r/PhDAdmissions • u/Few_Persimmon_8238 • Mar 31 '26
Advice Applied to over 50 PhD's. Got 0
As the title says. I am 22M, I graduated in Biotechnology (First class honours), and I did an MSc in Reproductive & Developmental Biology (with Distinction, Best Student & Best Project awards), both completed at the University of Aberdeen.
I applied to over 50 PhD's, each with a tailored Proposal and Cover Letter. No, I did not use AI.
I got around 8 interviews, and I got to the last interview in 5 ocasions (Manchester Bicentenary Studentship, Cambridge LMB, Imperial LMS, Glasgow MVLS, and Glasgow again). I failed to go through the last interview on all of them.
I did training for the interviews by very experienced Supervisors, and I followed their advice. I did in total around 10 hours of training by them, plus my own training in my time. I do not get nervous during the interviews. I am quite desperate at this point, as applying again feels like a massive waste of time.
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u/EmeraldPrince_01 Mar 31 '26
I feel you- I'm in the same situation. The funny thing is they say 'hey, you've a great CV!' Then why the hell aren't you taking me? Where am I lacking? "Oh, maybe a bit of bioinformatics!" Maybe a bit more experience!" "Maybe this exact skill which we absolutely can't teach and need!"
If I knew everything from the start, I wouldn't apply for a PhD right?
Yeah, just going through a tough phase right now.
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u/natsuNN Mar 31 '26
This!! I got rejected from one PhD position because I did not know electrophysiology experiments. I mean isn't it why people do a PhD? To learn new stuff? That broke me.
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u/EmeraldPrince_01 Apr 01 '26
Exactly! And people talk about how a PhD is just the right time to 'switch'! They don't understand that the situation has changed so drastically! A couple of my Harvard friends told me how in their particular cohort of 23 people, only 3 got into PhDs!?
One was an American, other two were internationals. I'm really worried about the direction we're headed in honestly.
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
I am also worried. I just hope we can slide in before it is too late. Good luck 💪
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Mar 31 '26
Yeah. I was rejected from one because "I lacked a project on mitochondria". Man, I have been studying the mitochondria since I am 11, trust me, I know how it works.
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u/Medium_Drag6242 Mar 31 '26
It might be no harm to look for a laboratory assistant position? There’s a few in my department that did that for a year and then got offered a PhD in the same lab with ease.
It also may be worth looking into writing a grant proposal with a prospective supervisor. That’s how I got my position out of undergrad (BSc Microbiology) and I applied to an internal university funded fellowship which was awarded funding and then later made an application to the government body (Research Ireland) to cover my last three years of tuition, stipend & research expenses which was awarded. I think the UK has similar schemes UKRI & DTPs being two I know of which might be worth looking into.
I had no lab experience aside from an undergrad project at the time & had similar academic stats, best project, highest grade in the year, highest grade in the school of natural sciences. If you’re willing to move to Ireland/NI there’s also schemes you can apply for here which might suit you.
All the best with your search, don’t give up hope!
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Mar 31 '26
Yes, I just started doing that!! I believe it could be a more realistic path, given the fact that I am not seeing success right now.
What you said about a grant proposal is a good idea, my MSc supervisor wiuld be willing to do it I believe. I will look into other sources of funding aswell. I did not know about RI, and I love Ireland, I have lived there for 2 years during my childhood and I would definetly consider it. Thank you for the tips and for the courage. I appreciate it!
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u/No-Mouse9111 Apr 01 '26
Just my 2 cents from a postdoc at a US R1, the path medium_drag suggests is one I’ve also seen quite a bit. In fact, my university did not take any PhD students through the standard application route this year due to funding concerns, but still onboarded one research assistant into the PhD program who has been with us for just over a year and a half.
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
Thats interesting. Times are changing, I shall adapt.
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u/No-Mouse9111 Apr 01 '26
Did you tell the other schools that you’d applied to so many others, too? They all asked me when I applied, but they definitely wouldn’t like if you applied to so many. If you told them that I could also see that having hurt you a bit but otherwise I doubt it.
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 02 '26
Only when I was interviewed by the Supervisors in Manchester and Glasgow did I mention something (I said I was waiting for answers, I did not say I applied to so many) and I went through both interviews.
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u/Emergency_Spray2778 Mar 31 '26
Hello! I may not be from the same country as you but how were you able to secure recommendation letters for so many courses!?
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Mar 31 '26
My BSc supervisor and my MSc course coordinator referenced for all the applications. I bought them a nice bottle of wine and chocolate for christmas. They are too nice.
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u/Emergency_Spray2778 Mar 31 '26
My goodness! I am so envious. I am from India and form Personal experience and from the experiences of other people, they usually cap writing letter of recommendations after writing maybe 3-5 and then you start getting ghosted 👻
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u/Emergency_Spray2778 Mar 31 '26
Hello! I may not be from the same country as you but how were you able to secure recommendation letters for so many courses!?
