Plovdiv Entrance Exam 2027: Complete Preparation Guide

Fifty-one official topics. Remember that only one of the six task types is multiple choice: several of these areas will be examined through diagram labelling, comparative tables or text correction rather than through options on a page.

• Cell structure and organisation: the cell as the basic unit of living matter, the prokaryotic cell, the eukaryotic cell, the cell membrane and selective permeability, non-membranous and single-membraned organelles, double-membraned organelles, the cell nucleus and nuclear envelope, plant and animal cell differences (official topics 1 and 40-46)
• Biological molecules and enzymes: chemical composition of the cell, water and inorganic substances, carbohydrates and lipids, proteins, amino acids and the peptide bond, enzymes as biological catalysts, nucleic acids, DNA and RNA structure and base pairing, the types of RNA (official topics 34-38)
• Genetic processes: DNA replication and the enzymes involved, transcription and translation, the realization of genetic information, the gene as a DNA segment coding for RNA or protein, the genetic code (official topics 47-48)
• Cell division and differentiation: amitosis and mitosis, meiosis I and II, crossing-over, the cell cycle and its phases, haploid and diploid chromosome numbers, cellular differentiation (official topics 49-51)
• Viruses and immunity: supramolecular complexes and viruses, capsid and envelope, bacteriophages, immunity, antigens and antibodies, leukocytes in immune defence, vaccination and active immunity (official topics 39 and 17)
• Tissues and the organism: epithelial and connective tissue, muscle and nervous tissue, neurons and synapses, the organism as a unified unit (official topics 2-4)
• Digestive system and nutrition: nutrition, digestion in the oral cavity, digestion in the stomach and intestines, structure and functions of the small and large intestine, the digestive glands, hygiene and health knowledge of the digestive system (official topics 5-8)
• Respiratory system: structure and functions of the respiratory organs, breathing and gas exchange, respiratory mechanics, hygiene and health knowledge of the respiratory system (official topics 9-11)
• Excretory system: excretion, the kidney and the nephron, urine formation, water and salt balance, hygiene and health knowledge of the excretory system (official topics 12-13)
• Cardiovascular system and blood: the heart and blood vessels, blood and its components, heart activity and circulation, pulmonary and systemic circulation, clotting, hygiene and health knowledge of the cardiovascular system (official topics 14-16 and 18)
• Musculoskeletal system: structure of bones and joints, the skull, the vertebral column, the rib cage and the limbs, muscles and tendons (official topics 19-21)
• Reproductive system and development: the male reproductive system, the female reproductive system, gametes and gonads, fertilization, embryonic and post-embryonic development (official topics 22-24)
• Nervous system: the spinal cord, the brain including medulla, pons and cerebellum, the cerebrum, the autonomic nervous system (official topics 25-28)
• Endocrine system: the pituitary, pineal, thyroid and parathyroid glands, the pancreas, the adrenal glands and the gonads, their hormones and effects (official topics 29-30)
• Sensory systems and skin: the visual analyzer, the auditory, balance, taste and olfactory analyzers, structure and functions of the skin, thermoregulation (official topics 31-33)

Eighteen official numbered sections under three headings: General Chemistry (1-7), Inorganic Chemistry (8-10) and Organic Chemistry (11-18). Every item has to be answerable without a periodic table, which the guidelines state is not needed during the exam.

