Ranked in Tier one of the CEO Magazine Global MBA Rankings 2025
The Lancaster Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a transformative experience that goes far beyond acquiring knowledge — it reshapes how you think, lead, and make decisions in a complex, fast-changing world. Designed for ambitious professionals, the programme combines rigorous academic learning with real-world application and a globally connected, diverse community that challenges and supports you every step of the way. Through exposure to cutting-edge research, global business strategy, and practitioner insight, you will develop the skills and mindset needed to lead with confidence and integrity.
Experiential learning and industry connections
What truly sets the Lancaster MBA apart is our commitment to experiential learning. You won’t just study case studies; you will live them by working on real projects with real companies, solving real problems. This is foregrounded in our action-learning challenges, as well as our visits to companies and programme partners, guest lectures from our Entrepreneurs and Leaders in Residence, alumni networking, and business consulting opportunities. This approach enables you to make responsible decisions as business leaders, decisions that ensure the best outcomes and that consider our environment, social wellbeing, opportunity, and risk.
Responsible leadership
The Lancaster MBA seeks to challenge you, as the leader of tomorrow, to consider how you can be a responsible and adaptable leader and create value for your organisation that is both balanced and interconnected.
You will graduate with a resilience that allows you to overcome challenges and identify opportunities, even in volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous environments. After completing the programme, you will be globally fluent and ready to shape businesses and organisations around the world.
Over 30 years in the making
The Lancaster MBA, our Management School’s flagship programme, enjoys a rich heritage and engaged community that is over 30 years in the making. Our committed MBA team ensures our programme curriculum constantly evolves to ensure our graduates acquire the skills, knowledge, and experiences needed to excel in contemporary business environments. Consistently remaining relevant and delivering excellence, the Lancaster MBA is built upon our expertise in strategy, responsible leadership and social sustainability.
The full-time MBA at Lancaster empowers you to elevate your thinking, broaden your impact, and lead with confidence across functions, industries, and markets. It combines rigorous academic insight with real-world application, allowing you to develop new knowledge and a new approach to business and management.
12-month programme
The full-time MBA is an intense one-year programme, designed to accelerate your career.
Triple accredited
Lancaster's MBAs are accredited by AMBA, and our Management School is one of a small number of triple-accredited business schools worldwide.
Grow your network
Opportunities built into the programme to help enhance and extend your professional network.
Lancaster for life
Lancaster MBA graduates become part of an exclusive network of leaders and entrepreneurs which spans the globe.
Course accreditation
Lancaster MBA programmes have been accredited by the Association of MBAs since 1996. Although AMBA is UK-based in its origins, it is the only accreditation body that focuses on MBA programmes worldwide.
Lancaster students and alumni on AMBA-accredited programmes can benefit from complimentary AMBA student and graduate membership for life, giving access to networking opportunities and career development resources.
It's not just our world rankings and clever programme design that make the Lancaster MBA stand out. Through our expertise in leadership programmes, we have developed core themes to transform your own practice and personal management style. Our MBA graduates benefit from a new perspective, renewed confidence and the skills to take their career to the next level. Career advancement is embedded throughout the programme, enabling you to draw on your learning and experiences as you progress through your studies.
Career destinations
Lancaster MBA graduates are recruited by a wide variety of companies and organisations worldwide, both in the private and public sectors. Some join large multinational companies, others boost the management teams of smaller organisations or enjoy accelerated promotion with their former employers, and some start their own companies.
Learn more about our careers support and the roles our MBA graduates pursue: MBA careers.
The teaching was hands-on and directly applicable to the experiences we’d had previously as leaders and the experiences we knew we were going to have in the future.
Explore the Lancaster MBA
Learn more about the programme, including careers support and applications.
2:2 Hons degree (UK or equivalent) in any subject.
Additional requirements
As part of your application, you also need to provide/have:
A minimum of three years' professional work experience since graduation. This should be evidenced by providing a copy of your current CV detailing your professional experience and achievements to date. Preference will be given to those who can demonstrate that they have strong business experience and have held significant managerial responsibilities. Please ensure that you include dates of employment and job titles on your CV.
Two good references - one from your current employer and, ideally the other from someone who can comment on your academic ability.
A detailed personal statement (around 500 words).
An interview with a member of Lancaster's admissions team.
English language requirements
We require an IELTS (Academic) Test with an overall score of at least 6.5, and a minimum of 6.0 in each element of the test.
If you are thinking of applying to Lancaster and you would like to ask us a question, complete our enquiry form and one of the team will get back to you.
Delivered in partnership with INTO Lancaster University, our one-year tailored pre-master's pathways are designed to improve your subject knowledge and English language skills to the level required by a range of Lancaster University master's degrees. Visit INTO Lancaster University for more details and a list of eligible degrees you can progress onto.