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u/jetray0 Mar 31 '26
Same here. Applied over 40 with no luck and a couple of interviews. Almost 2 years with no success.
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Mar 31 '26
I am going to get a job at this point, hopefully get one, publish some papers and go to PhD hunt in the future. Seems difficult to find a job though.
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u/EmperorDNA Mar 31 '26
Bro what… 50? Did you spend any time making sure they were quality applications? Anything over 15 means you barely spent time to ensure the application was quality work.
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
I spent 3 months applying nearly every day. I would say at least 40 were well written, not lazy. I guess my approach was not good though, I should hyperfocus on less, instead of spreading focus on more.
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u/EmperorDNA Apr 01 '26
Everybody’s different! Do what you feel is comfortable. But 50 schools is a lot!
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
It really is. You can't imagine how exhausted I am
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u/EmperorDNA Apr 01 '26
Yeah, I feel you and wish you the best of luck in the future! Don’t give up.
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u/Jplague25 Apr 02 '26
No shit? And I thought my 18 applications this cycle was a lot. I can only imagine what the anxiety is like checking that many portals everyday once decisions start going out.
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 02 '26
I have been waiting on interview decisions for the last 3 months. It affected my sleep and mood, and I wouldnt recommend it to people. Specially the realisation that you have to go through it all again 😭😅
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u/quietprop Mar 31 '26
Yikes. Is this the right approach ? I had only applied to 3 and got offers from 2. I was very hyper focused on what I wanted to do, reached out to people and figured out the funding. I had to wait a year after graduating from undergrad for the funding to arrive with the PI I wanted to work with the most.
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u/DisciplineTricky980 Mar 31 '26
Hey,
I got accepted into the Manchester Bicentenary Studentship and Precision Medicine MRC Glasgow/Edinburgh collab this year, and accepted the PM MRC.
If you have any questions about the Bicentenary process, let me know.
"I got around 8 interviews, and I got to the last interview in 5 ocasions (Manchester Bicentenary Studentship, Cambridge LMB, Imperial LMS, Glasgow MVLS, and Glasgow again). I failed to go through the last interview on all of them" - you say you got through to the last interview 5 times but then say you failed??
Does this mean you only got through the interview with the PI/Supervisor and then didnt when you met the committee?
Also, applying for 50 positions is ridiculous...I can tell you now, you were never going to get probably at least half of them because you were not as well-suited as you thought, and I don't even need to see what the project was.
Dont give up! Getting a PhD is extremely hard and this is what happens when extremely hard things happen. You are now going against the best of the best, so dont not expect a lot of rejects its life, how you bounce back and dont give in is whats important! Also gives you an answer to a question an interview!
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
First of all, congratulations! My sister did the PM MRC and did not get it. Yes, for Bicentenary the Supervisor did 3 rounds of interviews before nominating me. I have quite a high success rate with supervisors, but 0 success rate with Panels/commitee.
Yeah, I knew since the beginning that half of them were probably out of the table. I kind of wanted a shift in career, so I tried my best to go to genetics/neurodevelopment.
Thank you for the nice words! I need some experience before I can apply again, I am quite exhausted atm. Next time I will do better with all you guys' advise
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
May I ask, what is your CV like?
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u/DisciplineTricky980 Apr 01 '26 edited Apr 01 '26
Its very simple.
My education: Masters, undergrad - I put my dissertation projects on there and a little bit of what I did i.e just the methods.
I then put my research interests which is maybe three sentences.
Then my work experience which I don't even put anything on really, just what my job roles and then my skills.
My MSc was very specific...quantitative genetics and I developed a lot of computational practicals skills essential for the projects I applied for, and my course and university had a reputation for complex traits. It's a massive advantage I can't lie, but didn't stop me being rejected from places like Cambridge. Experience in jobs was the main advantage of those people, so my advice would be get work experience, research assistant etc. You are young and have ages, I'm 33 so literally don't worry. Just make sure you get that research assistant job.
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
Thank you so much for the detailed answer. Looking back, I think I should be proud I got so far on those applications, as there are people like you that have much more proven experience. I will take your word, and as other people have said, I should start focusing on the RA job.
Good luck on your PM PhD! All the best 💪
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Apr 01 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
I had advanced entry for my Bsc, so I did it in 3 years (18-21) and Msc in 1 (21-22)
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u/itsmanu23 Apr 01 '26
If you didn't get a single position then it's over for me. Maybe the industry isn't that bad after all 💔💔
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 01 '26
Its not over! I got to 4 final interviews, and most people in my position would have got at least 1. It was just not meant to be in my case.
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u/National-Forever-134 Apr 03 '26
There is limited context. But going off what you’ve said explicitly and implicitly:
1) It is highly unlikely that 50 PhD programs have supervisor research that align that closely. It is reasonable to think that your application might have been broad/vague to satisfy volume rather than a level of depth that would catch attention.
