Study honours

Gain a competitive edge, undertake a research project

If you’re looking to improve your career prospects, open the door to further academic study, or pursue research with impact, honours is your next step.

Honours is an additional qualification that can be completed as part of a combined Bachelor of Advanced Studies degree, through an embedded or integrated year in some professional or specialist degrees or via a one-year standalone Bachelor of Advanced Studies (Honours) or appended honours degree following completion of a qualifying undergraduate degree.

To be admitted to honours you need to meet specific and additional entry requirements.

Why study honours?

Independent research can be a life-changing opportunity to become a subject matter expert in a niche area. You’ll have the chance to develop significant insights, and make your own meaningful contribution to a field of knowledge.

An honours pathway can open the door for further research study, equipping you with the prerequisite research skills to undertake a research degree such as the PhD.

Alternatively, if you decide to only complete an honours pathway without pursuing further research, you will graduate with a robust set of transferrable skills including:

time management and research skills
project management and delivery
showing future employers you can investigate independently and achieve more complex goals.

Completing honours also shows you have achieved high academic standards and gives you an honours-level award.

How does honours work?

Honours is an optional full-time pathway usually taking one year to complete. It is also available part-time in some disciplines. Generally, your honours year consists of:

an independent research project, mentored by your academic supervisor
additional units in research design/technical training
some honours and coursework units.

Under the guidance of an academic supervisor, you’ll select a thesis topic, create a reading list, and identify your method of research.

During the year you’ll be mentored by scholars in your faculty as you write a thesis to document your research journey from proposal to conclusion.

Types of honours

If you’re about to apply for your undergraduate degree at the University of Sydney and already know you want to do honours, you can apply for one of our combined Bachelor of Advanced Studies degrees.

Currently studying a single undergraduate degree?

Honours in the combined Bachelor of Advanced Studies

If you are a current University of Sydney student in an eligible bachelor’s degree and haven’t yet started your final semester of study (or completed more than 120 credit points), you can apply to a combined Bachelor of Advanced Studies. You’ll need to have completed or be on track to complete two majors by the end of your combined degree. Once transferred into one of the combined degrees, you will be able to apply for honours through Sydney Student.

Embedded honours

Some University of Sydney bachelor’s degrees have an embedded Honours component. This means you will complete your honours study in the final semesters of your current undergraduate degree by completing specific units. Your honours component will not increase the overall time taken to complete your studies. Generally, you will apply for embedded honours directly to your faculty or school. 

Integrated honours

In some degrees honours is integrated and runs alongside the pass degree. This means you won’t have to apply separately to do honours and won’t need to complete specific honours units, but you will need to maintain a certain weighted average mark. An example is the Bachelor of Engineering Honours.

Stand-alone honours

Stand-alone or appended honours are additional courses you enrol into after completing your undergraduate degree.

These are the types of stand-alone honours:

Bachelor of Advanced Studies (Honours)

You can apply for the standalone Bachelor of Advanced Studies (Honours) if you:

are a current University of Sydney student in their last semester of study of an eligible single bachelor degree or
are an undergraduate student from another university, or
finished your undergraduate studies a while ago and
you have completed or are on track to complete two majors.

Appended honours

If you do not have two majors or aren't on track to complete them, you can still pursue honours via our appended honours degrees:

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