I have applied for Ph.D. in Law at Cambridge. Does anyone have an idea when I should expect the result?

I applied as well, have an interview today. Previous years received offers in mid- to late-Feb, and rejections came in March.

Did you apply for Law or other subject?

applied for law.

Congratulations!! May I ask you when did you submit your application (as in how many months/weeks before the deadline)? My application is still under review by the department and after knowing that they have started interviewing candidates, I am anticipating a rejection already

Nah, I wouldn't honestly say that - my interview was extremely harsh and the two professors seemed kind of skeptical that it was viable, so I'm a bit unsure what that means for me... If your proposal is clearly original, they might not even bother interviewing you as you'll be a shoo-in? Not sure when we'll know though tbh. Just applied on deadline day though, they don't review in order of who applied when

Thank you for sharing your honest views! 

Last year I received an offer for the PhD in mid-March, without having been invited for an interview prior or having any indication really. It’s a long process with very little transparency. But it’s no time to despair, we’re really just at the beginning of it. 

Thanks a lot!! Fingers crossed 

Hey, I've applied to the PhD too. Have not got an interview mail as of yet, and I'm super nervous. I think interview mails go out till mid feb, but with people receiving interview mails already, I do feel quite nervous and anxious!

Any updates on how the interviews went, what to expect, what needs to be highlighted, etc? Also, what is the objective criterion for selection? Is it only the proposal + CV?

Nah, I wouldn't honestly say that - my interview was extremely harsh and the two professors seemed kind of skeptical that it was viable, so I'm a bit unsure what that means for me... If your proposal is clearly original, they might not even bother interviewing you as you'll be a shoo-in? Not sure when we'll know though tbh. Just applied on deadline day though, they don't review in order of who applied when

They're really just interested in the proposal, it's all just proposal-specific. They weren't really interested in my CV or motivations.

They're really just interested in the proposal, it's all just proposal-specific. They weren't really interested in my CV or motivations.

Had my interview earlier today. 
They pitched the easiest underarm throws and I still managed to whiff them.
I'm not /too/ worried, since they seemed to like the proposal and I understand it's more a way to ascertain if you'd be a good fit for the department, but it certainly hasn't done me any favours.

[Edited by Flumbo on Jan 25, 2022]

applied for law.

Had my interview earlier today. 
They pitched the easiest underarm throws and I still managed to whiff them.
I'm not /too/ worried, since they seemed to like the proposal and I understand it's more a way to ascertain if you'd be a good fit for the department, but it certainly hasn't done me any favours.

My surname begins with M, but I think it's more a question of when the degree committee meets. I know they meet on Wednesdays and only once a month, so either they met last Wednesday or (more likely, to have completed as many interviews as possible before deciding) tomorrow. Maybe we'll get decisions in the next week.

Hope I can help with a few clarifiers:

1. Time until invited for an interview is not decided by chronology (e.g., time of submission or surname, etc.). It is usually attributed to the time it might take to find an available supervisor (or even reach them), but those who get interview offers substantially later might be in that position because they didn’t want university funding or were ranked too low for central funding (ref. #2). An interview is not a requirement for admission - especially if the supo/uni already know you. Nevertheless, they seem to require one for the majority of applicants. 

2.  Re when interviews are normally called, this tends to be during the first 2-4 weeks of Jan. The only truly important deadline for those hinging on Gates/Cambridge Trust/Research Council funding would be the internal deadline that they set for submission of their internal ranking of the candidates. You either will or won’t be nominated for central funding (it’s unknown how many are usually nominated, but it seems to be less than half of those who get offers). Whether they feel an interview is required or not for their internal ranking, the deadline tends to be early ~ around end-January (I think it is normally the second last week of January, which in this case would be by 21 Jan). If they need an interview and ask for one after this internal funding deadline, this tends to indicate (nothing is ever 100% though) that you have not been nominated for central funding. Still lots of college funding instead though (Caius tends to be the best bet for law PhD funding), and they might not prioritise you before their central nomination deadline if you already have secured some other funding. 
TL;DR: If you have an interview after late January, you are likely to be out of the central funding competition already, but approx. half of the funded offers are external or college funds anyway.

