Undergraduate courses

All undergraduate and postgraduate students will be expected to meet the basic academic competency standards as laid down by the admission criteria of their degree programme in the Department of Computing.

The following highlights the key supplementary competences expected of students studying in the Department of Computing:

• The ability to work as part of a group/team, for the purposes of research, collective problem solving and communication of results/findings.
• The ability to present key facts, ideas, problem solutions, results etc. both verbally and in written form.
• The ability to work independently.
• The ability to use computer systems and appropriate software packages as an aid to research, analysis, problem solving and presentation.
• The ability to exercise self-learning.
• The ability to use acquired theoretical and practical knowledge to tackle unseen problems.
• Knowledge of the general principles and practices of professional codes of conduct.

Students seeking admission to Faculty of Engineering degrees should are also advised to consult the Engineering Council’s UK Standard for Professional Engineering Competence (UK-SPEC) which identifies key competences for the various levels of the Council’s registrants.

This document provides insight into the expectations of the Engineering Council for practising professionals, post-graduation. 

Programme Structure

Our Computing degree programmes are designed to ensure that you will have detailed exposure to both the theoretical and practical aspects of Computing. At Imperial we see Computing as an engineering discipline where the emphasis is on building complex computer-based systems that work and are fit for purpose.

In the first two years, there is a carefully planned programme of practical laboratory work where you will solve problems of gradually increasing size and complexity. Each problem is designed to teach a specific aspect of Computing and, at the same time, provide exposure to a range of software and hardware platforms and tools appropriate to the problem. The emphasis throughout is on instilling transferable problem-solving skills and independent learning, rather than on the teaching of specific technologies.

The mathematical foundations of computing, which includes various topics in discrete and continuous mathematics, is taught through a series of core modules in the first two years. Follow-on modules in the third and fourth years allow you to apply the knowledge and skills gained to build and reason about complex systems, with key drivers being correctness, usability, security, reliability and performance.

If you enrolled on an MEng programme then at the end of the Spring term of the third year you will embark on a full-time, paid industrial placement which finishes just prior to the start of the final year.  

In the final year you will undertake a major individual project spanning around eight months. This presents an exciting opportunity for you to apply the technical skills you have learnt throughout the course, including research and presentation skills, under the supervision of an academic adviser. The topics covered by individual projects vary enormously, from the very theoretical to the very practical. Many projects are aligned directly with the Department’s cutting-edge research activities.

Students graduate with exceptional practical skills and with the ability to apply their extensive knowledge of key Computing principles to the engineering of complex systems that are fit for purpose, and also to academic and industrial research.

BEng vs MEng

The department offers both a three-year BEng programme and four-year integrated Master’s MEng programme in Computing. Both degree programmes involve substantial group and individual project work. The MEng programme has the added benefit of an industrial placement, and in your final year of your programme you will be able to choose from a range of Master’s level elective modules and gain further exposure to cutting-edge research problems in computing.

Visit our Undergraduate Computing webpage for degree and course information. The information here relates to the current academic year and the course offering and curriculum may change in future years.

Please note that we consider all aspects of each application, including academic record, predicted grades/marks, and evidence of motivation for Computing. Competition for the limited number of places on our courses is intense and regrettably, we have to turn down many excellent candidates.

Even if your application is very strong, you may unfortunately not receive an offer.

Our offers are individually tailored, and aim at helping our future students to be fully prepared for the challenges ahead, should they join our courses. Our advertised grades are "minimum", and our offers may be more demanding.

Please search our courses to find out about our entry requirements here, including our English language requirements: https://www.imperial.ac.uk/study/courses/ 

All applications for all our undergraduate Computing degrees are made through UCAS in the first instance. Note that we cannot accept direct applications from applicants. The college provides a complete description of how to go about applying through UCAS. You are advised to get your application in as early as possible before the UCAS deadline.

Admissions test – the TMUA

To be considered for this course for 2025 entry, you will need to sit the Test of Mathematics for University Admission (TMUA) as part of the application process.

Find out more about the TMUA and how to register for 2025 entry.

You can choose whether you sit the test in October 2024 or January 2025 – though we strongly encourage you to register for test sitting 1, where possible.

