Transferring Back to Germany: What Counts in Credit Transfer for Semesters Abroad

How the transfer generally works

If you're studying medicine abroad and want to transfer to Germany, you don't apply through hochschulstart for a first-semester place. The route is entry into a higher semester, arranged individually by each university rather than centrally. You count as a 'location changer' (Ortswechsler), formerly known as a lateral entrant.

These places open up wherever students have transferred, taken a break, or shifted focus. There's no central allocation body and no rule that applies identically across all faculties. Each university decides for itself whether entry is possible and which semester to place you in.

That's exactly why you won't find lists or dates here: they differ by faculty, subject, and cohort, and an outdated overview wouldn't help anyone. What we do instead is more concrete: we look at where you stand in your studies and tell you what's realistic in your situation.

The three paths back

Before getting into details, it's worth looking at the big picture. There are exactly three realistic paths, and they aren't mutually exclusive.

• Path 1 – Entry into a higher semester. The classic route back: your coursework from abroad is recognised, and you join a German faculty partway through the programme. This is what 90 percent of this guide is about.
• Path 2 – finish abroad and apply for licensure (Approbation) in Germany. Within the EU, the degree is automatically recognised. This path is always available, regardless of whether places are free in Germany, which makes it the solid ground underneath everything else.
• Path 3 – starting fresh in the first semester. Through the familiar German admissions process. Mainly useful for students who've only just started abroad and would be starting from scratch anyway.

In practice, most people combine paths 1 and 2: keeping the option of transferring back open while continuing their studies abroad undisturbed. If the transfer works out, great. If it doesn't, you still end up with a fully valid EU degree.

What determines your placement

It's not the number of semesters you've studied that counts, but the recognition of your individual coursework. The state examination offices (Landesprüfungsämter) are responsible; the legal basis is Section 12 of the Approbationsordnung für Ärzte (Physicians' Licensing Regulations) for human medicine, and Section 23 of the Approbationsordnung für Zahnärzte (Dentists' Licensing Regulations) for dentistry. This determines which semester you're placed into and which of your courses count as equivalent.

Two things determine, in practice, how high that placement turns out to be.

How subjects are structured. Curricula abroad rarely divide subjects exactly the way German programmes do. A broad course abroad might correspond to two separate subjects in Germany – or the reverse. If this isn't mapped carefully, a genuinely solid piece of coursework can end up counting for less than it's worth.

Content fit with the target semester. What matters isn't just how much you bring with you, but whether the content matches the stage of study you want to enter. If key content that German faculties assume at that particular stage is missing, your placement will come out lower than a simple tally would suggest.

Because most universities abroad examine by academic year rather than semester, the first solid proof of achievement only comes at the end of the second semester anyway. Before that, a transfer is practically not on the table.

How high your entry point could be

How much gets credited depends on your university, where you are in your studies, and your specific case – and it shifts whenever a curriculum is revised. So instead of a table, here's an offer: send us your academic record so far and your preferred countries, and we'll individually assess which entry point is realistic for you. For transfers, we always aim for the highest possible entry point, often in the final two years of study.

And if you're still right at the start, we'll tell you which university, in which country, we can reliably place you at. We place students in medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, nursing, and veterinary medicine through the largest network of official partner universities – the initial assessment is free.

When a transfer makes sense

There are three sensible points in time, and they differ considerably in effort and payoff.

After the first year of study. The earliest possible point. The advantage: almost no time lost. The disadvantage: places are scarcer at the very lowest semesters, because hardly anyone in Germany changes location that early.

After completing the full pre-clinical phase. By far the most popular point, and in most cases the best one. If you bring a fully completed pre-clinical phase, you move straight into the clinical part – and that's exactly where most faculties open their doors in the first place.

During the clinical phase. Possible, and regularly successful, but more granular: individual clinical achievements count here, and curricula differ more from one another. In our experience, this works well from Bulgaria, Poland, and Riga.

Shortly before or during your final clinical year (PJ) is the most demanding case for a transfer. Here, the more elegant solution is usually to finish your studies abroad and instead complete one or more PJ rotations in Germany. This is explicitly provided for and is something many teaching hospitals are happy to support.

Which point in time is right for your situation is something we discuss in a free consultation.

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Standard programme or model programme

One point many students discover only late: not every faculty translates equally well into classic semesters. Model programmes – for example in Aachen, Bochum, Hamburg, Oldenburg, Bielefeld, or at Charité – integrate pre-clinical and clinical training from the start and use their own module structures instead of the classic Physikum exam.

For returning students, this simply means these locations are a tighter fit than standard programmes. That's not a flaw in the model – it's a question of fit. If you want to keep your options broad, focus on standard programmes and treat model locations as a bonus option wherever they match your profile.

Who gets the place?

When more applications come in than there are places available, universities sort them into fixed groups. The exact order varies in detail, but almost everywhere follows this pattern:

1. Hardship cases with particular social or health-related reasons
2. Location changers – students in the same subject who are changing location – this is the category you fall into as a medicine student coming from the EU
3. Lateral entrants from other degree programmes such as biology or pharmacy
4. Lottery, if places remain open after these groups

This is exactly where the often-overlooked advantage of an EU medical study place lies: you count as a location changer, which puts you ahead of anyone coming from a different subject. Having already started a medicine degree in the EU structurally improves your starting position for a German study place – and not just because time has passed.

Within the group of location changers, social criteria usually decide next: family reunification, children living locally, caring for relatives, or an employment relationship at the location. We're happy to work through how this applies in your case together with you.

Dentistry: its own rules

Credit transfer is considerably more complex in dentistry. Since the 2021 amendment to the Approbationsordnung für Zahnärzte (Dentists' Licensing Regulations), transfers from abroad more often come with a downgrade in placement. The main reason is the practical courses, which take place abroad in different scope and order.

The practical consequence: in dentistry, transferring back tends to come up more during the clinical phase, and for many students, the clearer calculation is to complete the degree abroad and apply for licensure afterwards. We'll look at which option is better in your case together.

The solid ground: finishing abroad

If you finish your degree in an EU country, you reach German licensure (Approbation) without detours. The legal basis is the Professional Qualifications Directive 2005/36/EC: degrees from EU member states are automatically recognised, so no equivalency or knowledge test is required.

The application goes through the licensing authority responsible for the German state where you want to work. This is professional licensing, not a second study admissions process – and it's why transferring back never has to happen under pressure. This option is always available, regardless of whether places open up in the right semester.

The honest picture

A transfer back is never guaranteed. It depends on whether places actually open up in the right semester, and even the best preparation can't change that. What you can very much influence is the quality of your starting position: a study place at a university whose curriculum translates well, a cleanly documented academic record, and a realistic assessment before you make decisions.

If you go abroad, you should be ready to finish there. Transferring back is the option, not the requirement. And for everything before that: send us your profile, and we'll tell you where we can place you. Book a free consultation.