For decades school leavers have been told that a degree is the safest route to a good job. That assumption is now being tested: 9 in 10 young people aged 11 to 18 say they would consider an apprenticeship over a university degree, and the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) finds 1 in 4 graduates may be financially worse off over their lifetimes than if they had never gone.
With that in mind, Careerminds UK surveyed 1,000 UK graduates aged 21 to 36 who finished a degree in 2021 or later, asking whether they regret it and what they would do differently.
The survey found:
- A quarterof UK graduates would skip university altogether: More than a third of recent UK graduates (37.5 per cent) regret their degree. Of those, 27.2 per cent state they regret is ‘somewhat’ whereas a further 10.3 per cent regret their degree Roughly one in four (22.5 per cent) go further still, saying that with the choice again they would not go to university at all. Among those who regret their degree, 9.9 per cent say they picked their subject for the wrong reasons in the first place, and a further 9.3 per cent say it didn’t give them the skills employers want.
- Even the best-paid graduates have regrets:Regret doesn’t correlate with having a lack of pay. Medicine and dentistry graduates went on to be the best paid of any degree subject group analysed, and yet 9 per cent of them still regret their degree. Biological and sports sciences records the highest regret of any subject at 52.2 per cent, while engineering and technology graduates are the least likely to regret their choice, at 21.4 per cent.
- A lack of jobs is the top reason for degree regret:When asked to name the biggest reason, the most common answer was a lack of jobs in their chosen field. More than a quarter of regretful graduates (26.1 per cent) said prospects in their field are poor, and a further 14.4 per cent said the pay for the jobs they wanted was too low for what the degree cost. A further one in eight (12.8 per cent) say artificial intelligence (AI) has reduced the jobs they trained for, and separately a study by Randstad found 38 per cent of employers plan to hire fewer graduates this year because of AI.
- Starting their own business tops the list of alternatives:When asked which alternative paths would tempt them instead of university, 37.6 per cent of graduates named starting their own business, 25.4 per cent an apprenticeship in tech or engineering and 17.9 per cent a skilled trade. Only 21.7 per cent said none of the alternatives appealed.
”Those findings are reminder that career satisfaction isn’t determined by salary or job security alone,” said Amanda Augustine, CPCC and resident careers expert at Careerminds UK. “A degree can lead to a promising career on paper and still turn out to be a poor fit for someone’s interests, strengths or priorities.”
Augustine added: “The job market graduates are entering today looks very different from the one many expected when they chose their degree. AI is reshaping entry-level work, and employers increasingly want evidence of practical skills and experience alongside academic qualifications. Graduates may not be able to change the degree they chose, but they can continue building on it through work experience, additional training and new skills that make them more competitive in the job market.”
