Admission

The admission requirements for doctoral candidates are recorded in Article 2 of theTU Delft Doctoral Regulations. More detailed information can be found in the back of the Regulations, in section A of the Implementation Decree.

Admission requirements

According to Dutch law and the TU Delft Doctoral Regulations a doctoral candidate should be in possession of a Dutch Master’s degree. This may be a Master of Science or a Master of Arts degree from a University or College of Higher Education.

Naturally, doctoral candidates with foreign Master degrees are also admitted to TU Delft. Some foreign degrees are evaluated by the TU Delft Admissions Office. This office determines whether the foreign degree can be considered as an equivalent of the Dutch Master degree.

Preparation and paperwork

For every would-be doctoral candidate of TU Delft, a check of their eligibility is standard procedure. This means that, besides a letter and a CV, all applications must include scans of the (highest) diploma and transcript. Furthermore, at the start of their Doctoral Programme all doctoral candidates must be registered as such at the TU Delft Graduate School. For more information about registration and the required documents see Intake Meeting.

Language

Doing a PhD at TU Delft requires English proficiency at a certain level to ensure that the candidate is able to communicate and interact well, participate in English-taught Doctoral Education courses, and write scientific articles and a final thesis. The minimum requirement of a TOEFL overall band score of 100 (with scores of at least 21 for all sections) or IELTS overall band score of 7.0  (with scores of at least 6.5 for all sections) applies to all candidates wanting to pursue a PhD or PDEng programme at TU Delft, starting as of January 2023. Candidates do not need to present the test results as part of their application; these results will be requested at a later stage during the selection procedure. 

Native speakers will be exempt from the English test requirement, as well as, in principle, non-native applicants who have obtained an English-taught Master’s degree. If during the selection process it is deemed that the English proficiency of the candidate with an English-taught Master’s degree does not meet the requirements, they may also be asked to do a test.