Applying via hochschulstart: DoSV & ZV (1st semester)

The dialogue-oriented service procedure (DoSV) is an admissions support service provided to universities in Germany by the Foundation for University Admissions (Stiftung für Hochschulzulassung). The DoSV procedure helps to avoid unfilled university places.

Information about the DoSV procedure is available on the website https://hochschulstart.de. You'll find a wealth of information, including FAQs, covering the entire process from initial registration to the final decision on your application.

In Germany, admission applications for the undergraduate degree programmes in Medicine, Pharmaceutical Science and Dentistry are administered nationally through the DoSV procedure.

Saarland University also makes use of the DoSV system to manage admissions to its Bachelor's degree programmes in Biology and Psychology. Here, too, the first step is to register with www.hochschulstart.de. Once you have received your applicant ID number (BID) and your applicant authentication number (BAN) from hochschulstart.de, you should continue the application process via Saarland University's SIM application portal or the SIM student web portal during the application period that runs from the start of June until 15 July. After submitting the application questionnaire, your admission application will be stored in your hochschulstart user account for you to access and process further, if required. (Note: there may be a delay between submitting your application and when it appears in your hoschulstart account.)

To be able to use the online DoSV procedure for applications for 'Medicine', 'Pharmaceutical Science' or 'Dentistry', you must first complete the registration process at www.hochschulstart.de. After entering your personal details, you will be issued with an applicant ID (BID) and an applicant authentication number (BAN). Please note that you are not permitted to register more than once. If you registered for the DoSV procedure in a previous year, please use the user name and password from your earlier registration. If you have forgotten your earlier user name or password, the online registration window has links for requesting a new DoSV user name and/or password. Once registration is complete, you will be sent an email with further information. You can then log in at www.hochschulstart.de and begin using the DoSV service.

To see which degree programmes are offered by which higher education institutions, go to dosv.hochschulstart.de/bewerber, switch to 'English' (top right of page) and then click on the link 'Courses offered'. Scroll down to the 'Search' section, enter 'Saarland University' in the field 'Higher education institution' and then click 'Search' to see a list of the degree programmes at Saarland University that use the DoSV system. Select the degree programme that you are interested in and then click on the icon in the 'Action' column to get more detailed information. The 'Detailed view' section provides important information about the study programme and the associated admission procedure. Please read this information carefully.

If you have selected one of the subjects 'Medicine', 'Pharmaceutical Science' or 'Dentistry', you will need to access the online application portal AntOn (at the bottom of the 'Detailed view' section) in order to enter your application information. After registering in AntOn and entering all of the required information, your application (and any others you may have submitted) will be stored in your DoSV user account under 'My applications'. Please note that if you are applying for admission to one of these degree programmes, you must send all of your application documents (e.g. the officially certified copy of your higher education entrance qualification) and your signed application form by post to Hochschulstart within the designated application period. This checklist provides an overview of the steps that you need to take when applying for admission to one of the undergraduate degree programmes in 'Medicine', 'Pharmaceutical Science' and 'Dentistry'.

You can manage your admission applications in your DoSV user account. For example, you can start a new application (you are allowed a maximum of 12 applications nationwide), you can withdraw or reactivate an application and, most importantly, you can prioritize your applications. Prioritizing your applications is a crucial aspect of the admissions process. To learn more about how to prioritize your applications, take a look at the video tutorials provided by www.hochschulstart.de. (Note: available in German only). Please also note that if you are applying for 'Medicine', 'Pharmaceutical Science' or 'Dentistry', you can make use of the special internal prioritization feature.

The application procedure is slightly different for the two Bachelor's degree programmes 'Biology' and 'Psychology'.
The first step, however, is the same: you will need to register with www.hochschulstart.de. After receiving your applicant ID number (BID) and your applicant authentication number (BAN) from hochschulstart.de, you should then continue the application process locally via Saarland University's SIM application portal or SIM student web portal. After submitting the application questionnaire, your admission application will be stored in your hochschulstart user account for you to access and process further, if required. (Note: there may be a delay between submitting your application and when it appears in your hoschulstart account.)

Applications for Medicine, Pharmaceutical Science or Dentistry can be submitted via hochschulstart from 24 April 2023 until midnight of 15 July 2023 (application phase). Applicants who are nationals of the European Union (EU) or the European Economic Area (EEA) and who were awarded their higher education entrance qualification (HEEQ) before 16 January 2023 must have submitted their applications for 'Medicine', 'Pharmaceutical Science' or 'Dentistry' by 31 May 2022. Further information on deadlines is available here.

Applications for places on the Bachelor's programmes in Biology and Psychology at Saarland University can be submitted from the start of June until 15 July 2023 after first registering with the DoSV system at hoschulstart.de. Note: This deadline also applies to applicants who gained their higher education entrance qualification in the previous year.

After you have submitted your applications, you can log in to your account on hochschulstart.de to monitor the status of your applications and prioritize them according to personal preference. Which of your admission applications has the best possible chance of success is determined in the subsequent coordination phase.

How you prioritize your applications plays a critical role in this phase of the process. Due to the dynamic nature of the process, an offer of a place ranked with lower priority will be removed from the system (and can therefore no longer be accepted by you) as soon as you receive an offer with higher-priority. This is why it is important that you rank your applications in order of personal preference. For applications for winter semester 2023/2024, you have until 22 July 2023 to prioritize your applications.

For information on how to prioritize your applications and why it is important to do so, go to www.hochschulstart.de. The website www.hochschulstart.de also provides detailed information on the entire admission application procedure as well as on the rules governing the allocation of study places.

Details of all submission deadlines are available here.

The coordination phase starts once the application phase has ended (16 July 2023 to 24 August 2023). During the coordination phase, which of your admission applications has the best possible chance of success will be determined based on how you ranked your applications. (Please make sure that you have prioritized your applications by no later than 22 July 2023.) Although several offers may be received during the coordination phase, only one of them will remain at the end of this phase. The final offer is the best offer at that time based on your ranked admission applications. You can now accept this offer and you will then be admitted to the programme and a letter of admission will be sent to you. If you do not respond, you will be automatically admitted to the study programme associated with the offer remaining at the end of the coordination phase. If you do not receive any offer during the coordination phase, a rejection letter will be sent to you.

Applicants who do not receive a single offer during the coordination phase, may be able to take part in the coordinated pre-clearance scheme (Koordiniertes Nachrückverfahren, KNR) for those study programmes that they have already applied to (25 August 2023 until 30 September 2023), provided that the university or universities to which they have applied are part of the KNR scheme. In this case, Hochschulstart will send an email to the applicant with the subject line ‘Wichtiger Hinweis zum Nachrücken’ (‘Important information on pre-clearance options’. This email will contain a link that the applicant can use to confirm their wish to register for the KNR scheme. (KNR registration period: 25–27 August 2023).

Note: Saarland University does not participate in the coordinated pre-clearance scheme (KNR) for its Bachelor’s Programmes in ‘Biology’ and ‘Psychology’.

If you have any questions about registering for the DoSV procedure or about the procedure itself, please refer to the information provided at www.hochschulstart.de or send an email to service(at)hochschulstart.de.

If you have other questions relating to your application for admission to study at Saarland University, please get in touch with the Central Student Advisory Service: studienberatung(at)uni-saarland.de.

Hochschulstart processes selected data that we at Saarland University receive from our applicants. We can only access data that has been submitted for an application to Saarland University and we cannot access information relating to other admission applications that you may have sent to other universities. The security of your data is guaranteed at all times.

For further information about data protection and privacy, please refer to Hochschulstart’s privacy notice.