• Atomic structure and periodicity: atomic number, atomic nucleus and atomic mass, isotopes and isobars, electronic structure of the atom and energy levels, characteristics of s-, p- and d-orbitals, electronic configuration and orbital diagrams for the elements of periods I and II, periodic trends in atomic radius, ionization energy and electronegativity, elements of metallic and nonmetallic character (official section 1)
• Chemical bonding: the ionic bond, the covalent bond and its polar and nonpolar types, bond energy, bond length and direction, coordinate or dative covalent bonding, the metallic bond, the hydrogen bond, Van der Waals forces (official section 2)
• Reaction rate and catalysis: the kinetic equation and the rate constant, the energy diagram of a reaction, activation energy, exothermic and endothermic reactions, the effect of state of reactants, temperature, concentration and pressure, the rate determining step, properties of catalysts, the mechanism of homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis (official section 3)
• Chemical equilibrium: reversible reactions and the state of equilibrium, the equilibrium constant, the effect of concentration and pressure change, the effect of temperature and of catalysts, Le Chatelier's principle (official section 4)
• Solutions: saturated, supersaturated and unsaturated solutions, mass and volume concentration, molar concentration and molality, factors affecting the solubility of solid, liquid and gas compounds in liquids, vapor pressure lowering, boiling point elevation, freezing point depression and osmotic pressure (official section 5)
• Electrolytes, acids and bases: weak and strong electrolytes, degree of dissociation, the Arrhenius, Brønsted-Lowry and Lewis theories of acids and bases, ionization of water and the pH scale, hydrolysis of salts (official section 6)
• Oxidation-reduction reactions: oxidation number, oxidizing and reducing agents, oxidation and reduction, balancing oxidation-reduction reactions, the oxidizing and reducing properties of elements, electrolysis and its practical application (official section 7)
• Properties of metals and nonmetals: the reactivity series of metals, reactions of metals with diluted acids, oxygen, nonmetals, water, acids and salts, reactions of nonmetals with oxygen, hydrogen, other nonmetals, metals and salts (official section 8)
• Oxides, oxyacids and bases: chemical properties of basic and acid oxides, reactions of oxides with water, other oxides, acids and bases, reactions of oxyacids with metals, basic oxides, bases and salts, reactions of bases with oxides, acids and salts (official section 9)
• Amphoteric oxides and hydroxides: the chemical properties of amphoteric oxides and hydroxides and their reaction with both acids and bases (official section 10)
• Organic basics and nomenclature: hybridization of the carbon atom, sigma and pi bonds, single, double and triple bonds, structural and stereoisomerism of organic compounds, the general principles of IUPAC nomenclature (official section 11)
• Hydrocarbons: the homologous series of alkanes, alkenes and alkynes, alkane halogenation, addition reactions of alkenes and alkynes, polymerization of alkenes, benzene and alkylbenzenes, substitution with halogens, nitric and sulphuric acid, Friedel-Crafts reactions (official section 12)
• Alcohols and phenols: classification and nomenclature of alcohols and phenols, methods of preparation, acid properties, ester formation, oxidation, dehydration (official section 13)
• Carbonyl compounds: classification into aldehydes and ketones, methods of preparation, addition and condensation reactions, oxidation of aldehydes and ketones (official section 14)
• Carbohydrates: monosaccharides including the structure, stereochemistry and chemical properties of glucose and fructose, the disaccharide sucrose and its structure and chemical properties, the polysaccharides starch and cellulose and their structure and biological functions (official section 15)
• Carboxylic acids and derivatives: preparation of carboxylic acids, acid properties and formation of salts, alpha halogenation, decarboxylation, the acid derivatives halides, anhydrides, esters and amides and their preparation and properties (official section 16)
• Amines and amino acids: classification of amines, preparation by reduction of nitrogen-containing compounds and from alkyl halides, basic properties, formation of amides, reaction with nitrous acid, the alpha-amino acids glycine, alanine, phenylalanine, cysteine, aspartic acid and lysine, zwitterion structure and stereoisomerism, chemical properties of amino acids and formation of the peptide bond (official sections 17-18)

Partly derived. The official description names only two content areas: collocations and set phrases characteristic of everyday speech, and grammatical rules such as those for forming verb tenses and questions. The remaining areas below are read from the published sample test and from what CEFR B1 verification implies, and are labelled as such.

• Reading comprehension (official Part 1): one text drawn from medicine, health care, biology, chemistry or a similar field with ten multiple-cloze statements offering three answers, surveying a text to extract relevant information, drawing conclusions, distinguishing nuances in the meaning of words and word combinations, retrieving detailed information, and understanding opinions and facts stated directly or understood from context
• Verb tenses and forms: present, past and future tenses, simple and continuous aspect, the perfect forms, active and passive voice, sequence of tenses in gapped sentences; the official description names the forming of verb tenses as a task focus but does not enumerate the forms tested
• Question forms and reported speech: direct and indirect question formation, question tags, subject and object questions, reported statements, questions and commands, backshift of tenses; question formation is named officially, reported speech is derived from the sample test
• Modal verbs and conditionals: modals of obligation, prohibition, permission, ability, advice and deduction, the conditional types, and wish or regret structures (derived from the sample test, not listed in the official description)
• Determiners, pronouns and comparison: articles, quantifiers and determiners, countable and uncountable nouns, personal, reflexive and reciprocal pronouns, comparative and superlative forms (derived from the sample test)
• Prepositions and phrasal verbs: dependent prepositions after verbs, nouns and adjectives, prepositions of time, place and movement, and common phrasal verbs (derived from the sample test)
• Collocations and set phrases (officially named): collocations and set phrases characteristic of everyday speech, fixed expressions and common idioms, and choosing the single idiomatic option among near-synonyms
• Medical and everyday vocabulary: basic medical and health-care vocabulary of the kind met in the reading text, everyday lexis, word choice among near-synonyms and word formation; lexical knowledge is named officially as a task focus, but no word list is published, so the range is derived

