University Challenge

University Challenge (UC) is a British television quiz show in which teams of students from universities and colleges in the UK compete against each other in a knockout tournament. University Challenge was originally a spin-off of College Bowl. The programme first aired in 1962, being aired on ITV and hosted by Bamber Gascoigne until the show was axed after 1987. UC was revived in 1994, airing on the BBC and being hosted by Jeremy Paxman until the end of the 52nd series in 2023, whereupon he was replaced by Amol Rajan.

Imperial College London has the most series wins, with 5 as of 2024. The University of Manchester and Oxford's Magdalene College are tied for second with 4 wins each.

Format

University Challenge is roughly similar to quizbowl in format, although differs in question style. Starter questions are answered on the buzzer and are worth 10 points, with a 5 point penalty for an incorrect interruption. Starter questions are generally much shorter than quizbowl tossups, only consisting of 1 or 2 sentences, and are not necessarily pyramidal. A correct starter question earns the team a set of 3 bonus questions, worth 5 points each.

There are always two visual (or picture) rounds per game, and an audio round (almost invariably music) at the halfway mark. The visual rounds can be on a wide range of themes, although the audio round is typically either classical or popular music. If a picture or music starter is missed, the related bonus questions are held until the next starter question is correctly answered.

The tournament format has been unchanged since 2010. 28 teams are selected to take part every year, with the first round consisting of 14 one-on-one matches between them. The 14 winning teams automatically go through to the second round, while the 4 teams with the highest losing score compete against each other at the end of the first round, with a total of 16 teams entering the second round. The second round is a straight knockout round with no repechage. In the quarter-final round, teams must win twice to progress to the semi-finals, and teams that lose twice are knocked out. From the semi-finals, it once again becomes a knock-out tournament.

The programme has been criticised for allowing individual colleges from the universities of Oxford and Cambridge to enter as separate teams, which results in those universities receiving a disproportionate amount of airtime.

Past results

BBC series (1994-present)

Year	Winners	Runners-up
1995	Trinity, Cambridge	New, Oxford
1996	Imperial	London School of Economics
1997	Magdalen, Oxford	Open University
1998	Magdalen, Oxford	Birkbeck, London
1999	Open University	Oriel, Oxford
2000	Durham	Oriel, Oxford
2001	Imperial	St John's, Oxford
2002	Somerville, Oxford	Imperial
2003	Birkbeck, University of London	Cranfield University
2004	Magdalen, Oxford	Gonville and Caius, Cambridge
2005	Corpus Christi, Oxford	UCL
2006	Manchester	Trinity Hall, Cambridge
2007	Warwick	Manchester
2008	Christ Church, Oxford	Sheffield
2009	Manchester	Corpus Christi, Oxford
2010	Emmanuel, Cambridge	St John's, Oxford
2011	Magdalen, Oxford	York
2012	Manchester	Pembroke, Cambridge
2013	Manchester	UCL
2014	Trinity, Cambridge	Somerville, Oxford
2015	Gonville and Caius, Cambridge	Magdalen, Oxford
2016	Peterhouse, Cambridge	St John's, Oxford
2017	Balliol, Oxford	Wolfson, Cambridge
2018	St John's, Cambridge	Merton, Oxford
2019	Edinburgh	St Edmund's, Oxford
2020	Imperial	Corpus Christi, Cambridge
2021	Warwick	Magdalene, Cambridge
2022	Imperial	Reading
2023	Durham	Bristol
2024	Imperial	UCL

External links

• Blanchflower results page
• Wikipedia entry
• University Challenge page on bbc.co.uk
• the 2006 film Starter for 10 is named for the British equivalent of "for 10 points" and follows the Bristol University UC team