Students from Seoul will be able to apply for less than half of all medical school seats in the 2027 admissions cycle, as the share of spots reserved exclusively for regional applicants reaches a record high of 49.4% across the country's 39 medical schools. The expansion of local-quota admissions, combined with the newly introduced regional doctor program, is set to widen access significantly for students from outside the capital — while making the admissions landscape the most difficult on record for Seoul applicants.
An analysis of 2027 enrollment plans for all 39 medical schools by Jongno Hagwon, released Sunday, found that 1,734 of the total 3,508 seats — or 49.4% — are open only to students from the respective regions. The share of seats reserved for regional students has risen steadily: 25.4% in the 2022 admissions cycle, 32.1% in 2023, 34.0% in 2024, 42.7% in 2025 and 40.8% in 2026.
The concentration is even sharper when looking only at the 27 medical schools located outside the greater Seoul area. Of their combined 2,490 seats, 1,734 — or 69.6% — are set aside for local students. That share has climbed from 38.0% in 2022 to 47.9% in 2023, 50.7% in 2024, 59.9% in 2025 and 61.0% in 2026.
Conversely, the number of seats open to all applicants nationwide — including those from Seoul — has shrunk sharply. Jongno Hagwon put the nationally open pool at 1,752 seats, or 49.9% of the total, for 2027. In 2022, that figure stood at 2,247 seats, representing 74.6% of the total — meaning the share accessible to Seoul students has fallen 24.7 percentage points in five years.
![An analysis by Jongno Hagwon of 2027 enrollment plans for all 39 medical schools nationwide found that 1,734 of the total 3,508 seats — 49.4% — are open only to regional applicants. [Provided by Jongno Hagwon / produced with ChatGPT]](https://wimg.heraldcorp.com/news/cms/2026/08/09/news-p.v1.20260809.fc795bc23f764c158fa665f1f3e8fe68_P1.png)
The Honam region has the highest share of locally reserved seats, with its four medical schools setting aside 77.3% of enrollment for regional students. Jeju follows at 76.5%, then the Busan-Ulsan-South Gyeongsang Province cluster at 73.7%, the Daegu-North Gyeongsang Province cluster at 70.9%, the Chungcheong provinces at 69.6% and Gangwon Province at 46.4%. By individual institution, Dong-A University topped the list at 84.8%, followed by Chonnam National University at 84.0%, Gyeongsang National University at 83.7%, Wonkwang University at 83.6%, Dongguk University WISE Campus at 83.3% and Pusan National University at 80.8%.
Next year, the launch of the regional doctor program will add further momentum to the trend. The number of local-quota seats at regional medical schools will rise from 1,232 this year to 1,268 next year — a gain of 36 — while the new regional doctor track will add another 466 seats. In total, the number of seats reserved for regional students will increase by 502, or 40.7 percent, compared with this year.
Since the 2023 admissions cycle, regional medical schools have been required by law to fill at least 40 percent of their seats through local-quota admissions, with a lower threshold of 20 percent applying to Gangwon Province and Jeju. Many schools have since exceeded those minimums, and the pool of seats open to students from Seoul and the broader metropolitan area has continued to shrink as a result. Both the local-quota track and the regional doctor track are open only to students who graduated from middle and high schools in the relevant region.
"For students from Seoul, the 2027 admissions cycle could be the most difficult for medical school entry on record," said Lim Seong-ho, chief executive of Jongno Hagwon. "Regional students, by contrast, can apply simultaneously to metropolitan-area medical schools, local-quota tracks and the regional doctor track — meaning their opportunities for medical school admission are expanding significantly."
brunch@heraldcorp.com
