last days to express your wishes, schedule of next steps

The process Parcoursup keep going! March 12, 2026 marks the end of the registration phaselast day to express your wishes. A circuit that can become a real source of stress for high school students looking for a future in higher education, except when you know the steps to anticipate! Here are the main dates of Parcoursup calendar 2026to venture peacefully towards life after the baccalaureate.

The Parcoursup 2026 calendar is made up of several stages:

• Thursday March 12, 2026 : last day to add training to your list, except for students attending school in Reunion, who have until March 19. It is possible to formulate up to ten wishes, in no order of preference, to which ten wishes can also be added for apprenticeship training.
• Wednesday April 1, 2026 : last day to complete your file and confirm your wishes. Some training courses require specific documents, which must be added to your Parcoursup file before this deadline. Only apprenticeship contracts can still be added after April 1st.
• Tuesday June 2, 2026 : start of the admission phase. It is from this date that candidates will receive answers and will be able to make their choice among the courses in which they have been accepted. It is obligatory to respond to all admission offers within the time limit indicated in the file.
• From Friday June 5 to Monday June 8, 2026 : classification of pending wishes. Candidates have three days to rank in order of preference the wishes they wish to keep.
• Thursday June 11, 2026 : start of the complementary admission phase. High school students who have not yet received a proposal can make up to ten additional wishes. The choice depends on the courses in which places remain.
• Tuesday July 7, 2026 : start of administrative registrations for students who have definitively accepted an admission offer. Registration details depend on the chosen establishment, and are indicated in the candidate’s file.
• Saturday July 11, 2026 : end of the main phase. This is the last day to receive an admission offer. After this date, it’s time for registrations for candidates who have received training, and time for the complementary phase for those who have not yet found one.
• Thursday September 10, 2026 : end of the complementary phase, which signs on the very last day to receive an admission proposal. This is also the end of the Parcoursup 2026 procedure. Support for candidates by the CAES (commission for access to higher education) continues until mid-October, but outside the platform.

Registration for Parcoursup can be done online for free on the dedicated website coursup.gouv.fr. The candidate will directly find the registration tab on the home page of the site, “I am registering on Parcoursup”. Simply click on the “Register” box. Then, to register and create your file, the candidate must provide several pieces of information for their registration to be validated. He must have a email address valid, sound transcript for the anticipated baccalaureate exams as well as its INE numberthe National Student Identifier (which can be found on school report cards or on the transcript for anticipated baccalaureate exams). The Public Service website also indicates that the tax notice from parents or guardians is sometimes necessary: “This is the case if you request a preparatory class for the grandes écoles with boarding or wish to carry out a simulation of the award of a higher education scholarship based on social criteria.”

Once registration has been validated, it’s time to express your wishes. To do this, simply connect to your file and click on the “Make a wish” button : you will then be directed to the Parcoursup search engine, where all the training courses offered are listed. Each candidate is entitled to ten wishes (for selective training or not), and ten more wishes for work-study training. It is not necessary to rank them in order of preference, and establishments are not informed of other wishes expressed by candidates.

For certain training courses, it is also possible to make sub-wishes : you can apply to several establishments offering the same training, and this will be counted as a single request. Concretely, the training represents the wish and the establishments which offer it represent the sub-wishes. The maximum number of sub-wishes is ten per training, with a limit of twenty in total, although with a few exceptions such as engineering schools or the Sciences-Po network for example, which do not set a limit. On the other hand, the system of sub-wishes does not apply everywhereyou must check this on the training information sheet. Thus, two identical licenses in two different establishments will count as two vows, as will two different licenses in the same faculty.

The Parcoursup file is essential for applying for higher education courses. It must be complete to be reviewed by training directors. It is at the time of registration on Parcoursup that students create it online. In general, the Avenir sheet, the student’s transcripts and assessments appear automatically. After, it is up to each candidate to complete and personalize their Parcoursup file by adding his motivated training project, his activities and interests (valuing experiences achieved or skills), his preferences and other projects. Furthermore, depending on the training chosen, different elements are requested in addition by the establishments (cover letter, a self-positioning test for nursing training for example). So be sure to check in advance whether this is the case for the training courses you have selected.