Eligibility — am I allowed to apply?

The differences in short

Komvux and folkhögskola have low formal requirements. They exist to build the foundation — you do not need upper secondary school to start there. The folkhögskola looks at you individually and asks to see what you have.

Yrkeshögskola requires the most. It comes after upper secondary school, so you need an upper secondary diploma or equivalent knowledge. Many programmes also require specific prior knowledge — certain upper secondary courses, work experience, a driving licence or a work sample. It is stated on each programme's own page.

Arbetsmarknadsutbildning works differently. There it is not grades that decide, but Arbetsförmedlingen's assessment of your situation. You can be eligible without upper secondary school — but you can also be refused even though you have it, if the programme is not judged to suit your situation.

The simplest way to get an answer

Ask on the programme's own page. There you will almost always find contact details for a study and career counsellor (studie- och yrkesvägledare), or for the school. Send an email and describe what you have studied and worked with — they will answer whether you are eligible.

It is quicker than guessing, and it costs nothing.

You can also ask your career coach. If you are unsure what to write in the email, do it together.

If you have no papers for what you can do

If you have worked in an occupation without having grades for it, there is validering (validation of skills). It means that someone assesses what you actually know, and you get a paper to prove it.

There is no single place where all validering happens. There are three routes:

• Through Arbetsförmedlingen — they decide, and an external provider makes the assessment. Read more and find validering
• Through adult education in your municipality — anyone considering studying has the right to an initial assessment (kartläggning). Once you are a student, they can validate against komvux courses, which can shorten your study time. About validering within komvux
• Through the industry — some occupations have validering models of their own. The Swedish Agency for Higher Vocational Education on validering

For yrkeshögskola there is in addition something called reell kompetens (assessed prior learning). The school then assesses your experience instead of your grades. You apply as usual, tick that you want to be assessed on prior learning, and attach employment certificates. It is the school that decides — so ask that particular school.

Yrkeshögskola may also admit a small number of applicants who lack formal eligibility but have the right experience. It is worth applying even if you are unsure.

If you have education from another country

Universitets- och högskolerådet (UHR), the Swedish Council for Higher Education, assesses education from other countries and issues a statement of what it corresponds to in Sweden. It costs nothing.

Apply for an assessment from UHR

UHR assesses completed upper secondary education and post-secondary education. They do not assess unfinished education or education shorter than one year. For healthcare occupations the assessment goes through Socialstyrelsen, and for teachers through Skolverket.

If you need your old upper secondary grades

Here is something many people come unstuck on: there is no national service where all grades are held together. What applies depends on which municipality the school was in.

Start with the school if it still exists. If you left a few years ago, the school often still has your grades in its own archive. Malmö city archive, for example, asks anyone looking for grades from the last five years to ask the school first.

Otherwise it is the municipal archive — in the municipality where the school was, not where you live now. In larger cities it is called the city archive (stadsarkivet). Search for the name of the municipality plus "beställa betyg".

Several municipalities have an e-service where you log in with Swedish e-identification and fetch the grades yourself. Stockholm and Malmö do. Not all of them do — where there is no e-service, the archive takes an order by email or telephone.

This applies to independent schools too. Independent schools are not covered by the Archives Act, but the Education Act says the organiser must hand over final grades and grade documents to the municipality where the school is located. Older grades may still sit with the school — Stockholm city archive, for instance, holds independent-school grades only from 2012 onwards.

Expect it to take a week or two, and expect a small fee, including for a digital copy. So start before you have found the programme you want to apply to, so that the grades are home when you need them.

If you attended a school run by the region — a healthcare or agricultural school, for example — the grades are in the regional archive instead.

Applying via antagning.se brings your grades there

If you apply to a course or a programme at antagning.se, your grades are usually fetched there, and then you can see which ones are registered in your name.

The grades are fetched a couple of days after you apply and are then on Mina sidor. Creating an account is not enough — the grades are only fetched once you have applied to at least one programme.

Your benefits are not affected by applying. You are not deregistered from Arbetsförmedlingen until you have actually started studying. You report your activity and income every month as usual.

When can you apply?

• For the spring semester: 15 September to 15 October
• For the autumn semester: 15 March to 15 April

After the closing date it is often still possible to make a late application to programmes that have an "Add" button.

Which grades are fetched?

• Upper secondary grades from 1999 onwards, if the school was connected to the database
• Komvux: final grades and diplomas from autumn 2012, individual courses from 2011
• The folkhögskola's certificate of eligibility from May 2024
• Subject levels from upper secondary school from July 2025, that is, after Gy25 was introduced

If your grades are older than that they are not fetched. Then the municipal archive is the way — see above.

This you have to upload yourself, even if you have made an application:

• A studiebevis or a collected grade document from upper secondary school
• Grades from upper secondary adult education from before autumn 2012
• Grades from schools that were not connected to the database when you finished
• Courses or subject levels you took at upper secondary school after you got your diploma

Applying to yrkeshögskola? Do not trust the automation

Yrkeshögskola has an application system of its own, yh-antagning.se, separate from antagning.se. Many schools use it, but you still apply to each programme separately.

There your grades can be fetched automatically from the national grade database (Nationella betygsdatabasen) when you identify yourself with BankID. When it works it is convenient — but there are two holes in it:

• Not all schools have access to the database. Then nothing is fetched, however you identify yourself.
• Not all grades are in it. Older grades, and grades from schools that never reported them, are missing.

So you may need to send the grades in yourself — to some of the programmes you apply to, or to all of them. Responsibility for the application being complete always rests with you, not with the school.

How to check: log in and look under your application documents. If the grades have been fetched they show there. If they do not show, upload them yourself. Do that check before the closing date — not after.

Three examples

Ahmed has worked in kitchens for twelve years

Ahmed has never taken a chef's course, but he has cooked professionally since he was nineteen.

He starts with validering — through Arbetsförmedlingen or through adult education in the municipality. If the validering shows what he already knows, he may only need to take a few courses rather than a whole programme.

Without validering he would have had to start from the beginning.

Sanna wants to apply to yrkeshögskola but failed two subjects

Sanna has upper secondary school but lacks a pass in two courses, and the programme she wants requires one of them.

She has two routes: take those courses at komvux, or email the school and ask about assessed prior learning based on her work experience. Many people do the first without asking about the second.

She applies anyway — and she emails the school first.

Peter does not know where his grades are

Peter went to upper secondary school in Landskrona in the nineties and lives in Kävlinge today.

He should contact Landskrona, not Kävlinge — the grades are in the archive where the school was. That the school has since changed its name or closed makes no difference; the municipal archive has them anyway.

Unsure?

Do not guess, and do not let uncertainty stop you from applying. Email the school and ask, or take it up with your career coach. It takes ten minutes and you get a real answer.