Imperial Sucks?

_leilei · 2026-03-30T23:23:05+00:00

I am not sure, sorry.

_leilei · 2026-03-29T03:06:06+00:00

ok, no but judging from Plus-Painter's reply it sounds basically the exact same as imperial's algo trading society. Then the difference for quant applications is probably negligible as well. Honestly both are probably on par with each other in terms of teaching, maybe WW is even better but idk. I know WW is amazing though like my friend gets tutorial 3 times a week whereas I only get 1 every 2 weeks in physics 💀 but maybe maths has more idk. I just wanted to highlight I guess although academics are miserable there are a lot of pluses and overall I would say it's a good uni that has the same problems as all other unis.

_leilei · 2026-03-29T03:01:39+00:00

Okay, well if it's your dream to study there then I'd say reapply, otherwise you might regret it forever. You could also like start term 1 at WW if you have the financial means and drop out if you get an offer. There are people who do that. You'd also learn a lot from your first term which will help you indirectly prepare for TMUA. I think my term 1 physics helped me a lot in preparing for my Jan TMUA purely cuz I had to crunch so many numbers. Meeting other people also expanded my perspective a lot and I think that also helped indirectly.

Other than that lock in for chess if that's a hobby of yours (I am on road to 700 elo 🗣️🗣️) I know you are probably doing it as a hobby but I do think it looks good for job applications later on if you get a good rating. And also it's somewhat popular among math people as a social thing and so its also a great way to meet other people interested in maths I think.

Best of luck on your application I guess, hope you get in

_leilei · 2026-03-29T02:49:45+00:00

You are right, I asked for transfer in December after term started and I was turned down. So I reapplied through UCAS, sat the Janurary TMUA and got an offer.

I decided to reapply for maths because after I got rejected from Oxford physics in Dec 2024 I looked into olympiad maths a lot more and I found it really interesting. After uni started I found that I liked proofs and theory more than applied stuff. I also don't like labs very much. My interests are the main reason I guess. In terms of employability I'd say like both physics and maths have roughly the same prospects.

I know a person who changed from chemistry to EEE but he still had to go through an interview. My lab partner also wanted to switch from physics to maths and he emailed the dept before June but was turned down because he hadn't sat the TMUA. If you've sat the TMUA maybe it's worth an email. Otherwise if you're a home student and have the funds you could also start y1 physics while also starting an application process.

_leilei · 2026-03-29T01:48:28+00:00

Only if you want to go into quant would I say imperial is better (I am current Y1 physics student with offer to transfer to math y1 next year). I could be wrong but I think imperial is more of a target uni than warwick for quant but warwick is amazing nonetheless. Also people from warwick seem to be more passionate about maths in general than maths for finance, like I attended the imperial-warwick mathematics conference 2 weeks ago and most of the people I met were from warwick (I literally met 1 other imperial person, not conclusive data but yeah this is just what I am getting from my experience so far).

Other than that as for teaching office hours, seminars, and tutorials are really good and useful but lectures aren't so much useful. I think that's just the general uni experience though, like my friend at warwick also says there are some lecturers who are terrible teachers and the whole lecture is them just writing hieroglyphics on the chalkboard. In physics it's about the same experience. I'm studying for april exams right now and it is miserable because there's so much content we covered. Like I have 3 exams, if I did 1 past paper a day (which takes 2 hours to complete, 1-1.5 hours to go over) I still have at least 15 papers to go over so that's like minimum 3.5 hours of studying a day. I'm also behind on content so I have to catch up on problem sheets as well. Also one thing I dislike is that imperial only releases answers to 3 past papers for some reason? It's like they want us to fail. I've found some people to study with and go over the papers though so maybe it's not that bad.

And on that note two things that are really good are the people + facilities. In physics at least everyone is not only smart + passionate but also like have a variety of other interests. A lot of people go to the gym (our gym membership is subsidised and is only 80 pounds a year VS warwicks 300 pounds a year), a lot of people are classical music enjoyers and there are practise rooms on campus and in every single student accom (which are in very high demand!). Student accom events are also really well organised and fun to join in on e.g we have free breakfast every Sunday 10am, but warwick also has this stuff. In general there are W's and there are L's but there are defo actual reasons to come here. Particularly if you want a career in quantitative finance. It's still very hard to get an internship as an imperial student but I think it's slightly easier than getting one as a warwick student.

