HEAR 2027: income limits, the 7-point score and how to apply

Who can apply

HEAR (the Higher Education Access Route) is for school leavers living in the Republic of Ireland who are under 23 on 1 January 2027. You apply through your CAO form and it runs alongside your normal application rather than replacing it. Twenty colleges take part, from Trinity and UCD to the technological universities, Marino and Mary Immaculate.

Being eligible does not hand you a place. It lets you compete for a quota of places each college holds back for HEAR students, usually at lower points than the published cut-off, and it comes with supports once you start: an orientation programme you must attend, plus mentoring and extra help in first year.

Step one: the income limit

Unless you apply as care-experienced, a Traveller or a Roma applicant, your family income for 2025 has to be at or under the HEAR limit. Miss it and nothing else is scored. The limit depends on how many children are in your family, and the handbook’s own examples count the applicant as one of them.

For every other person in the house in a full-time further or higher education course of at least a year (a brother or sister, or a parent back in college), add €4,785 to the limit. The handbook works it through for Obi: five children, a brother and his dad both in college, family income €63,500. The basic limit is €64,080, plus two lots of €4,785, so his real limit is €73,650 and he is well inside it.

The three figures are the same ones SUSI uses for its Band 4 maintenance grant in 2026/27, which is also assessed on 2025 income (SUSI wants you under the figure, HEAR accepts at or below it). So if your family would get any SUSI maintenance grant this year, you are very likely inside the HEAR limit. Our sister site, the SUSI grant calculator, checks that in a minute.

Step two: the score out of 7

HEAR changed its rules for 2026 entry and keeps the same system for 2027. Instead of needing a fixed combination of indicators, you now collect points for each one that applies to you:

Your area score comes from your address, which is why the form asks for your Eircode. An area rated “marginally below average” or better scores 0.

Then the total puts you in one of three groups:

• 5.5 to 7, HEAR priority. You compete for HEAR places and are offered them first.
• 2.5 to 5, HEAR eligible. You compete for HEAR places, after the priority applicants.
• 2 or below, ineligible. No HEAR place, but your CAO application is untouched.

Two things trip people up. A medical card on its own (1) or a welfare payment on its own (2) is not enough; you need at least one more criterion. And young parents still have to pass the income test, unlike the other three priority groups. Applicants eligible for both HEAR and DARE are treated as priority too.

Check your own score

Dates and documents

• Monday 1 February 2027, 5pm: apply to CAO (the form opened on 5 November 2026).
• Monday 1 March 2027, 5pm: tick that you want HEAR and finish every section of the online HEAR form. A checklist of the documents you owe then appears on screen.
• Wednesday 10 March 2027, 5pm: supporting documents must arrive at CAO, Tower House, Eglinton Street, Galway. Post early and get a free certificate of posting.
• 23 June 2027: outcome by email. Reviews and appeals close on 2 July 2027 at 5pm.

The paperwork that matters most is proof of 2025 income for both parents if both contributed:

• PAYE workers: a Statement of Liability for 2025 from Revenue myAccount (all pages). An Employment Detail Summary is not accepted.
• Self-employed, farming or rental income: the 2025 self-assessment documents from Revenue.
• Social welfare: a Department of Social Protection form or online statement showing the payment name, the 2025 total and the start and end dates.
• Redundancy or retirement in 2025: Form RP50, or a letter from the employer with the lump sum and dates.

Medical card and DEIS details are checked directly with the HSE and the Department of Education if you give your PPS number and consent on the form, so you usually do not post anything for those. Send photocopies, never originals.

What a HEAR offer looks like

The 2025 figures from the Irish Universities Association are worth knowing before you get your hopes up or write HEAR off. 8,226 students said on their CAO form that they would apply. Only 5,009 sent in all their documents, and 3,016 were found eligible. So the biggest single reason people miss out is not finishing the application.

Of 3,484 HEAR offers made in 2025, 2,340 (67%) were above the normal points for the course and 1,144 (33%) were reduced-points offers. At Level 8 the split was almost even: 1,058 above the points, 1,015 below. In other words, HEAR matters most for honours degrees, where it decides about half of the places it touches.

How far below? Nobody can tell you in advance. Each college sets its HEAR cut-off from how many reserved places it has and how many eligible students want them. You still need the minimum entry requirements and any subject requirement for the course (see minimum entry requirements by college). Look up the normal cut-off for your course on our CAO points list to see what you would be measured against.

Already eligible in 2026?

If you were HEAR eligible for 2026 entry (you are repeating, or deferring), your eligibility carries forward one year. You still apply to CAO by 1 February and fill in the 2027 HEAR form by 1 March, entering your 2026 CAO number, but you do not send documents again unless you accept a HEAR place and the college asks.

Frequently asked questions