EPQ Help: The Complete Guide to the Extended Project Qualification

The Extended Project Qualification is a standalone qualification worth half an A level, taken alongside A levels or other Level 3 study, in which you design, research and complete an independent project on a topic of your own choosing. There is no set syllabus and no exam: you are assessed on the project itself, the record of how you managed it, and a final presentation. That freedom is the point — universities value the EPQ precisely because it tests the independent research, planning and writing skills that sixth-form study otherwise rehearses only in miniature — and it is also why students find it daunting. This guide explains what the EPQ involves, the four formats you can choose between, how it is graded, what it is worth for university entry, and how to pace the work across two terms.

United Academic Help supports EPQ students with guidance: question and planning reviews, research coaching, structure advice, feedback on drafts you have written, and model material to study and learn from. One boundary is absolute and we state it on this page rather than in small print. The EPQ is your own project, supervised and authenticated by your school or college, and it must remain yours — no legitimate service can write it for you. What guidance can do, legitimately and effectively, is teach you the method and sharpen the work you produce yourself.

What the EPQ actually involves

Every EPQ follows the same broad arc, whatever the format. You choose a topic and negotiate a title or proposal with your supervisor — a teacher at your centre who oversees the project and authenticates it as your work. You plan the project: aims, stages, deadlines, resources. You research and produce the outcome, adapting the plan as reality requires, and you record that whole journey in a production log. Finally you present the project to a non-specialist audience and reflect on how it went. Along the way there are usually taught skills sessions at your centre — research methods, referencing, presentation skills — which are worth taking seriously, because the assessment rewards exactly those skills.

The qualification is offered by the main awarding bodies, and while details of paperwork and deadlines vary between boards and centres, the underlying model is shared: independence within supervision, process as well as product, and authentication throughout. Your centre’s specific requirements always take precedence over any general guide, including this one.

The four formats: dissertation, artefact, performance and field study

The EPQ can be completed in four formats, and choosing well matters, because each format makes different demands and suits different kinds of curiosity.

Dissertation. A written project of 5,000 words answering a research question through library-based research and argument. Best for questions with a genuine debate behind them — in the humanities, social sciences, law, medicine and beyond. Our step-by-step guide to how to write an EPQ dissertation covers its structure, research method and production log in full.
Artefact. You make something — a product, a model, a piece of software, a garment, a campaign — supported by a written report of 1,000 words explaining the research and decisions behind it. Best where the making is the thinking: design, engineering, computing, art and enterprise ideas.
Performance or event. You organise and deliver a performance or an event — a concert, a play, a sports tournament, a charity fundraiser — again supported by written evidence of the research and planning behind it. Best for students whose strengths are organisational and practical, and whose project is fundamentally something that happens.
Field study. You investigate a question through primary data you collect yourself — surveys, observations, measurements, interviews — and write it up as a research report. Best for geography, biology, psychology, economics and similar subjects where a small, well-designed study can genuinely add evidence rather than merely repeat the literature.

Choose by fit, not fashion. Ask where your evidence will come from: published sources point to a dissertation, your own data to a field study, your own making or organising to an artefact or performance. Ask also what you can sustain for two terms, and what your centre can supervise and authenticate — an ambitious artefact nobody at your centre can oversee is a risk, however exciting it sounds in September. If you are still at the stage of choosing a subject and a question, browsing worked examples helps: our collection of EPQ title ideas shows what a well-shaped dissertation question looks like across ten subjects.

How the EPQ is graded: objectives, the log and the presentation

Assessment rests on four assessment objectives, and understanding them changes how you work, because each is evidenced differently.

AO1 — Manage. Identifying the project, planning it, and adapting the plan as circumstances change. Evidenced mainly in your production log: aims, timelines, decisions, problems and your responses to them.
AO2 — Use resources. Finding, selecting and using research and information critically. Evidenced in the quality and discrimination of your sources and in how your log records the search process.
AO3 — Develop and realise. Carrying the project through to a finished outcome that answers its aims. Evidenced in the dissertation, artefact, event or study itself — its completeness, quality and fitness for the brief you set.
AO4 — Review. Evaluating the process and the outcome honestly, and communicating both, including in the final presentation to a non-specialist audience.

Two practical consequences follow. First, the production log is not admin: it records your planning, decisions and changes, and it carries the process marks, so a project managed brilliantly but logged thinly will be graded as if the management never happened. Keep it contemporaneously, in dated entries, across the whole project. Second, the presentation is assessed, not ceremonial — prepare it as carefully as any chapter. Grades run on the A level scale, and an A* EPQ earns 28 UCAS points, with lower grades earning fewer points on the same scale. There is no separate exam and no coursework moderation shortcut: the grade is the project’s.