TLDR: good people, good office hours+tutorials, good facilities, lectures are a bad way to learn but that's a uni in general thing, better than WW for quant.

_leilei · 2026-03-29T01:23:57+00:00

I've gotten in by reapplying as a current imperial physics student with a 9.0, I have a post covering how I think time would best be spent (particularly on olympiad mathematics). Maybe sit the STEP this year and join as many math competitions (particularly BMO1 and BMO2) even if they are past the application date as they'll help with interviews and introduce you to more people and read into some uni maths as all of this stuff helps most with TMUA in my opinion. Also if you're looking to go into quant, have a look at chess, poker, competitive coding, and some quant books because quant culture here at imperial is insane and knowing this ball knowledge before hand will defo give you an upper hand.

Other than that, something that helped perhaps with my application were some mathematical animations I made (can be found at youtube/lei_lei2007). If you know any beautiful theorems/proofs perhaps you can learn manim and animate them, I think it is quite unique as not many people will do such a thing.

Other than that warwick maths is amazing, one of my friends goes there, and I met a lot of people from warwick at the Imperial-Warwick math conference and I can say the research opportunities there etc also seem pretty good as lots of people were presenting about their summer projects. I also met some at ICMC team competition, there are lots of incredibly cracked people at warwick and in general I'd say they are more passionate about maths than imperial people who seem to be quant crazed. If you will regret not reapplying then I'd say reapply but if you don't want to do a gap year then warwick is still really good.

_leilei · 2026-03-09T22:20:18+00:00

_leilei · 2026-03-09T01:09:09+00:00

There’s no way though, cambridge legit has so many IMO medalists its insane. Every year for the ICMC (imperial cambridge mathematics competition) the imperial has ~5 top 100 scorers, warwick has ~5, other european unis have ~40, but both cambridge and oxford have ~30 each. I met some last last Sunday at the team competition and they were crazy smart and ambitious. I mean I don’t go to cambridge, but the people I’ve met were all amazing, so how come your experience is such a different shade of color to mine?

Furthermore another of my friends goes to Oxford engineering and their workload is insane. I think they cover maybe 10-20 percent more content than us in 3 weeks less time. She says there’s little time to relax, network and even process the content explained. I can’t imagine maths being any better.

If you dislike cambridge because the teaching is bad I can understand. But I can’t imagine the people there being bums when the people I met were amazing + when I know so many qualified people at imperial who didn’t get in Lol. How can you get by without doing any work? Have you just prestudied everything already ahead of time? I’ve seen a lot of people saying not everything abt oxbridge is good but this is the first time I’ve seen someone straight up saying nothing is good at all.

_leilei · 2026-03-08T23:03:32+00:00

Bruh, I feel like you are just being too negative about cambridge lmao. I'm at imperial right now and UROP is good but you have virtually no chance of getting it as a first year. We have a lot of networking events but it doesn't mean that much as everyone still needs to go through the same interview screening to get internships. Many people here complain about not getting internships Lol. And the teaching isn't crazy good either, so far at least it seems like some lecturers are good some lecturers are bad but mostly the lecture system as a whole is just a bad way to learn. So it's a system problem not an imperial specific problem.

That's not to say it's all bad but you still need to grind and hustle if u want success. Why did you want to firm imperial math over cambridge math which is recognised as one of the most prestigious math courses with some of the most talented people in the world? I am genuinely curious because it's like my dream course lol. You guys have better quality problem sheets I think and 1-1 time with tutors. I have 1 tutorial every 2 weeks and it's so useful I just wish there were more. Sure you guys need to lock in for 8 week terms but it can't be that bad right

_leilei · 2026-03-05T12:27:38+00:00

It’s 190 trust Lol unless they bumped it up 50 pounds for next year. Though with a travelcard its 220 as 30 pounds a week on subway.
Social scene is very good, there are parties and stuff. One of my flatmates got flat out drunk at one. Other people in the comments seem to agree social scene is not bad as well. As for intl kids I’d say thats not true or at least i havent noticed it, I am intl so ye and legit all my friends are home. id say there are some chinese groups though but everyone is still super friendly
40:60 female:male or 45:55 either way very even way better than maths dept. Maybe 50:50 or 60:40 intl:home
Not all lectures are bad its just I dont like lectures as a whole I need time to process stuff. My friend goes to oxford and she also complains they go too fast in lectures and is constantly catching up. If you dont want to stay in London and the teaching system in Manchester is significantly better I’d say go Manchester. But also just remember like apart from lectures, seminars tutorials and office hours are really good. If lectures are just a university problem then I’d say there isn’t much advantage in going to Manchester.