It is the examination the Medical University of Plovdiv uses to select international students for its English-taught Medicine, Dental Medicine and Pharmacy programmes. It has three components: a Biology paper and a 30-question Chemistry paper sat back to back in one 90-minute window (45 minutes each, Biology first), plus a separate 45-minute Diagnostic Test of English taken only by candidates without an accepted English certificate.

Neither. Bulgaria has no national medical entrance test. Plovdiv and Sofia do use an identically shaped ranking formula: three times the Biology grade, plus three times the Chemistry grade, plus the English grade, to a maximum of 42.00, but the papers underneath it differ substantially. Plovdiv publishes its component counts, timings, option counts and a minimum of 21.00; Sofia publishes a 50-question combined exam with no option count, no marking rule and no minimum at all.

Both, depending on the component. Chemistry is an online written, anonymous test. Biology is an online or in-person written, anonymous test. All components are delivered in English. Confirm which mode applies to the sitting you choose, since the Biology component can run either way.

Each component is converted to a grade on the Bulgarian 2.00-to-6.00 scale, and §6.1 of the official Admission Guide combines them: three times the Biology grade, plus three times the Chemistry grade, plus the English grade. The maximum is 42.00 and the stated minimum is 21.00. Within a component, one point is awarded per correct answer (explicitly stated for Chemistry and for both parts of the English test), with no penalty anywhere for a wrong or blank answer.

Not in the way it sounds. Because each component is graded from 2.00 to 6.00 rather than from 0, the lowest score anyone can arithmetically obtain is (3 × 2.00) + (3 × 2.00) + 2.00 = 14.00. The achievable range is therefore 14.00 to 42.00, and 21.00 sits 7.00 above the bottom of a 28.00-point span: a quarter of the way up, not half. It is also very nearly a restatement of the per-component rule: three marks of exactly 3.00 compute to precisely 21.00.

No. §6.3 of the Admission Guide states that a missing mark, or any component mark lower than the average of 3.00, removes you from the final ranking list regardless of your total. A candidate with Biology 4.50, Chemistry 2.75 and English 4.00 scores 25.75, comfortably over the published 21.00 minimum, and is barred anyway. In practice §6.3, not the 21.00 figure, is the rule that decides eligibility.

It differs by block, which is unusual. Chemistry is four options (A to D) on all 30 questions, officially confirmed. Part 2 of the English test, the 30 Use of English items, is also four. But Part 1 of the English test (the 10 Reading Comprehension cloze items) is officially three options, not four. Biology's multiple-choice task does not have a published option count; four is likely but unconfirmed. That three-option block is the most guess-favourable part of the paper: with no penalty stated, a blind guess there is worth +0.33 raw marks against +0.25 on a four-option item.

Because only one of its six task types is multiple choice. The official Biology programme describes six tasks: 20 multiple-choice questions, identifying the 10 correct statements among 20 given, matching 6 biological terms to definitions, labelling a supplied anatomy, molecular biology or cell biology diagram and answering questions on it, completing a comparative table characterising two processes, molecules or structures, and identifying and replacing incorrect words in a text before answering further questions on it. MU-Plovdiv publishes item counts for only the first three of those, and no total for the component.

Only if you do not hold one of MU-Plovdiv's accepted English language certificates. Certificate-holders skip the Diagnostic Test entirely. What the official documents do not state is how that exemption is reflected in the competition score: the English mark is worth up to 6.00 of the 42.00, so this is a real open question worth confirming directly with the university rather than assuming either way.

Within the EU, yes: automatically, as a standard Bulgarian medical degree, since Bulgaria is an EU member state. There is no separate national board exam afterwards: Bulgaria's state exam is built into the final year of the six-year degree itself, followed by free and indefinite registration in the National Register of the Bulgarian Medical Association. Outside the EU recognition isn't automatic as a rule, but the UK is an exception. Under the Medical Act 1983 (section 21B, as in force on 12 October 2026), a Bulgarian medical degree is a 'relevant European qualification', so a graduate who applies to the GMC with one, whatever their nationality, is not asked to show the knowledge and skills other international graduates prove through PLAB/UKMLA; evidence of English is still required, and the rule is UK policy that can change. US-bound graduates need ECFMG certification via USMLE Step 1 and Step 2 CK, the same requirement every international medical graduate faces.

