How Higher Education Works in France: Degrees, Universities and the Academic Year

The LMD Degree System

France structures higher education around the LMD system: Licence, Master, Doctorat. This matches the Bologna process used across the European Higher Education Area, so your credits and years of study compare directly with degrees from other European countries.

A Licence takes 3 years (6 semesters) and carries 180 ECTS credits. A Master adds 2 more years and 120 ECTS credits, for 300 ECTS total after 5 years. A Doctorat follows a Master and typically takes 3 more years of original research, so a full run from Licence to Doctorat spans around 8 years.

Short-Cycle and Professional Tracks

Not every student follows the full LMD path. The BUT (Bachelor Universitaire de Technologie), delivered at IUTs, is a 3-year vocational bachelor's degree built for direct entry into the workforce or a top-up master's. BTS (Brevet de Technicien Supérieur) is a 2-year vocational diploma taught mostly in lycées rather than universities.

Types of Institutions

France does not have one uniform university system. Several institution types run side by side, and you apply to each through different channels.

• Public universities: open to any student holding the baccalauréat or an equivalent qualification, low tuition, research-active, organized by discipline (law, science, medicine, humanities and so on).

• Grandes écoles: selective institutions covering engineering, business and public administration. Entry usually goes through a competitive exam (concours), often after 2 years of preparatory classes (CPGE).

• IUTs: technology institutes attached to universities, delivering the BUT and shorter professional tracks with close ties to local employers.

• Écoles spécialisées: specialized schools for architecture, art, design, journalism and similar fields, each with its own admission process.

Medicine, dentistry, pharmacy and midwifery use a separate entry route (PASS or LAS) in the first year, with limited places decided by exam and continuous assessment rather than open enrollment.

Academic Year and Credit Structure

The academic year runs from September to May or June, split into two semesters. The first semester covers roughly September to January, the second February to May. You need 30 ECTS credits to validate a semester and 60 to validate a full academic year.

Assessment mixes continuous coursework (contrôle continu) with end-of-semester exams, and the balance between the two varies by institution and subject. Missing the pass mark in a module usually means a resit session (rattrapage) later in the same year.

Language of Instruction

Most Licence and many Master programs teach entirely in French, so a recognized French language certificate (DELF, DALF or TCF) is standard for admission if French is not your first language. Business schools, engineering grandes écoles and a growing number of university master's programs now run tracks fully in English, aimed partly at attracting international students.

Check the language of instruction on the specific program page before applying. A university offering an English-taught master's in one department does not mean every program at that university teaches in English.

Grading and Credit Transfer

French institutions grade on a 20-point scale rather than letters or a 4.0 GPA. A pass is usually 10/20, and anything above 16/20 counts as an excellent result, so a transcript with marks in the 12-14 range is a solid, average pass rather than a weak one. If you plan to transfer credits from France to another European country, your ECTS credits convert directly, since France uses the same credit system as the rest of the Bologna area.

Exchange students on Erasmus+ or bilateral agreements keep their home degree registration while studying in France for a semester or year, and the ECTS credits earned transfer back to their home transcript once the host university sends an official transcript of records.

Quality Assurance and Accreditation

The Haut Conseil de l'evaluation de la recherche et de l'enseignement superieur (HCERES) evaluates French higher education institutions and their degree programs on a regular cycle. A program's HCERES accreditation status is a useful, independent check when comparing offers from different universities, particularly for newer or less well-known programs.

Why Public Tuition Stays Low

Official tuition at public universities looks inexpensive compared to actual teaching costs. According to Campus France , the real cost of educating one student at a public institution typically runs between 10,000 and more than 15,000 euros a year, with the French government covering most of that gap through general taxation. That is why French and EU students pay a small fraction of the true cost, and why the fee difference for non-EU students, while larger, still sits well below the full cost of their education.

How France Compares in Europe

The Licence-Master-Doctorat structure, ECTS credits and two-semester year make France directly comparable to Germany, Spain, Italy and most other Bologna-process countries. What sets France apart is the split between open-access public universities and separately-run, selective grandes écoles, a dual-track model not found in most other European systems, where universities are typically the single main route into higher education.