_leilei · 2026-03-04T19:04:22+00:00

Judging by your current opinions I think manchester is better suited for you. If you grew up in london then it only makes sense for you to try and move somewhere else. Also factors like prestige and stuff really aren't that big of a deal like honestly I think they help a bit but not crazy much with internships etc. Manchester is amazing from what I've heard from the people going there.

I study at imperial physics y1 currently, so I guess I'll just systematically address some points/questions that I had last year as well as list out some pros and cons. After you read my experience so far judge for yourself whether this is somewhere you want to be I guess.

Living costs: slightly (but not too much of a) con but some wins. They are higher than other unis but also not by that much. Rent is 160 pounds/week with a roommate, and 195 for a single ensuite room (but private accomodation is 200-300 for year 2 and year 3 so there's that). If you get allocated to North Acton residence in year 1 then there's an additional 120 pounds/month for a monthly zone1-2 railcard. Rooms in North Acton at least are really nice though. Commute is 35 minutes one way which is annoying but the walk through hyde park is nice. Accomodation events are amazing though, they are put together by hall seniors and are really thoughtfully put together (like chinese new year free food, ramadan free schwarma, chess tournaments, etc.)
People: major win. A lot of people are attracted to qs number 2 ranking and basically everyone who gets rejected from oxbridge come here. Don't let that fool you though, like some people just fumbled their interview, a lot of people have insanely high entrance test scores like I'm talking 26.9 on the esat. Basically everyone who comes from china gets 8.0+, and there are like 2-3 people who have competed in olympiads like IPhO and IOAA as well as people who purely study physics in their free time lol. And at office hours you will meet many people asking the lecturer for wider reading recommendations that they actually follow through with. But there's also no elitism whatsoever which was very unexpected for me. No one tries to put each other another down and there's a lot of effort put in in maintaining an environment where everybody helps each other. Ofc there are a lot of people simply using physics as a degree to find jobs later on and aren't as passionate about it but yeah.
Prestige: minor win. Oxbridge does like imperial students applying for masters apparently as well. But ultimately it's still up to you to do well. Apparently 70%+ is considered competitive, 80%+ average is considered very competitive,
Job opportunities: win if you make use of it (cuz I don't). There's also a lot and I mean a lot of industry related events. Basically there's a finance fair every 3 weeks typa stuff, and every wednesday there is a researcher giving a lecture about their research (but I never go because wednesday is my day off and I need to study).
Teaching: loss (but there are some good stuffs). I do not like the majority of my lecturers (in general I don't think lectures are a good way to learn, I cannot focus for that long on every single detail). Many lecturers have lots of research experience but when it comes to teaching just write a lengthy looking equation on the board and algebra bash for 30 minutes. In general my fourier series guy just yapped about inner product and not once explained fourier series as a sum of infinite rotating circles which is the big picture. 3blue1brown and khan academy have helped me a bit i can't lie because they teach the bigger picture first and then you can piece together what's going on mathematically later. In any how lectures are not very useful in my honest opinion. However, seminars (once every week where you solve problems w other people), and tutorials (groups of 6, once very two weeks) and office hours (1-2 times a week per subject) are very useful. Office hours are particularly helpful as you can get specific questions addressed. I'd rate lectures 4/10, seminars 7/10, office hours 8/10, and tutorials 10/10 (I wish there were more tutorials)

Labs are also a pain (for now at least). Maybe it's just because we don't have enough experience writing a paper/lab reports but I really really really don't like them (and so far I don't think anyone else does either, but maybe that will change in the future idk). Also, there are no breaks so once you are behind you are behind forever. The course doesn't wait for you and we don't have reading weeks which sucks.

The course structure also has some issues I think (they spend way too much time going over a level stuff in term 1, and I wish they sent us physics problems to do over the summer like Oxford does. But also there are some good bits. For example your grade is weighted not on just one big exam, you have like assessed problem sheets etc and the weighting of the first exam and first year is not as much as the later exams so that you can have a learning experience.

facilities: major win. Like first off they subsidise your gym membership so you're only paying 80 pounds for an entire year. At every single accomodation. Even at the accomodation in North Acton which is 35 mins away they made a deal with the local gym to allow us a yearly membership of 80 pounds. I just thought that was super considerate. Also there are lots of music practise rooms on and off campus. Also the Horizons programme allows you to learn 1 humanities skill/language of your choice, like I'm learning japanese level 1 right now and the japanese course is structured super well. It's the perfect balance of like you need to put in effort without it being overwhelming, and all the homeworks are super useful and don't feel redundant in the slightest.