UCAS value and why universities like the EPQ

The EPQ’s tariff value — half an A level, 28 UCAS points at A* — is only part of its usefulness. Admissions tutors consistently say the qualification evidences the skills first-year students most often lack: framing a question, finding and judging sources, sustaining a long piece of work, and writing at length with references. Some universities make reduced offers to applicants with strong EPQ grades, typically where the project is relevant to the course applied for; the details vary by institution and course, so check the entry profiles that interest you rather than relying on general claims.

The EPQ also earns its keep in the application itself. A project gives you something concrete and personal to write about — a question you chose, evidence you weighed, a conclusion you reached — and something substantial to discuss at interview. That is why we so often work on the two together: students planning their applications alongside their project may find our personal statement help useful for turning the EPQ experience into application material without exaggerating it. Choose an EPQ topic you might plausibly study further, and the project, the statement and the interview all start reinforcing each other.

A realistic two-term timeline

Most centres run the EPQ across roughly two terms. Exact dates are your centre’s, but a pacing that works — and that keeps the log honest — looks like this.

Weeks 1–3: explore and propose. Read around two or three candidate areas, draft a question or project aim, and agree the proposal with your supervisor. Log the alternatives you rejected and why.
Weeks 4–6: plan and research skills. Build a staged plan with deadlines, learn your centre’s referencing style, and begin systematic searching. Log searches, terms and early judgements about sources.
Weeks 7–12: research and first drafting. The bulk of the reading and note-taking, then drafting in sections rather than in one heroic block. Artefact, performance and field-study projects are making, rehearsing or collecting data in this phase. Supervisor check-ins happen here — log the advice and your response.
Weeks 13–16: complete and redraft. Finish the outcome, then revise against the assessment objectives: is the argument weighed, the evidence discriminated, the conclusion earned? Update the log’s reflections as you revise.
Weeks 17–18: presentation and final review. Prepare and deliver the presentation, answer questions, and write the final evaluation in the log while the experience is fresh.

The pattern to copy is front-loading the thinking and spreading the writing. The pattern to avoid is the one every supervisor recognises: a quiet first term, a panicked second, and a log reconstructed at the end from memory — which examiners can spot, and which undersells whatever the finished product achieves.

Support for your EPQ, priced plainly

Good EPQ support makes your project better without ever making it someone else’s. Ours works like this: a specialist reviews your proposed question and plan and tells you plainly whether the scope will hold; coaches you through searching, selecting and referencing sources; comments on drafts you have written, section by section, so the revision is yours; and prepares model material — an exemplar chapter structure, a sample literature discussion — that you study to understand the standard, then apply in your own words. Fees start from £20 per 1,000 words for material prepared or reviewed. When you are ready, place an order with your question, board and deadline, or chat with us on WhatsApp to talk through which kind of guidance fits the stage you have reached.

EPQ questions

Can someone write my EPQ for me?

No — honestly, and without exception. The EPQ must be your own work, supervised and authenticated by your school or college, and submitting a project written by anyone else risks losing the qualification and far more besides. What guidance can legitimately do is everything around the writing: help you shape the question, plan the stages, learn the research and referencing method, understand what a strong chapter looks like from model material, and improve drafts you have written through detailed feedback. That support is real, and it works — but the words and the decisions have to be yours.

How much is an EPQ worth in UCAS points?

The EPQ is worth half an A level. An A* grade earns 28 UCAS points, and lower grades earn fewer points on the same scale. Beyond the tariff, some universities make reduced offers for strong EPQ grades, and the project gives you strong material for your personal statement and interviews.

Which EPQ format should I choose?

Follow the evidence. If your question is best answered from published sources and argument, choose the dissertation. If answering it means collecting your own data, choose a field study. If the project is fundamentally a thing made or an event delivered, choose the artefact or the performance/event format — each with its supporting written report. Your supervisor’s ability to oversee the project should also count in the decision.

How long is an EPQ dissertation?

5,000 words for the dissertation format. The artefact format pairs the object you make with a written report of 1,000 words, and the other formats carry their own written evidence — your centre will confirm the exact requirements for your board.

What is the production log, and does it really affect my grade?

It is the dated record of your planning, research decisions, problems and changes across the project, and yes — it carries the process marks. It is the main evidence for the manage and review objectives, so keep it as you go rather than reconstructing it at the end.

When should I start my EPQ?

As early as your centre allows, and certainly with question, proposal and plan settled in the first few weeks. The qualification rewards a project that develops over two terms; compressing it into the final month undermines both the product and the log that evidences your management of it.

Beginning your EPQ

If you are at the start, the most valuable next step is a question that will hold: narrow, debatable and researchable, agreed with your supervisor and logged properly from day one. If you are mid-project, the most valuable step is usually an honest review against the four assessment objectives — where is your evidence thin, where is your log behind, where does the draft describe instead of argue? Send us your question or proposal, your board, your centre’s deadlines and a note of the stage you have reached, and we will tell you plainly what guidance would help most. The project will still be entirely yours — which is, in the end, exactly what makes it worth half an A level.