,700 prospective students, is the School of Management, which reports a 74 percent increase in applications for master’s programs as compared with the previous year. Other fields of study showing a strong year-on-year increase in applicant numbers are  master programs of the Munich School of Engineering  (plus 80 %) and the departments of  Sport and Health Sciences (plus 48 %), Informatics (plus 36 %) and Mathematics (plus 35 %).

The newest facilities and fields of study at TUM are also a magnet for new students: The TUM-Campus Straubing for Biotechnology and Sustainability has received 400 applications. The new Chemical Biotechnology degree program is in particularly strong demand. The Politics & Technology masters program, which the Bavarian School of Public Policy (HfP) is offering for the first time, attracted 90 applications. TUM assumed responsibility for the HfP in 2014 and since then has refocused the school's activities on the field of politics and technology.

Masters applications from abroad up 280 percent since 2012


For the second consecutive year, the foreign applicants for master’s programs (around 13,700) outnumbered those from Germany (around 7,000). The number of master’s applicants from abroad is 30 percent higher than last year and has increased 280 percent as compared with 2012.

“Since 2000, TUM has pushed hard in every field of study to establish its identity as an international university that strives to recruit the best talent, regardless of nationality, from the freshman class to top academics. To achieve that objective, we make extensive efforts to assess the aptitude of prospective students,” says TUM President Wolfgang A. Herrmann. “TUM is now an internationally recognized brand because an education with close ties to top-level research offers the very best career prospects.”

TUM regularly receives excellent ratings from companies and students alike. It ranks eighth in the world in the “Global University Employability Ranking”, which is  based on managers' assessments of graduates.

Further Information:

Studying at TUM

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Technical University of Munich

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