Please see below for detailed information relating to the College's thesis submission and viva examination procedures.
Further information on entering for examination can be found on the Examination Entry Form webpage.
Thesis Submission & Vivas
Candidates must submit their thesis electronically via the Postgraduate Research Milestones tile in My Imperial.
Please refer to the College's Thesis Submission Checklist for further information on thesis submission procedures and requirements: Submission checklist for Imperial College degrees
Candidates must submit their thesis by the given submission deadline displayed in My Imperial, regardless of the status of their examination entry paperwork. There is no set thesis file submission limit, however, additional illustrative material to be provided to the examiners may be submitted to the Registry Assessment Records Team (assessment.records@imperial.ac.uk) directly.
Information on the process for requesting an extension to a thesis submission deadline is available from the Thesis Deadline Extension Request.
Step-by-step guidance for My Imperial Postgraduate Reasearch Milestones is available from the PGR Milestones Manual - Students. The following video provides an overview of the Thesis Submission process. Login using your Imperial username and password. To begin, click on Play.
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Thesis Submission
Thesis Submission Process
Thesis Submission Process
Upon submision of your thesis, the Registry Assessment Records Team will liaise with your examination panel and provide them with an electronic copy of your thesis.
Your main supervisor, or another member of staff in your department/division, will be responsible for organising the viva examination and making all parties aware of the confirmed arrangements.
Further guidance on how to prepare for your examination and what to expect during the viva is avaiable via the Graduate School's webpages.
Following your viva examination, the examiners will inform you verbally of the outcome. Written confirmation of the outcome and next steps will be provided to you by the Registry Assessment Records Team, upon submission of the required examination paperwork for processing by your examiners.
After the examination is successfully completed and the subsequent approval of any minor corrections required by the examiners, the final version of your thesis must be submitted to Spiral, the College’s digital repository. Bound copies of the thesis and copies on CD are no longer required.
Please note that this is a requirement of the degree, and no award will be conferred until the final submission has been received and processed by the College.
The final thesis will noly be made available via Spiral upon expiry of any embargo period agreed via the Thesis Declaration procedure.
A hard bound copy of the thesis is no longer required.
If you wish to have printed and hard bound copies of your final thesis printed, please contact the Registry Assessment Records Team for advice.
Research degree awards are conferred by the College on the first of every month.
Following submission of your final thesis, and your examiners' approval that they are satisfied, the degree will be conferred on the first day of the following month. The Registry Assessment Records Team will provide you with written confirmation of award conferral at the appropriate time.
Access further information on the degree award documentation issued to graduates by the College.
Embargoes and access to theses by other scholars
A key outcome of a research programme leading to the award of a PhD, EngD, MPhil or MD Res degree is the accessibility of the thesis embodying that research for the benefit of scholars and the public generally. A research candidate might also publish material generated from their research in the form of a paper in a journal.
For more information on thesis storage and embargoes, please see Access to Research Degree Thesis by Other Scholars [pdf] or visit the Scholarly Communications team website.