Application process

• Apply via UCAS track
• Imperial College will check to see if you meet the minimum entry requirements of the course
• If you do not meet the minimum entry requirements, your application will be declined
• To be considered for this course for 2025 entry, you will need to sit the Test of Mathematics for University Admissions (TMUA) as part of the application process. Your application will not be considered if you do not sit the TMUA in the year of application.
• If your TMUA test performance is sufficient, this will be considered in conjunction with your UCAS application form. Your TMUA test score performance in combination with a full assessment of your application form will then inform the decisions of the admissions tutors of whether to make you an offer or not. 

Assessing your application

Admissions Tutors consider all the evidence available during our rigorous selection process and the College flags key information providing assessors with a more complete picture of the educational and social circumstances relevant to the applicant. Some applicants may be set lower offers and some more challenging ones.

Interview

Interviews are not standard for our courses. In very rare circumstances, interviews may be offered to some candidates at the discretion of the admissions tutors.

A-level Selection

Many applicants ask us what A-levels we would recommend. In an effort to provide helpful advice, we have developed the following suggestions:

We strongly encourage applicants to take Further Maths at A2 level. If your school offers Further Maths, we expect you to take it. If your school does not offer you the chance to take Further Maths, please make sure this is stated in your school reference. We will take this into account and will still welcome your application.

Some candidates choose to take Further Maths independently through a local Further Maths Network Centre.

*We do not accept ICT, Business Studies, General Studies and Critical Thinking.

We should emphasise that, with the exception of the required A-level Maths and the A-levels we do not accept, Category 2 and 3 are only a set of suggestions. If your A-level selection does not match this exact pattern, you should not worry unduly.

We do understand that some schools do not offer Computing for students wishing to study the subject for A-level. We will not hold this against an applicant as we do not require Computing as an A-level subject for any applicant, so if you would prefer to take another subject, then this would be fine.

For students looking for a good grounding in the principles of Computing pre A-level, we do recommend the OCR GCSE in Computing. Again, however, this is not a requirement for admission to any of our degrees.

Relevant Subjects Selection

Many applicants ask us what relevant subjects we would recommend, for example at higher level for the IB. Below are our suggestions:

• Physics
• Computer Science
• Chemistry
• Economics
• Biology

Computing Experience?

Each year, a large number of our incoming students have no prior programming experience.

If you are in this category and are thinking of applying to our courses but are worried that a lack of computing experience will leave you at a disadvantage, don't be: we teach a variety of programming languages from scratch in the first and second year, so this is not a problem. You do not need to have taken A-level Computer Science for our degrees.

We look for people who are good at Maths and are excited by computing and its many applications and are or have the potential to be great problem-solvers, lateral-thinkers or systematic thinkers. We welcome people with a wide variety of A-level subjects for our courses.

All undergraduate and postgraduate students will be expected to meet the basic academic competency standards as laid down by the admission criteria of their degree programme in the Department of Computing.

The following highlights the key supplementary competences expected of students studying in the Department of Computing:

• The ability to work as part of a group/team, for the purposes of research, collective problem solving and communication of results/findings.
• The ability to present key facts, ideas, problem solutions, results etc. both verbally and in written form.
• The ability to work independently.
• The ability to use computer systems and appropriate software packages as an aid to research, analysis, problem solving and presentation.
• The ability to exercise self-learning.
• The ability to use acquired theoretical and practical knowledge to tackle unseen problems.
• Knowledge of the general principles and practices of professional codes of conduct.

Students seeking admission to Faculty of Engineering degrees should are also advised to consult the Engineering Council’s UK Standard for Professional Engineering Competence (UK-SPEC) which identifies key competences for the various levels of the Council’s registrants.

This document provides insight into the expectations of the Engineering Council for practising professionals, post-graduation. 

The Departments of Computing and Mathematics of Imperial College offer a three-year and a four-year joint degree course.

1. BEng Mathematics and Computer Science (3 year)
2. MEng Mathematics and Computer Science (4 year)

All courses lead to the Associate of the City and Guilds Institute (ACGI).

These programmes, offered jointly by the two departments, are designed as mathematical courses oriented towards computing science and are suited to mathematically able students with interests in both subjects. The programmes give a firm foundation in Mathematics, in particular Pure Mathematics, Numerical Analysis and Statistics, and cover all the essentials of Computer Science, with an emphasis on developing software and reasoning formally about it, as well as more theoretical topics. The teaching is divided approximately equally between the two Departments.

