The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has reaffirmed that the minimum admissible age for candidates seeking entry into Nigerian tertiary institutions remains 16 years.
This position was restated during the 2025 Policy Meeting on Admissions, held on Tuesday at the Bola Ahmed Tinubu International Conference Centre in Abuja.
According to the Board, the 16-year age requirement is enforced through its Central Admissions Processing System (CAPS), and provisions have been made to accommodate candidates who will turn 16 on or before August 31, 2025.
Despite this, JAMB expressed concern that some institutions continue to flout the directive by admitting underage candidates outside the CAPS framework and collecting large sums as tuition fees.
“The Board implemented the 16-year admissible age on its CAPS platform and even bent backwards to accommodate candidates who would be 16 as of 31st August 2025,” JAMB said. “However, some institutions admitted candidates who were not up to the admissible age outside CAPS and even collected huge sums of money from them as tuition fees.”
The Board stressed that such admissions are illegal and not recognised within the CAPS system, adding that some of these violations have resulted in legal action against the defaulting institutions.
In another major announcement, JAMB revealed that, starting from the 2025 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), candidates’ national ranking among their peers will be displayed on their result slips.
This initiative, the Board explained, is aimed at discouraging the over-celebration of isolated high scores and curbing the spread of falsified UTME results.
“To curb the menace of celebrating top scorers of UTME, candidates’ ranking (position) will be indicated on the result slip for each candidate,” JAMB said.
It noted that this new measure would help tertiary institutions assess applicants more accurately and provide a uniform benchmark across exam cohorts. The Board also argued that proposals to extend the validity of UTME results could undermine score comparability and complicate the admissions process.
Providing insight into the ranking system, JAMB disclosed that in the 2025 UTME, a score of 370 ranked 16th, 320 ranked 5,806th, 250 ranked 107,819th, 200 ranked 533,805th, 180 ranked 948,025th, 140 ranked 1,855,607th, 120 ranked 1,900,872nd, and 100 ranked 1,903,661st out of a total of 1,905,539 candidates.
JAMB reiterated its commitment to equity, transparency, and merit-based admissions.
The ongoing policy meeting, which brings together vice chancellors, provosts, registrars, and other key stakeholders in tertiary education, is expected to conclude with the approval of the national cut-off marks and other guidelines for the 2025 admission cycle.