Course structure
We continually review and enhance our curriculum to ensure we are delivering the best possible learning experience, and to make sure that the subject knowledge and transferable skills you develop will prepare you for your future. The University will make every reasonable effort to offer programmes and modules as advertised. In some cases, changes may be necessary and may result in new modules or some modules and combinations being unavailable, for example as a result of student feedback, timetabling, Professional Statutory and Regulatory Bodies' (PSRB) requirements, staff changes and new research. Not all optional modules are available every year.
Core
core modules accordion
This module explores the exciting relationship between entrepreneurship and innovation within business environments.
You will consider how entrepreneurial thinking drives innovation, and how innovative practices can create value across a wide range of sectors and industries. You will increase your capacity to assess and exploit entrepreneurial opportunities, navigate uncertainty, and lead innovative initiatives within a business environment. The module supports the development of an entrepreneurial mindset and encourages you to apply creative and innovative thinking to real-world business challenges.
This module explores strategic decision-making within complex financial and market environments. It integrates economic theory, finance, and game-theoretic approaches to examine behaviour under uncertainty, competition, and regulation.
Key topics include:
market structure and dynamics
pricing strategies
information asymmetries
market failures
risk management
the role of financial institutions in the real economy.
You will analyse case studies of market crises and strategy scenarios, developing skills to evaluate incentives, anticipate competitor behaviour, and design robust strategic positioning. The module also covers the impact of policy interventions and regulatory frameworks on decision-making, total economic output, and productivity growth. It provides you with the tools to make informed strategic choices in both corporate and policy contexts.
You will be prepared to conduct critical analyses of real-world scenarios, including their ethical and environmental dimensions, to enhance decision-making capabilities in uncertain and rapidly changing domestic and international markets.
This module serves as the capstone for the Lancaster MBA, allowing you to consolidate your learning by focusing on a key leadership or management issue or project. The module is flexible and offers a choice of how to complete the dissertation module, which could take the form of an applied academic research project, an organisation-facing strategic business proposal, a company consultancy project or a company internship. Importantly, the module enables you to apply your newly acquired experience and knowledge from your programme of study to a real-world issue or project, thereby creating genuine impact and learning.
As reflective practice is essential for lifelong learning and professional development, this module includes a reflective element that draws on your learning experiences and reflections from before and during the MBA programme and prompts you to consider your next steps in your career journey and lifelong learning.
This module integrates managing people and organisations:
Managing people:
What shapes do modern organisations and institutions take when managing their people - and why?
What does human work mean concretely: how is it defined, valued and therefore managed today?
What does it mean for us all to depend on technologies without historical precedent: that is, on machines that are expected to decide for us - and already do?
How will we manage in a world where the entire human enterprise faces increasingly complicated natural, political, ethical, and cultural tensions to which no ready-made solution exists?
These questions are ongoing concerns for the management profession. Reflecting on them is always part of a manager's role and requires an interdisciplinary approach to understanding how organisations can best structure their human resources departments to enable individuals and broader stakeholders to achieve their own ambitions through work.
Managing organisations:
We work and live in organised contexts. Enduring organisational questions relate to how people are managed in different types of organisations (eg professional, project-based, etc.), along with emerging questions such as managing digitally and inter-generationally. Being able to analyse organisational forms and practices, and how these shape workplace dynamics, is a vital part of learning how to manage people, teams, projects, and more.
In today’s rapidly changing business environment, operational excellence is inseparable from digital innovation. This module provides future leaders with the insights and tools to reimagine business operations in the digital age.
You will explore how technologies such as AI, automation, cloud platforms, and real-time analytics are transforming supply chains, process design, project delivery, and customer value creation. Simultaneously, you will critically assess the leadership challenges involved in driving digital transformation at scale, how digital innovation rebalances the trade-offs between agility and efficiency, and the opportunities and risks it presents for sustainability, ethics, and security. By the end of the module, you will not only understand the fundamentals of operations management, but also know how to strategically harness digital disruption—positioning organisations for competitiveness, resilience, sustainable, and responsible growth.
This module explores the complexities of leading responsibly in today’s interconnected world.
You will critically examine how individuals learn to lead and what it means to lead with purpose, vision, and character. You will be encouraged to reflect on leadership theory, behaviours, and processes. Through practical and critical engagement, you will define your leadership purpose and explore how to lead with integrity and impact.
This module is focused on developing your capability to strategically transform organisations.
You will gain a comprehensive understanding of strategic management, which will equip you with the skills, knowledge, and tools to evaluate strategy and create value across different organisations. The module will examine strategy formation and leading strategic change, and understand how well-designed strategic leadership promotes value-creation in organisations.
