Last year, 14,000 students flocked to the Welcome Fair to bag freebies, learn about the Union and meet clubs and societies.
It's always one of the highlights of the year, let alone the week! But with over 200 stalls to visit, it's a pretty major affair.
Here are our tips for getting the most out of it...
You must book a ticket to attend
Your ticket will be for entry at a specific time on Thursday 25 September, at UCL East. You'll be able to book your free ticket from Tuesday 16 September.
The ticketing and entry system means we’ll be able to safely manage the number of attendees throughout the day. Book a ticket at the bottom of this page (on mobile) or on the right-hand side (on desktop). You'll need to log in with your UCL account when tickets become available.
It all starts at UCL East, Marshgate
UCL East is easy to get to, accessible by overground (Hackney Wick Station), the underground (take the Jubilee, Elizabeth or Central Line to Stratford station) and bus.
Head to UCL East Marshgate for your chance to talk to hundreds of our brilliant sports clubs, societies, and student-led Networks. Alongside student-led clubs, there's a huge selection of national and local businesses, ready and waiting with 1,000's of freebies. We'll have live entertainment, society demonstrations, music, and a range of food stalls.
The clubs and societies are in alphabetical order
There will be more than 400 different student-led groups. We'll update the list of groups who will be there closer to the time, so you can have a look through and start to plan who to meet and chat to.
If you have an idea of who you want to talk to, you'll know roughly whereabouts they'll be and if you've already gone past them. American Football is going to be near the start and Yoga at the end.
Pick up one of our snazzy tote bags
Grab one of our 8,000 free tote bags, jam-packed with lots of goodies to get you going. Be quick though, because once they're gone, they're gone!
You're not actually joining any groups today...
Memberships aren't actually bought at the fair. This is your chance to get to speak to different societies, try out some tasters, and catch societies doing demos or performing. It's the perfect way to get introduced to the societies. Joining societies is all done online of course!
...and that's a good thing
Because you don't want to join anything before you know your timetable. What if you join two societies who have their meetings at the same time?
What if you join Aikido but then realise you'd have preferred Karate? What if you go to a Mountaineering taster session and discover you're afraid of heights? Use the fair to size up your options and then join later.
Hang around
Alongside all of the stalls, Marshgate will be full of fun activities and stalls, so spend some time enjoying the atmosphere before you move on. We've had free food, energy drinks, tote bags and more in the past, so prepare to come back armed with goodies.
Don't miss the commercial marquee
In Marshgate, there will be a big marquee which is freebie heaven! Inside will be all of the companies that want to give you free stuff in exchange for telling you about what they do. See how many freebies you can get on the day!
Leave enough time
Because of the volume of people, it does take quite a while to get around the fair. It's a big one-way system, meaning it's not possible to just pop into one stall. So we'd say leave a couple of hours to see everything.
You don't have to go
We think it's a great day, but if you can't make it, it's not the end of the world.
We'll have an online version of the Welcome Fair and you'll still be able to join clubs and societies and you can find out about them and their welcome events on our What's On calendar or their directory page. Most Clubs and Societies run Give it a Go sessions, so don't stress.
Accessibility
The Welcome Fair takes place at the UCL East campus. All of these spaces are wheelchair accessible. If you have any access needs, either come to the front of the queue where a member of event staff will be able to support you or let us know in advance by specifying your access requirements and how we can best support you when making your booking. If you are supported by a carer, there is no need to book an additional ticket for your carer.
During the first hour of the day, the event is generally quieter with fewer people in the space. Please book a ticket at this time if you'd like to attend the event whilst it's quieter.
The UCL East campus is an alcohol-free space during Welcome Fair.