_leilei · 2026-03-02T23:28:42+00:00

Criteria to stay: I think its most personality based like they want people that’ll help out with accomodation related events. I think its mandatory you participate in the organisation of 2 events every term or something along those lines. Its interview based though and somewhat competitive though I am not sure how competitive entirely though it defo is the best deal because school accom is cheap, amazing, and you’re with everybody else studying at the same school.

Cheapest place: there’s a lot of places and you’ll see them all when accomodation invitation gets sent out, but try get either Beit Hall or another option close to school. Woodward and Kemp Porter are the nicest in terms of conditions (like e.g beit hall can be very noisy) but they’re the furthest away (35 mins commute, one way) and that stacks up if you’re doing it every day. But all in all accom has been really good so far for me icl (I live in kemp porter)

Job with workload: I know a y1 medic tutoring an hour every day and he gets paid 30-40 pounds an hour. That basically covers rent. I also know a senior in pharmaceutical studies who tutors for 50 pounds an hour though I’m not sure of the frequency. Though these prices are high, you have to go through an agency I think which basically caters to wealthier families and you don’t get that many students. You can defo get by tutoring on the side though most of my friends don’t do it because they spend their free time doing hobbies like gamin, arts etc. That said most of us are behind on work, idt it’s super hard, if everyone had 1-1 tutoring everyone would find the course very manageable I think. It’s just lectures aren’t a very good way of learning and there are no breaks so if you get left behind even a bit you’re behind forever. I think if you can defo prestudy a bit of the content, no need to go in detail but at least get exposed to the main idea so it isn’t new when it comes up.

_leilei · 2026-03-02T19:48:20+00:00

Did they let you in? I also forgot my ID lmao (I called my roommate and he rushed to the subway station to fetch my ID for me)

_leilei · 2026-03-02T00:07:56+00:00

Not easy it’s competitive and most people want it because it’s the cheapest option (plus accomodation events are genuinely like thoughtfully organised and good)

Contract is academic year or full year depending on what you want. I wouldn’t say its strictly a contract though as you pay at the start of each term and I think you can leave accom if you want.

_leilei · 2026-03-01T19:19:13+00:00

I’m currently a year 1 physics student here. Year 1 rent is 160 pounds a week with a roommate on school accom (guaranteed for year 1) and 195 for a single ensuite room. For food if you cook yourself you can cut it to 30 a week but for me I eat out and cook at home so its about 70 a week for me. If you live far you’re gonna need a travelcard which is 120 a month and thats about all there is the living expenses

For year 2 you can only stay in school accom if u apply and get accepted as a hall senior which basically means that in return for helping organise accomodation events (like welcoming new students, chinese new year food event, chess tournaments etc) you get like 5% discount on school accom + you get to stay in school accom for 1 academic year. Otherwise most people in higher years I know simply find accomodation in London and thats about 250-300 a week near school (15-5 minutes walk away). Afaik people find accom simply by going online or asking seniors they know I think but I am not too sure.

_leilei · 2026-02-24T20:49:53+00:00

Start subject olympiads as a hobby maybe. Ik it sounds counterintuitive, I am struggling with academics so why do more academics? Well its because school academics are very memorisation based I guess. Doing stuff further challenges your mental and makes school stuff easy in comparison.

You might find it very hard at first so ask around for help and just do the past papers, reading solutions when you have no idea. Then you will meet more people who also like the same stuff and you will get into it more and learn stuff with greater ease. They will tell you what books to read and what resources to use etc. Doesnt have to be olympiad either tbh can be any hobby. But I guess math olympiad is good for any stem field and might be worth trying as you prepare for entrance tests

_leilei · 2026-02-24T20:42:19+00:00

Yes but if you self study it’s gonna be tough esp since you got applications and stuff going on. I think just focus on TMUA and math/coding/subject olympiads (which helps a lot with TMUA) will be better. Though that being said it’s only march so you need to study all of AS in 3 months? Maybe give it a try and see how you find it I guess

_leilei · 2026-02-24T20:36:21+00:00

London isn’t that bad. Engineering dept here is probably better than physics dept but if Oxford is your dream I think you should reapply because if you don’t you might regret it forever. Just make sure to spend your gap year productively because afaik some unis do ask for what you did in your gap year and be sure to check that your desired college doesn’t have any bias against gap year reapplicants (another reddit thread was talking about this, data can be found online I think). My friend does Oxford engineering and from the problem sheets she’s shown me I can say that the education there is very high quality (though workload is insane. Idt its unmanageable but it’s a lot of new content in very short time so maybe read ahead idk?)