By combining cutting-edge theory with practical cases, lectures, in-class discussions, and interactive workshops, you will develop core analytical, problem-solving, and decision-making skills. By completing this module, you will increase your capacity to assess an organisation’s strategy, strategic management, and leadership of strategic change, preparing you for leadership roles in business, consulting, or policymaking.
Marketing and markets have never been more dynamic, transformed by the continuous expansion of global forces—technology, digitisation, and sustainable thinking. As a future business leader, this module will equip you with the strategic marketing capabilities required to succeed in an evolving global marketplace. You will encounter a blend of marketing theory, digital innovation, and responsible business practice, and discover firsthand how marketing strategy shapes the delivery of value creation for customers.
We understand the transformative role of technology – particularly Artificial Intelligence (AI), and digital media – which is re-writing customer experiences, personalisation and strategic decision-making. You will explore how global organisations drive business performance through a commitment to this innovation-led strategy. In conjunction with core marketing principles such as brand strategy, strategic market segmentation, and integrated marketing communications, you will be immersed in current trends – environmental and ethical marketing. This will prepare you to lead and develop sustainable, customer-centred growth strategies now and into the future.
Fees and funding
Location
Full Time (per year)
Part Time (per year)
Home
£33,000
n/a
International
£33,000
n/a
Additional fees and funding information accordion
There may be extra costs related to your course for items such as books, stationery, printing, photocopying, binding and general subsistence on trips and visits. Following graduation, you may need to pay a subscription to a professional body for some chosen careers.
Specific additional costs for studying at Lancaster are listed below.
College fees
Lancaster is proud to be one of only a handful of UK universities to have a collegiate system. Every student belongs to a college, and all students pay a small College Membership Fee which supports the running of college events and activities. Students on some distance-learning courses are not liable to pay a college fee.
For students starting in 2025, the fee is £40 for undergraduates and research students and £15 for students on one-year courses.
Computer equipment and internet access
To support your studies, you will also require access to a computer, along with reliable internet access. You will be able to access a range of software and services from a Windows, Mac, Chromebook or Linux device. For certain degree programmes, you may need a specific device, or we may provide you with a laptop and appropriate software - details of which will be available on relevant programme pages. A dedicated IT support helpdesk is available in the event of any problems.
The University provides limited financial support to assist students who do not have the required IT equipment or broadband support in place.
Application fees for 2025
For most taught postgraduate programmes starting in 2025 you must pay a non-refundable application fee of £40. We cannot consider applications until this fee has been paid, as advised on our online secure payment system. There is no application fee for postgraduate research applications.
Application fees for 2026
There is no application fee if you are applying for postgraduate study starting in 2026.
Paying a deposit
For some of our courses you will need to pay a deposit to accept your offer and secure your place. We will let you know in your offer letter if a deposit is required and you will be given a deadline date when this is due to be paid.
The fee that you pay will depend on whether you are considered to be a home or international student. Read more about how we assign your fee status.
If you are studying on a programme of more than one year’s duration, tuition fees are reviewed annually and are not fixed for the duration of your studies. Read more about fees in subsequent years.
You may be eligible for the following funding opportunities, depending on your fee status and course. You will be automatically considered for our main scholarships and bursaries when you apply, so there's nothing extra that you need to do.
Unfortunately no scholarships and bursaries match your selection, but there are more listed on scholarships and bursaries page.
The Lancaster MBA exposed me to the multi-faceted nature of business, challenged my perspectives about business and life in general, and helped expand my networks.
I was constantly challenged to push my boundaries and to step out of my comfort zone. I was able to spot some of my flaws and work on them. But also I discovered several of my strengths which I had overlooked in the past.
Alumni story: Aman Bhutani
Aman Bhutani graduated in 1999 and went on to become the CEO of GoDaddy. Discover inspirational MBA alumni stories like Aman's.
Our candidates for the 2024-2025 MBA programme include a broad range of sectors, nationalities and backgrounds. For more information, please contact Andy Bagshaw.
The information on this site relates primarily to the stated entry year and every effort has been taken to ensure the information is correct at the time of publication.
The University will use all reasonable effort to deliver the courses as described, but the University reserves the right to make changes to advertised courses. In exceptional circumstances that are beyond the University’s reasonable control (Force Majeure Events), we may need to amend the programmes and provision advertised. In this event, the University will take reasonable steps to minimise the disruption to your studies. If a course is withdrawn or if there are any fundamental changes to your course, we will give you reasonable notice and you will be entitled to request that you are considered for an alternative course or withdraw your application. You are advised to revisit our website for up-to-date course information before you submit your application.
More information on limits to the University’s liability can be found in our legal information.
Our Students’ Charter
We believe in the importance of a strong and productive partnership between our students and staff. In order to ensure your time at Lancaster is a positive experience we have worked with the Students’ Union to articulate this relationship and the standards to which the University and its students aspire. Find out more about our Charter and student policies.
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