Students take set courses from each Department in each of the first two years, with some options available in the second year. In each of the third and fourth year students select a total of eight courses from either department to support their particular interests and areas of specialisation. Students are able to switch between JMC degree courses at any stage during the first year. Note that progress on the 4 year MEng degrees require that the student maintains a sufficient performance (2:1 level) throughout the first two years of the degree. As with other MEng degrees in Computing, students may be required to transfer to the 3 year BEng degree if they do not meet this level.

With the spread of computing procedures and mathematical ideas into many areas, there is high demand for professionals who are expert in both computing and mathematics. Graduates in these courses are also well qualified for careers that normally require graduates from one or other of the two disciplines.

JMC Courses

Visit our Undergraduate Joint Maths and Computing webpage for degree and course information. The information here relates to the current academic year and the course offering and curriculum may change in future years.

Please note that we consider all aspects of each application, including academic record, predicted grades/marks, and evidence of motivation for Computing. Competition for the limited number of places on our courses is intense and regrettably, we have to turn down many excellent candidates.

Even if your application is very strong, you may unfortunately not receive an offer.

Our offers are individually tailored, and aim at helping our future students to be fully prepared for the challenges ahead, should they join our courses. Our advertised grades are "minimum", and our offers may be more demanding.

Please search our courses to find out about our entry requirements here, including our English language requirements: https://www.imperial.ac.uk/study/courses/

All applications for all our undergraduate Computing degrees are made through UCAS in the first instance. Note that we cannot accept direct applications from applicants. The college provides a complete description of how to go about applying through UCAS. You are advised to get your application in as early as possible before the UCAS deadline.

Admissions test – the TMUA

To be considered for this course for 2025 entry, you will need to sit the Test of Mathematics for University Admission (TMUA) as part of the application process.

Find out more about the TMUA and how to register for 2025 entry.

You can choose whether you sit the test in October 2024 or January 2025 – though we strongly encourage you to register for test sitting 1, where possible.

Application process

• Apply via UCAS track
• Imperial College will check to see if you meet the minimum entry requirements of the course
• If you do not meet the minimum entry requirements, your application will be declined
• To be considered for this course for 2025 entry, you will need to sit the Test of Mathematics for University Admissions (TMUA) as part of the application process. Your application will not be considered if you do not sit the TMUA in the year of application.
• If your TMUA test performance is sufficient, this will be considered in conjunction with your UCAS application form. Your TMUA test score performance in combination with a full assessment of your application form will then inform the decisions of the admissions tutors of whether to make you an offer or not. 

Assessing your application

Admissions Tutors consider all the evidence available during our rigorous selection process and the College flags key information providing assessors with a more complete picture of the educational and social circumstances relevant to the applicant. Some applicants may be set lower offers and some more challenging ones.

Interview

Interviews are not standard for our courses. In very rare circumstances, interviews may be offered to some candidates at the discretion of the admissions tutors.

A-level Selection

Many applicants ask us what A-levels we would recommend. In an effort to provide helpful advice, we have developed the following suggestions.

Some candidates choose to take Further Maths independently through a local Further Maths Network Centre.

**We do not accept ICT, Business Studies, General Studies and Critical Thinking.

We should emphasise that, with the exception of the required A-level Maths, A-level Further Maths and the A-levels we do not accept, Category 2 and 3 are only a set of suggestions. If your A-level selection does not match this exact pattern, you should not worry unduly.

We do understand that some schools do not offer Computing for students wishing to study the subject for A-level. We will not hold this against an applicant as we do not require Computing as an A-level subject for any applicant so if you would prefer to take another subject, then this is fine.

For students looking for a good grounding in the principles of Computing pre A-level, we do recommend the OCR GCSE in Computing. Again, however, this is not a requirement for admission to any of our degrees.

Relevant Subjects Selection

Many applicants ask us what relevant subjects we would recommend, for example at higher level for the IB. Below are our suggestions:

• Physics
• Computer Science
• Chemistry
• Economics
• Biology

Computing Experience?

Each year, a large number of our incoming students have no prior programming experience.

If you are in this category and are thinking of applying to our courses but are worried that a lack of computing experience will leave you at a disadvantage, don't be: we teach a variety of programming languages from scratch in the first and second year, so this is not a problem. You do not need to have taken A-level Computer Science for our degrees.

We look for people who are good at Maths and are excited by computing and its many applications and are or have the potential to be great problem-solvers, lateral-thinkers or systematic thinkers. We welcome people with a wide variety of A-level subjects for our courses.