Basic information and costs:

Our physics Bsc is a 240 ECTS, 4-year course of study. Tuition is at competitive public prices  yearly set by the regional Madrid government, and EU students pay the same amount as the locals. For the 22-23 academic year this has been 19,43 euro per ECTS credit (think 25 hours of your study, about 7-10 hours of contact lessons), so that a full academic year (September 1st through June 30th, typically) would cost you 1166 euro plus some minor taxes/secretarial fees. Tuition for the next academic year is usually set in June.

Prices do gradually steepen if you need to retake a course for a second or successive years, to a maximum of (currently in 22-23) 128,57 euro/ECTS the fourth time (or beyond) that you take the same course. International students that are not residents of Spain nor EU nationals and who cannot claim some other EU legal regime will have to pay the 128.57 euro per ECTS, regrettably from the first registration. Part-time study is possible.

Involvement of the department of theoretical physics:

Our department partakes in the teaching of both the Physics degree (for which we provide both physics and mathematics courses) and also the 5yr double-degree in Physics and Mathematics (where we mostly provide theoretical physics courses, with the mathematics ones in the hands of the mathematics faculty). This double degree has, for a decade, been the most prestigious Bsc program in Spain among all disciplines, with the most competitive entry requirements in the country. This is taught in spanish. 

The Physics bachelor has a broader base of admission, taking in ten times more students (classes of around 250 students per year) and is more suited for international students. You can follow our 1st and 2nd year courses, as well as the 3rd year core courses and the 4th year branch compulsory courses entirely in english. We have several parallel classes and one of them (group B) is completely english-spoken, and all tests are given in english too.  Optional courses in the upper two years are currently taught in spanish only (but by then you should have grasped enough of it to be able to follow them). The two branches are "Fundamental physics" and "Applied physics".  (Transfers to other majors -like materials or communication-electronics engineering- should in principle be feasible with some extra work if you change your mind later on.)

The theoretical physics department also provides some of the most popular end-of-the-Bsc projects (6 ECTS) for your eighth semester.

More information:

Here you can find complete course descriptors  (of both spanish and english courses).

For admissions, read the webpage of the relevant office at Complutense's central administration.

We can also welcome short term students, whether Erasmus exchange students (incoming students read through the end of that page) or free movers, 

A bit of history:

Complutense university of Madrid was founded as a general-study school in neighbooring Alcalá de Henares (roman Complutum) in the 13th century. It was promoted to university status on 1499 under cardinal Cisneros (cisne=swan in spanish, hence the swan in our coat). Taught were the arts, theology, medicine and law. 

During the XIXth century liberal revolutions, in 1822 and 1836 the university was moved to the city of Madrid, and a century later to our current Moncloa campus next to the city center . While physics teaching (e.g. mechanics) has been present since earlier, a physics section appears at least by 1936, and a physics degree around 1944-45. The theoretical physics department coalesced, in the 1970s, from earlier professorships.

 

 

A hundred years ago: Albert Einstein in Madrid with local professors, 1923, on the occasion of his Honoris Causa doctorate.

Photograph: historic deposit Marqués de Valdecilla of Universidad Complutense de Madrid