Universities Get State-Funded Slots for 2026 Academic Year

The Ministry of Science and Higher Education has determined the number of state-funded places for the 2026–2027 admission campaign. In Russia, the total number has increased, but distribution has shifted in favor of engineering, medical, and agricultural fields, while humanities, economics, and law have seen reductions.

Feb 19, 2026

The allocation shifts focus towards engineering and medical fields while reducing humanities places.
Source:
Alexander Baranov / Kommersant

For the 2026–2027 academic year, Russian universities have been allocated 620.5 thousand state-funded places, which is 1.5 thousand more than last year. Of these, 371 thousand places are intended for bachelor«s and specialist full-time programs.

At a government meeting, Minister of Science and Higher Education Valery Falkov called on universities to align requests for state-funded places with the needs of the regional labor market. «This alignment is not close in some cases,» he noted.

The structure of place distribution has changed: engineering fields received an increase (+1,169 places), agricultural (+594), and medical (+166). Simultaneously, a reduction in enrollment for humanities, arts, and culture is planned.

The minister paid special attention to the training of lawyers and economists in non-core universities. «We have a large number of students studying law and economics in technical, medical, agricultural, and pedagogical institutions,» Falkov added.

In St. Petersburg, for 2026, more than 34,300 state-funded places will be available for admission, which is almost 10% higher than last year«s figure.

The leaders in the number of places remain:

Polytechnical University (about 3,400 places)
St. Petersburg State University (control figures increased by 7%)
Mining University (+8%)

The highest relative growth in the number of state-funded places was demonstrated by:

Technological Institute (+69%)
Pushkin Leningrad State University (+26%)
Almazov National Medical Research Center (+15%)
Marine Technical University (+11%)

In 18 universities in the city, state-funded admission was reduced. The greatest decline was noted in branches of Moscow universities: Financial University (-62%) and RANEPA (-13%). Enrollment also decreased at the Institute of Psychology and Social Work (-20%).

In 2026, it will be easiest to enter fields where the number of state-funded places is in the hundreds:

«Pediatrics» at the Pediatric University (583 places)
«General Medicine» at the First Medical University
«Sports» at Lesgaft University
Many places are also available in engineering specialties at Petersburg State Transport University, «Shipbuilding» at the Marine Technical University, and «Electronics» at Saint Petersburg Electrotechnical University «LETI».

Paid enrollment in a number of universities has decreased by 25–40%, which is linked to the system of state regulation of fee-based admission. This particularly affected humanities, socio-economic fields, as well as economics and law programs in technical universities.

A number of popular programs remain exclusively fee-based. For example, at St. Petersburg State University, there are no state-funded places for creative fields (acting, vocals) and «International Management». At the State Architectural and Construction University, more than ten full-time programs (from IT to management) are offered only on a contract basis, and at the Polytechnic University, programs like «Asian Studies» and «Bioengineering» are not taught for free.