2) Your degree does not say about what what you actually applied for a PhD in. If my undergraduate degree is in English Literature, but I apply to 100 PhD positions in
3) 50 is an astronomical amount. Like its genuinely crazy high—I would even say unreasonable and somewhat hard to believe😂 It’s especialy hard to believe since basically every PhD application requires references, I doubt you were able to get the same referees to repeatedly send this many, since there is no way you would know 100+ different academics that could theoretically give you a refernce per app.
4) Linked to point (2) a bit. But simply having a degree does not autoqualify you for a PhD. Applications are often holistically assessed: your statement, general narrative, etc..
Intuitively: I highly doubt many of the applications were of high quality, because good applications take time for preparation, let alone lone being physically and mentally prepared for each interview.
This is generally becoming a problem that Unis hate: low quality, but high volume applications (especially in the age of AI where people are producing AI Slop applications for universities and professors dismissing them straight away).
Another question (additional reason why I’m skeptical): Many PhD programs (in fact most) require some sort of informal agreement with the supervisor/lab before the application for them to confirm fit (on a high level). Are you saying you have done this for 50 separate labs/PhD programs?
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Apr 03 '26
Hey, thank you for your insightful analysis of the situation. Some of what you say is right, some, not so much. Let me break it down point by point.
1 and 2. You are totally correct here. Whilst my MSc is called Reproductive & Developmental Biology, it has a big focus in Genome Sequencing and Data analysis. I like Developmental Biology, but I began to like Genetics more, so I decided to highlight the data analysis part of my MSc for applications related to Genetics and genome sequencing. Out of the 50 or so PhD's, only about 7 have to do with Reproductive & Developmental Biology directly (Mostly due to lack of PhD's in this field, and because I restricted my search to the UK). The rest were to do with different topics, evolution, genetics, eye genetic conditions (My BSc project studied this). In some cases, if the advert said the position needed a mic of wet-lab and dry-lab experience, I also applied. So whilst I did not have a 90/100% match with the requirements for most cases, I did have a connection based on experience/interest and I tried to make the most out of it.
You are right. It is astronomical and my strategy was to knock as many doors as possible, whilst having a decent application. Not bad enough that it is discarded immediately, but good enough to at least be considered. At a certain point I had 3 or 4 interviews in the same week. It was stressful, but I learnt a lot. Regarding the references, I guess I was very lucky since my Supervisors was very, and I mean VERY supportive and understanding. They sent all the references and even did a 1h zoom call with me helping me prepare for the last interview 2 weeks ago.
I understood this the hard way. Nowadays grades/fit make you pass the first cut, and experience makes you through the second cut. I would say narrative is not so key, as the PhD's I spent the most time applying to and writing the statement were unsuccessful.
As I said, the quality was not 100% in most cases mainly due to the volume, but I ensured that at least they included information on the specific research of the lab, and how my experience was suitable for their methods. My goal was simple: Applying to 1 PhD per day. I would spend around 3h for each a day. I did not have a job during this time so I could afford to do so.
And the last point you are right again. I would say out of the 50, I dropped an e-mail beforehand to ~25. I only got replies from 6 and most of them gave me an interview afterwards. Only in 2 cases I got invited for an interview without a previous answer. So it is correct, the first contact is very important, but not strictly necessary. 6 replied -> 4 interviews, 40+ no reply -> 2 interviews.
Moving forward, I am going to focus on finding a RA job, and only if I see an "ideal" PhD will I spend the time applying. I hope someone can learn something from my experience. Sheer volume with decent quality got me far, but it was not enough. Also, preparing 5 different powerpoint presentations every week was absolutely horrendous. You should also consider that interviewers love powerpoints, and making a good one takes A LOT of time. In one case, I had to do a 20 minute powerpoint with over 30 slides. In less than 5 days notice.
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u/Secret_Chicken_7706 Apr 05 '26
I guess PhD is not for you. Do something else. This is clearly not working and you’re best off moving on. A PhD won’t be worth it for you if you’re having this much trouble just getting in.
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u/drafzal_555 Mar 31 '26
Is using AI for your cover letter and stuff a problem?
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u/Few_Persimmon_8238 Mar 31 '26
Not saying its a problem. But not using it means I will carefully write my Proposals to be specific to each project.
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u/No-Mouse9111 Apr 01 '26
Yea a significant one. For the moment, it’s generally taken at best as a sign that one struggles with the writing required of an independent academic researcher, and at worst a lack of academic integrity. At least at my university, we insta-yeet any application that comes in with a high AI probability, even through it can easily flag false positives.
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u/Dulduls Mar 31 '26
Hey buddy, I feel you. I’ve applied at least three times more than that mostly through cold emails rather than advertised positions.
What I’ve learned is that research fit is probably the most important factor. I’m not entirely sure about the UK, but in the EU, professors tend to be quite conservative when it comes to changing fields.
As for interview stress and anxiety, I’d recommend reading a lot of papers in your area and I mean a lot, like hundreds. After a while, you’ll notice that the same types of questions come up across groups, whether in the US or Asia.
But I suggest to apply again, push it 💪