Yes. The IvyTest simulator runs MU-Plovdiv-format practice in the real 45-minute Biology then 45-minute Chemistry sequence, with Chemistry at its confirmed 30 questions and four options, the English Reading Comprehension block at its confirmed three options, and per-component reporting built around the §6.3 rule that one component below 3.00 removes you from the ranking list. A free diagnostic is available without payment.

MU-Plovdiv publishes no past papers. Its admission page gives free PDFs instead: for Biology, Chemistry and English, the programme and a sample test with its answers (Biology's covers all six task types, Chemistry's has 30 questions, English's 40), and for the two sciences a book of tests: Biology Entrance Exam Questions (2026, 89 pages, answers in bold) and Chemistry Admission Test Practice (108 pages of four-option questions with an answer key). The authors may revise both.

MU-Plovdiv had not published its 2027 dates on 7 October 2026. In 2026, registration opened on 2 March and the exam ran on 15 April, 15 May, 16 June, 17 July and 18 August, plus an additional re-sit on 4 September, each with a registration deadline five to seven days before. Documents were accepted from 2 March to 11 September 2026, the application deadline the university's FAQ gives. Expect a similar pattern, and confirm it on the admission page.

Results come as rankings: in 2026, one after each sitting from April to June and two in September, and each applicant sees theirs in their personal profile. The admission page publishes each ranking's minimum score out of 42. For Medicine it was 39.12 in April, 34.14 in May, 34.50 in June, 29.01 on 15 September and 25.89 on 24 September. Dental Medicine's was 42.00, the maximum, in April, May and mid-September, and by 24 September Dental Medicine and Pharmacy had filled every place.

The content is secondary-school Biology and Chemistry, set out in the official programmes, but the format is demanding: five of Biology's six task types are not multiple choice, and one component below 3.00 removes you from the ranking whatever your total. The competition sets the real bar. On the 42-point scale, the 2026 Medicine rankings closed between 39.12 in April and 25.89 in late September, and Dental Medicine's reached the maximum of 42.00.

A secondary school diploma that admits you to university in the country that issued it, verified by Bulgaria's NACID, with Biology and Chemistry studied and averaging at least 62% of the top mark in that country's grading system; elective marks do not count, and no separate A-level grade is set. You prove B1 English with a certificate or the Diagnostic Test, sit the entrance exams and send legalised, translated documents to the Admissions Office, 15A Vasil Aprilov Blvd., Plovdiv. There is no age limit.

For students admitted in 2026/2027, the first year costs €10,000 for Medicine or Dental Medicine and €6,200 for Pharmacy; the tuition-fees page still shows 2025/2026, when years 2 to 6 of Medicine cost €8,000. Each exam date costs €300 (€270 for the tests, €30 for data processing) and the additional re-sit €400. Applicants ranked from April to June pre-enrol online with €2,000 that counts towards the first semester and is not refunded if they withdraw. A university hostel room costs about €80 a month.

Medicine takes 6 years: 10 semesters, then a pre-graduation clerkship of 329 days in internal medicine, surgery, obstetrics and gynaecology, paediatrics, and hygiene and epidemiology, with state exams. Human Anatomy and Histology runs through the first four semesters, and English-taught students take 360 hours of Bulgarian in years 1-2. Course syllabi are on the university's Syllabus page. In 2026/2027, first-year English-taught classes began on 1 October 2026, and the summer semester runs from 8 February to 28 May 2027.

By its own account, MU-Plovdiv is a state university accredited by Bulgaria's National Evaluation and Accreditation Agency, founded in 1945 and one of the country's ten research university centres, which has trained over 37,700 students from 65 countries, with clinical training in six university hospitals. Its diploma has been recognised across the EU and EEA since 2007. Its pages cite no ranking and say nothing about the UK's General Medical Council, but UK law answers the question for the degree: under the Medical Act 1983 (section 21B, as in force on 12 October 2026), a Bulgarian medical degree is a 'relevant European qualification', so its graduates apply to the GMC without the PLAB/UKMLA that other international graduates sit, with evidence of English. The GMC still decides each application.