Study in the UK from Morocco

Morocco is the largest source of UK-bound students in North Africa, and the number that decides most Moroccan master’s applications is 14 out of 20. That is what the University of Sheffield equates to a UK 2:1 — a respectable Licence result rather than an exceptional one, and lower than many Moroccan applicants assume before they check.

Applying for a master’s from Morocco

Sheffield names the Licence and the Maîtrise as qualifying Moroccan degrees for postgraduate entry, and publishes the conversion:

Most taught master’s courses ask for a 2:1, and a meaningful number will consider a 2:2 — which brings 12/20 into range of a real set of options rather than none.

The reason this matters is that the French-derived marking system Morocco uses distributes marks differently from the UK’s. A 14/20 is a solid result; read through a UK lens by someone unfamiliar with the scale, it can look like 70% and therefore stronger than it is, or be dismissed as “only 14” and therefore weaker. Neither reading is right, and neither is your problem to solve — send the relevé de notes as your institution issued it, with the grading scale, and let the admissions team apply the published conversion.

Our guides to postgraduate study in the UK and master’s degree admission cover the process, and PhD admission covers research degrees, where a supervisor and a proposal matter more than a mark.

A UK taught master’s is normally one year, against the two years of a Moroccan Master. Where that is the comparison, it is a year of fees and living costs saved and a year earlier into work.

Undergraduate entry: check before assuming

Sheffield’s published entry-requirements page for Morocco lists A-levels and the International Baccalaureate among qualifications considered for direct admission, and does not list the Moroccan Baccalauréat — the page’s own instruction in that situation is “if your qualification is not listed here, please contact us.”

We would rather tell you that plainly than guess in either direction. It means the Baccalauréat marocain is a question to put to each university rather than one with a settled published answer, and the answer may depend on your série, your mark, and the course you are applying to.

What is unambiguous: where direct entry is not available, a foundation programme is the standard route — one year, purpose-built for this transition, ending in entry to the degree itself rather than in another application. If you hold A-levels or the IB alongside or instead of the Bac, those are direct routes.

Undergraduate admission explains how UK applications work, and UCAS versus direct application explains which route applies to you.

English language requirements

Sheffield’s published minimum is IELTS 6.0 or equivalent for undergraduate study and 6.5 for postgraduate, with some departments asking for more.

Moroccan schooling is conducted in Arabic and French rather than English, so unlike applicants from anglophone African countries, a Moroccan applicant should plan on sitting a recognised English test rather than expecting a waiver. Budget the time and the fee into your planning from the start. Where a score lands just short of an offer condition, a pre-sessional English course is the standard bridge and does not usually cost you the intake.

Subjects Moroccan applicants most often choose

Engineering, business and management, computer science, economics and architecture are common choices, reflecting Morocco’s strong grandes écoles tradition in engineering and management. Architecture carries professional-recognition requirements that differ between the UK and Morocco, and that is worth resolving before you apply rather than after you graduate.

Documents

Expect certificates and full transcripts for every qualification, with certified translations where the originals are in Arabic or French. The relevé de notes with the grading scale is the document that does most of the work in a Moroccan master’s application, because it is what establishes where your 14 sits.

Our guide to what documents are required sets out the full list, and common application document mistakes covers the errors that cost the most time.

Funding

Most Moroccan students fund UK study through family resources, sometimes with a scholarship attached to a specific offer. Those departmental awards are the category most often missed, because they are not advertised as national competitions — ask once you have an offer in hand.

Morocco is not a Commonwealth member, so Commonwealth Scholarships are not a route here. Chevening is, and it is genuinely prestigious and correspondingly hard to win. Our guide to scholarships for international students sets out what is realistically available, including an honest view of your chances.

We do not publish tuition figures on this page. Universities set their own fees per course and academic year, and with Dirham movement against Sterling a figure republished elsewhere is out of date before it is useful. Check the fee on the course page of the university you are applying to. Our tuition and study costs guide sets out what genuinely affects the number.

Timing

Postgraduate applications generally open around a year before entry and are assessed as they arrive rather than against a single deadline, so applying early is worth more than applying perfectly. Competitive courses close well before their published dates.

Leave time for document translation and for the English test, which are the two steps most likely to add weeks to a Moroccan application.