Working in the UK after graduation: the Graduate visa explained

If your sponsor has a track record of compliance and you study at degree level or above, you can work up to 20 hours a week in term time. Below degree level the limit is 10 hours. Outside term time, including vacations and before your course starts, you can work full time. Check your university’s official term dates before you agree extra shifts.

Some work is off limits whatever the hours: self-employment (including selling goods or services online), starting a business, paid work as a sports coach or as an entertainer, and a permanent full-time job with no end date in the contract. Breaking these conditions puts your immigration status at risk, so treat the limits as absolute.

The Graduate visa lets you stay after a UK bachelor’s degree, postgraduate degree or other eligible course and work in most jobs without an employer sponsor. It lasts 2 years if you apply on or before 31 December 2026 and 18 months if you apply on or after 1 January 2027. Doctoral graduates get 3 years.

To apply you must be in the UK, hold a Student visa (or Tier 4 student visa), and your university must have told the Home Office that you completed your course successfully. You apply before your current visa expires. The fee is £937, and the healthcare surcharge is usually £1,035 for each year of the visa. It cannot be extended, but you can switch to another visa such as Skilled Worker.

It depends on the date you apply, not the date you started your course. If your university reports your completion in time for you to apply by 31 December 2026, you get 2 years. If your course ends in late summer or early autumn, the timing is workable but leaves little slack for delayed results. If you finish later, or your results are delayed, you will get 18 months.

Eighteen months changes the plan more than it seems. You have roughly a year of real job searching before a new employer needs time to assign a certificate of sponsorship. Start applying for graduate roles in your final year rather than after graduation, and ask every interviewer early whether they sponsor Skilled Worker visas.

You can work in most jobs, full or part time, be self-employed, do voluntary work and travel abroad and return. You cannot claim most benefits or work as a professional sportsperson. Partners and children who were already your dependants on your Student visa can apply to stay as your dependants.

In practice, the Graduate visa makes you a low-risk hire: an employer can take you on like any local candidate, with no licence or fees. Use that. Many graduate roles will not sponsor on day one, but a year of strong performance changes the conversation.

You can switch from inside the UK once you have a job offer from a licensed sponsor. From a Student visa, you can switch if you have completed your course, if the job starts after your course ends, or if you have studied full time for a PhD for at least 24 months. From a Graduate visa, you apply when your employer assigns the certificate of sponsorship.

Recent graduates are cheaper to sponsor than most people realise. If you are switching from a Student or Graduate visa, or you are under 26, you count as a new entrant: the salary can be 70% of the going rate, with a floor of £33,400, rather than the usual £41,700 or full going rate. New-entrant status lasts a maximum of 4 years in the UK, including time on a Graduate visa. Employers also do not pay the Immigration Skills Charge when a Student visa holder switches to Skilled Worker; switching from a Graduate visa is not on that exemption list. Tell hiring managers what applies to you, because small employers new to sponsorship often don’t know.

Your university careers service is your best first stop: its job board carries employers already recruiting from your campus, and many services stay open to graduates after they finish. Use it for CV checks and mock interviews too.

For sponsorship-ready roles, cross-check employers on the Home Office register of licensed sponsors before you apply. Large graduate schemes in finance, consulting, engineering and the public sector recruit well ahead of the start date, while smaller firms hire when a need arises, so run both tracks. Summer internships and placement years often lead to return offers. For a first job with a thin CV, see our guide to your first job after graduation.

Keep it to one page, or two if you have several years of work before your degree. Put education first while it is your strongest asset: degree, classification or expected grade, and a line on your dissertation if it relates to the job. Then list part-time work, internships and society roles with results, not duties. A retail job shows customer service and reliability under pressure; quantify it.

PhD graduates applying to industry should turn the thesis into a project: the question, the method, the tools and the outcome, in two or three lines. Our UK CV guide covers format and right-to-work wording, and the internship CV example shows the one-page structure.