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I am currently doing my masters in theoretical physics in Switzerland, about halfway, with most of the coursework done. I will be done with the degree by summer 2025. So far, my grades are the highest possible (6.0), and I hope to keep that up. My ultimate goal is to find a PhD dealing with gravitation, either GR, semiclassical or quantum gravity, as these topics (or what I've learned about them so far) have fascinated me most.

I started doing some research online the past few days, and have stumbled upon the Relativity and Gravitation group of the University of Cambridge, which seems to be doing exactly what I am interested in. On their website, they state that most of their PhD students come from the Part III, and the external applicants usually get positions in "less formal areas" such as lattice field theory and cosmology.

Given this information, I have started considering to do the Part III after my masters, essentially as a second masters degree, to maybe get a PhD position in Cambridge. In another post on this forum, I have read that about 10 of the 70 Part III students get PhD offers from Cambridge, and a few from Oxford. Although I am confident in my performance, I do not know how I compare internationally, so I am simply estimating a one seventh chance of getting a PhD in Cambridge after doing Part III. If I don't get one there, I would need to apply for other PhD positions in Europe.

Now comes my main question: How useful/convincing is having a Part III degree in Europe? Would this significantly increase my control over what kind of PhD I will be able to do? I am not worried too much about "losing" a year of my life to Part III, since I will finish my masters at the age of 23.

Besides answers to these questions, I would also greatly appreciate any advice on doing a PhD, either in Cambridge, Oxford or anywhere else in Europe, as I am feeling somewhat lost at the moment with what I should be doing.

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  • This may be odd given the length of the question body, but I don't totally understand what you're asking. Are you asking "Will success in Part 3 make me more competitive for PhD places"?
    – user176372
    Commented Jul 30 at 21:17
  • @user176372 yes, essentially. Or rather, "will doing it and ending up at the middle of the class make me more attractive as a PhD candidate in europe?" I am asking this for the scenario in which I get into Part III and find funding, but am not offered a PhD in Cambridge at GR/HEP, to see how much it increases my chances for the then following PhD applications in other parts of europe.
    – Niels Slotboom
    Commented Jul 30 at 21:45
  • We've gotten essentially this question with minor variations 5+ times over the course of 10 years, so I'm now suggesting we create some kind of canonical version to centralize answers. In the interim: Part III is one of the most famous degrees of its type in the world, and it's a bit hard for it to hurt PhD applications. As to whether it's worth whatever its cost is to you, that's not a question we can really answer for other people.
    – user176372
    Commented Jul 30 at 22:03
  • @user176372 I am not asking whether its worth the cost in both money and effort, I am asking how much it helps for PhD applications in europe. This is because the other posts I saw here about Part III were US-specific, and I dont live nor plan to live in the US, so these dont really apply - the answers there state that it is not as much appreciated in the US due to the cultural differences in academia.
    – Niels Slotboom
    Commented Aug 1 at 8:38
  • Whether or not any given score on a course/degree would help or hurt you personally is probably too individualized of a question for it to be within Academia.SE's scope. What we can do is try to answer whether Part III is generally recognized by people hiring PhD students in Europe.
    – user176372
    Commented Aug 5 at 1:35

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To the best of my knowledge, the answer is the same as for our US-based answer (How appreciated is "Part III" in the US?).

Part III is one of the most well-known if not the best known degrees of its type given by one of the best-known mathematics departments in the world. Good marks would surely boost your competitiveness for PhD slots almost anywhere. Though I can speak mostly to math and not physics, it seems unlikely though not impossible to me that Part III could be anything less than a boost in physics subfields related to the physics subjects it covers.

The best I can offer is anecdotal justifications as to why you should also expect this to be the case in Europe as it is in the US. Perhaps someone from the continent can be even more confident.

  • I took a similarly-pitched course from Oxford 8 years ago, and have met several people then and since from various European countries who completed Part III.
  • Continental Europe is in closer proximity to Cambridge than the United States.
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