The federal government has fixed the jamb cut-off mark for 2026 at 150 for public and private universities and for colleges of nursing, while polytechnics and monotechnics will admit from 100. Any institution that goes below the agreed benchmark faces sanction.
The decision came at the 2026 admission policy meeting in Abuja, where the committee also set deadlines for admissions: public universities must finish by October 31, 2026, private universities by November 30, 2026, and polytechnics, monotechnics and colleges of education by December 31, 2026. Institutions that want to screen candidates may still do so, but they cannot charge more than N2,000.
The meeting also fixed the admissions mix for different categories of schools. Conventional universities and colleges of education must admit on a 60:40 science-to-arts ratio, while specialised universities and polytechnics were pegged at 80:20. That means the benchmark is not just about who gets in, but also about the shape of the intake each institution is expected to keep.
That was a change from the 2025 admission policy meeting in July, when JAMB set the minimum cut-off mark for universities at 150, colleges of nursing at 140, colleges of agriculture at 100 and colleges of education at 100. After the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination each year, JAMB holds the policy meeting to agree on student intake criteria, with institutions proposing their cut-off marks before the figures are debated and approved.
Tunji Alausa said the new exemptions would push admissions across tertiary institutions to about 1.5 million. He said the move would essentially double admission figures from two years ago, adding that the exemptions cover people going into colleges of education and those heading to monotechnics or polytechnics for non-technology agriculture courses because the country needs the policy to support food security. He said a new agric curriculum should be ready by the end of the year.
The friction in the policy is clear enough. The government is lifting the ceiling on admissions while also tightening the floor, and it is doing both in the same year. That leaves institutions with less room to improvise than in the past: they can screen, but they cannot overcharge; they can admit, but not below 150 for universities and nursing colleges, or 100 for polytechnics and monotechnics.
For students and schools, the answer to the question raised by the new cut-off is plain: 2026 will bring a higher national admission benchmark, stricter enforcement and a push to widen intake, not shrink it. The government is betting that more exemptions, not lower standards, will carry the system toward the 1.5 million target.