3. Interview questions depend completely on the individual supervisor. Some might try to test weaknesses in the proposal or some related knowledge. Others might be more interested in a general chat (they do have to live with meeting you fairly regularly for 3+ years after all). It will usually be about the proposal to address any concerns about it, though. Even profs who have shown considerable scepticism towards a project have ended up ranking candidates highly enough for them to receive funding in the past. 

4. Re the question about their selection criteria: at least for their internal ranking, word is that at least at some point they apparently rated you 0-10 in academics, proposal and references each, giving a potential total of 30 points. Who knows what they do now, but a version of it probably remains the criteria now.

5. Hard to say exactly when the first batch of offers are sent, but the first offers tend to come around early-mid February. They’ll have to go through PAO first once approved by the degree committee, which can take a while. The next wait after the formal offer would be for the colleges (takes from a few days to over a month, depending on the college you apply to). Cambridge Trust will send out most of the funding offers relevant to law fairly soon after that (I vaguely remember most Trust offers for law already being settled by March last year). People randomly get Trust offers as late as June/July - usually whenever someone decided to not accept their offer/go to a different uni. You can easily keep track of who receive funding offers from the Trust on the Cambridge Trust webpages, which updates once or twice a week during the funding allocation. College funding is not as transparent. 

6. Rejections tend to come a bit later on in the process - normally after the first (the one most likely to get their first choice college offer and funding) and second batch of offers are sent out. Expect them around March, but some that are on the borderline might be hanging in there for longer. There are occasionally some very late offers way after that, which usually indicate that the applicant  got waitlisted (unlike Oxford, Cambridge’s waitlist is not as transparent). Waitlisting is more or less guaranteed to not be a funded offer, unless you can grab something from college or externally.

[Edited by Gobbledygook on Feb 06, 2022]

Hope I can help with a few clarifiers:

1. Time until invited for an interview is not decided by chronology (e.g., time of submission or surname, etc.). It is usually attributed to the time it might take to find an available supervisor (or even reach them), but those who get interview offers substantially later might be in that position because they didn’t want university funding or were ranked too low for central funding (ref. #2). An interview is not a requirement for admission - especially if the supo/uni already know you. 

2.  Re when interviews are normally called, this tends to be during the first 2-4 weeks of Jan. The only truly important deadline for those hinging on Gates/Cambridge Trust/Research Council funding would be the internal deadline that they set for submission of their internal ranking of the candidates. You either will or won’t be nominated for central funding (it’s unknown how many are usually nominated, but it seems to be less than half of those who get offers). Whether they feel an interview is required or not for their internal ranking, the deadline tends to be early ~ around end-January. If they need an interview and ask for one after this internal deadline, this tends to indicate (nothing is ever 100% though) that you have not been nominated for central funding. Still lots of college funding instead though (Caius tends to be the best bet for law PhD funding), and they might not prioritise you before their central nomination deadline if you already have secured some other funding.

3. Interview questions depend completely on the individual supervisor. Some might try to test weaknesses in the proposal or some related knowledge. Others might be more interested in a general chat (they do have to live with meeting you fairly regularly for 3+ years after all). It will usually be about the proposal to address any concerns about it, though. Even profs who have shown considerable scepticism towards a project have ended up ranking candidates highly enough for them to receive funding in the past. 

4. Re the question about their selection criteria: at least for their internal ranking, word is that at least at some point they apparently rated you 0-10 in academics, proposal and references each, giving a potential total of 30 points. Who knows what they do now, but a version of it probably remains the criteria now.

5. Hard to say exactly when the first batch of offers are sent, but the first offers tend to come around early-mid February. They’ll have to go through PAO first once approved by the degree committee, which can take a while. The next wait after the formal offer would be for the colleges (takes from a few days to over a month, depending on the college you apply to). Cambridge Trust will send out most of the funding offers relevant to law fairly soon after that (I vaguely remember most Trust offers for law already being settled by March last year). People randomly get Trust offers as late as June/July - usually whenever someone decided to not accept their offer/go to a different uni. You can easily keep track of who receive funding offers from the Trust on the Cambridge Trust webpages, which updates once or twice a week during the funding allocation. College funding is not as transparent. 

Just found this. I got my interview invitation on 13 Jan and had the interview on 21 Jan. The application has been under review by the department since.