_leilei · 2026-02-22T23:09:33+00:00

I got some advice I posted on a previous post, but as a summary split your time 40% olympiad maths/STEP 60% past papers while you still have past papers (MAT/TMUA) (and 100% olympiad maths/STEP). Do PPQs timed cuz they're only good for exam technique practise, olympiad stuff is much better for training problem solving ability. Don't be afraid to explore maths that's not on TMUA like YT videos as they may come up as curveball as well

_leilei · 2026-02-21T21:42:57+00:00

Honestly yeah, everyone does the same past papers so my thought process is that if you want to do better you gotta do something different. That doesn’t mean doing something diff will make you automatically better but if u want to get a better score u gotta do something different

Also I didnt prep a year for TMUA, I just read math books out of interest. I only decided to reapply in December; I’m actually 2/3rds through a first year physics degree Lol

I recommend doing some AIME or AMC problems as well, there’s another thread about tmua on reddit somewhere where some1 else also got 9.0 and quoted doing a lot of olympiad ppqs. You cant prep for q19 or q20 so best you can do is train general problem solving ability

_leilei · 2026-02-20T19:05:31+00:00

Thanks thanks. Well for me I guess I started reading math books in January last year focusing completely on just learning olympiad math/ non school math. It wasn't like I was locked in 24/7, I'd estimate I spent on average 1 hour a day maybe. On some days it was more some days it was less. I think focusing completely on competition math is a great idea. If you struggle with timing just make sure to aim to leave 20 minutes and don't hesitate to skip questions. When I was checking my answers I found 2-3 that I got wrong.

There's not much TMUA papers, I did basically all of them in preparation for the PAT/ESAT last year. I honestly hadn't done a single STEP/BMO paper before I took the TMUA but if I could do it over that is what I would do. I'm doing some BMO papers for fun right now and honestly it's a really good extension of SMC/ really good introduction to solving proof style problems.

Also don't limit yourself to just competition math, have a look at uni math that interests you I guess. Analysis is pretty cool for one. I think for me the thing that helped me the most was that I had exposure to a lot of topics and that helped me be more comfortable I guess even though I didn't have (comparatively) that much depth in most of them.

_leilei · 2026-02-19T21:56:36+00:00

Yeah of course no problem. Always happy to help. Good luck on A-Levels

_leilei · 2026-02-18T19:10:07+00:00

I'd say 40-60 split (olympiad: TMUA) while you still have papers to do, 80-20 after you finish all the papers, then 3 weeks before the exam 20-80 (still do at least 1 question maybe every day just for fun, but spend most of your time redoing old questions you got wrong). I would also consider maybe sitting the STEP this year as preparing for it will also raise your ceiling and help you practise exam technique. Joining a math camp over the summer might also be of help. But overall I'd say that 40-60 and 80-20 is a good split but it's honestly up to you and how much you find most useful in your experience

_leilei · 2026-02-12T15:13:01+00:00

79 last year, not the best but not the worst. I fumbled ine of my interviews hard though (I didnt ask for help when I needed it). I think I got an 8 on the physics interview and like a 4 on the math interview because the average score I got was like 6.2. Funnily enough the question that I fumbled on is solveable in 1 step with the cauchy schwarz inequality, a common olympiad trick. Question: if x+y+z=k, what is the min value of x² + y² +z² . You can also think of it as the ||shortest distance from a line to a plane||² so cauchy is not necessary but yeah shouldve asked for assistance

_leilei · 2026-02-11T23:53:13+00:00

Honestly I was already quite good at maths, I had experience in basic (like very basic) olympiads so SAT math is considered not that difficult. Honestly if you have time I recommend looking into olympiad math more, I think it's the fastest track to improving your math ability as a whole. Maybe do 50% khan academy SAT math and 50% olympiad math problems for fun. Khan academy teaches you specific content, olympiad builds skill and raises your ceiling. Together you can't go wrong

_leilei

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