ARB Prescribed Examination or a UK Part 1 degree: the two routes costed side by side, from the fee pages themselves

This page compares the cost and shape of two routes. It contains nothing about how to prepare for the examination, because that is not what this comparison is for.

The short version: on the numbers we could read directly from the fee pages, the examination route costs roughly one to two percent of a three-year UK Part 1 degree at international rates. That gap is so large that price is not really the decision. The decision is eligibility, risk and what happens afterwards — and afterwards, both routes converge on the same unavoidable purchase.

Read this before the numbers

Two timing facts change what this comparison is currently good for.

ARB’s Exam Dates page states: “The deadline to apply to sit either the Part 1 or Part 2 Prescribed Examination under the current registration route will be 31 August 2026, with the final examinations taking place in October 2026.” That deadline has passed as of the verification date on this page.

ARB has separately published that it expects a revised Prescribed Examination in spring 2027, subject to a consultation that closes on 16 September 2026, with online applications anticipated from mid-January 2027. We are not going to price a route whose rules are still out for consultation. So the figures below describe the examination as ARB has charged for it up to now, and should be re-checked against whatever ARB publishes for the new arrangements.

Route A — The Prescribed Examination

Fee. ARB’s fees page lists “Prescribed Examination — £1,950 per part”, plus “£300 referral to lead examiner”. Historically both parts were required, so a clean run at Part 1 and Part 2 was £3,900 in examination fees. From October 2026 ARB says it will no longer offer a Part 1 Prescribed Examination, which removes one of those two charges for people who qualify for its incoming route.

Charges you can incur without sitting anything. ARB’s examination page states: “We will return incomplete applications or applications which do meet the eligibility criteria and charge you 25% of the examination fee to cover our initial inspection costs.” It also warns that “Any changes by you, to your preferred examination may incur a 25% charge”, and that if you cancel after accepting a date, “you may lose the entire examination fee unless there is good reason”.

Retry cost. On re-examination “the full examination fee will apply.” Attempts are capped: after a first attempt “you will be allowed two further attempts only”, with a fourth at the Registrar’s discretion on evidence of material improvement. There is a partial-referral concession — where a candidate has satisfied all of GC1 and a further 32 criteria, ARB offers “a referral to the lead examiner”, for which it says “There is a reduced cost for this submission”, and which its fee page prices at £300.

English test. ARB requires IELTS 6.5 or above in each band, academic level, if English is not your first or dual language. We did not read a current IELTS price from the test provider and do not publish one here.

Elapsed time. ARB says exams run virtually on Zoom, that “we are currently running a waiting list of approximately three months on a first-come, first-served basis”, and to “allow approximately three weeks” for eligibility, payment and plagiarism checks. Results come “within 15 working days”, with the result letter “normally within three weeks of the examination”.

What it does not do. ARB’s guidance is explicit: after satisfying Part 1 and Part 2, “you will then need to obtain a UK Part 3 qualification from a UK school of architecture.”

Route B — A UK Part 1 degree at international fees

We read three ARB-relevant undergraduate architecture courses directly from the universities’ own course pages on the verification date. All three are three-year full-time programmes.

University and course	Intake read	International tuition, per year
Newcastle University — Architecture BA Honours (K100)	2027 entry, September 2027 start	£30,900 (year 1)
University of Liverpool — Architecture BA (Hons)	fees stated for academic year 2026/27	£32,000
University of Nottingham — Architecture BArch (Hons)	September 2027 start	£33,500

Three years at those rates is on the order of £92,700 to £100,500 in tuition alone. Liverpool’s page adds the caution that “tuition fees may increase each year for both UK and international students”, so a three-year total computed from a year-one figure is a floor, not a quote.

None of these figures includes living costs, materials, model-making, travel, or the immigration costs of studying in the UK. We have not costed any of those and are not going to estimate them.

Entry. These are competitive admissions. Newcastle lists typical requirements of A-Level AAA or IB 36 points; Nottingham lists AAA or 34 points overall. Nottingham also requires a portfolio and publishes what it must and must not contain. Entry is decided by each university on its own terms.

Elapsed time. Three years full time for the Part 1 alone, before a Part 2 and before the practice-level qualification.

What both routes still cost afterwards

This is where most side-by-side comparisons quietly stop, and it is the part that decides real budgets.

Neither route registers you. Both end with a UK practice-level qualification — the outgoing Part 3 or its accredited replacement — plus practical experience. ARB’s guidance for people with an outgoing Part 3 says they “are likely to be required to have undertaken 24 months of professional practical experience, of which 12 months must be undertaken in the UK, and directly in the two years before you apply for registration.”

We could not read a current Part 3 tuition fee from any school’s own page during this check, and so we publish no figure for it. The prices circulating on third-party sites disagree with each other and we will not repeat them. Get it from the provider you are actually considering, on the day.

Registration itself is comparatively small. ARB’s fee page sets the 2026 registration fee at £225, with an application fee of £40 for first registration within two years of passing a Part 3, or £124 if more than two years have passed, and the registration element pro-rated by the quarter in which you apply.

The honest comparison

The examination route is not cheaper study. It is the removal of study you have already done. It exists for people who already hold an architecture qualification that ARB has not accredited. If you hold one, the exam converts it at a fee that is a rounding error against tuition. If you do not hold one, the exam is not a cheaper way to acquire the education — ARB states that it “cannot use work experience in lieu of any academic study not obtained.”

The degree route buys certainty about eligibility. An ARB-accredited qualification is accredited; there is no equivalence argument to lose, no scrutiny fee, no capped number of attempts. That certainty is what the six figures are actually purchasing.

The failure modes are different in kind. A failed exam costs the fee again and consumes one of three attempts. A degree does not have that statutory cap, but is governed by the university’s own progression and resit rules, which we have not read and do not characterise here.

Both routes converge. Whichever you take, you finish with a UK practice-level qualification and a practical-experience requirement that includes twelve UK-based months.

What to do

1. Answer the eligibility question before the cost question. If ARB’s eligibility test is not met, the examination route’s price is irrelevant. Our separate piece on what ARB requires for degrees not principally in architecture sets out the test.
2. Re-read every fee on the day you commit. All the figures here were read from the source pages on the verification date below. University tuition is restated annually and ARB’s fee schedule changes.
3. Cost the Part 3, not just the entry point. It is the item both routes share and the one no comparison prices.
4. Do not build an immigration plan from this page. Study and work permission in the UK is decided by a separate authority under separate rules. Check gov.uk.

We do not decide eligibility, do not assess qualifications and do not predict outcomes. This page compares two published price lists and the published requirements attached to them.