Latest figures for the number of A-level students embarking on law degrees suggest the supply of law graduates will continue to exceed the profession’s demand – despite undergraduate vacancies remaining at nearly 30 universities.

According to figures reported by admissions service Ucas, 22,890 applicants have been placed in the subject group of M (law) this year, compared with 19,480 four years ago.

On the day A-level results were published, law continued to be among the top-three subjects students searched on Ucas’s clearing service.

This morning, undergraduate LLB places were available through the clearing service at universities including: Anglia Ruskin, Bangor, BPP, Bradford, Brunel, Buckingham, Central Lancashire, Chester, Coventry, Cumbria, De Montfort, Essex, Gloucestershire, Greenwich, Huddersfield, Hull, Keele, Lancaster, Leeds, Lincoln, Liverpool John Moores, Northampton, Reading, South Wales, Staffordshire, Westminster, Wolverhampton and Worcester.

Pete Edge, director of admissions at the University of Law, said the university expected to see its highest ever undergraduate intake start next month across its full-time, part-time and online study modes.

He added: ‘In terms of clearing, the level of interest appears at present to be on a par with last year, and we expect an increase at the end of this week, as some students will receive their GCSE results that they may have been waiting on to fulfil university admissions criteria.’

The University of Derby exceeded its recruitment targets for undergraduate law.

Professor Kevin Brampton, director of the International Policing and Justice Institute, said the university continued to receive late applications and clearing requests from high-quality candidates, ‘which we are putting in additional capacity to accommodate’.

Sandra Clarke, head of department at the School of Law and Centre for Criminology at the University of Greenwich, said its new LLB extended programme was full.

It still had limited capacity for ‘exceptional’ applications on its three-year LLB (hons) law programme.

Deveral Capps, head of Leeds Law School at Leeds Beckett University, said clearing had been very busy, with places still available on its LLB (hons) law course.

Joint honours courses have been popular, such as LLB (hons) law with international business, law with management, and law with finance, Capps added.

Professor Lindsay Moir, director of admissions and recruitment at University of Hull Law School, said it has already placed many students on to its various LLB programmes.

'Nonetheless, we want to reassure those who may be faced with unexpected or disappointing results that we still have spaces avaiilable for well-qualified students,' Moir added.