'Relief’ for doctors as competition for specialty training falls

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By Daniel Pye

Competition ratios for specialty training have fallen significantly after UK prioritisation, official data on this year’s round of applications has revealed.

NHS England has so far published the competition ratios for round one of this year’s specialty training recruitment.

In total, there were 39,387 applicants for 10,682 posts, meaning 3.7 applicants for each role.

The British Medical Association (BMA) said doctors looking at the competition ratios will breathe “a sigh of relief” after years of “skyrocketing” numbers.

In 2025, there were more than double the applications per job post over two recruitment rounds.

The ratio is now slightly above the level it was in 2023, when there were 3.5 applicants per post. But it is still significantly higher than 2020, when it was 2.4.

This year 5,064 doctors were accepted onto GP training courses, the highest number of posts on record. Almost all of these accepted candidates were prioritised applicants – there were 24,000 applications for just over 5,000 roles, a 5:1 ratio, which was brought down to 2:1 after prioritisation.