Undergraduate · Computer Science
Bachelor of Advanced Computing (Honours)
Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
About this program
This is ANU's flagship computing degree for students who already know they want to go deep rather than broad: a four-year, 192-unit honours program accredited by the Australian Computer Society, built around choosing a specialisation and finishing with an honours research year that most Australian CS degrees don't offer at undergraduate level at all. It sits alongside the standard Bachelor of Advanced Computing without honours, and the honours track specifically targets students aiming at research careers or R&D-heavy industry roles.
The first two years are common to all students regardless of eventual specialisation, which is a deliberate design choice. ANU wants everyone solid on systems, algorithms, and software engineering fundamentals before they branch. From third year, students commit to a specialisation area and the honours thesis component means a real supervised research project, typically attached to one of the School of Computing's active research groups, rather than a capstone assignment marked against a rubric.
Students frequently combine this degree in a Flexible Double Degree, pairing with Science, Economics, or Politics/Philosophy/Economics as the most common combinations, which stretches the timetable but lets a student, say, pair machine learning coursework with an economics major aimed at quantitative finance.
Cost & duration
English test scores
Verified programsandcourses.anu.edu.au ↗
Course structure
5 terms of coursework
- Year 1: Introduction to Computer Systems, Introduction to Programming, Data Structures and Algorithms, Discrete Mathematics, university electives
- Year 2: Software Engineering, Computer Organisation and Program Execution, Databases, specialisation-track foundational courses
- Year 3: Specialisation core courses, Professional Practice in Computing, electives
- Year 4 (Honours): Honours thesis (individually supervised research project), advanced specialisation seminars, research methods coursework
- Accredited by the Australian Computer Society
Admissions
Year 12 completion, ATAR approx 95 or equivalent
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