This year’s Free Application for Federal Student Aid form opened Sept. 23 with easier-to-read language, a QR code to invite guardians and more revisions from last year’s form. In Texas, the deadline to apply for FAFSA aid is January 2027.
FAFSA is the form students will fill out nationwide for federal financial aid to cover next year’s costs. At UT, over 50% of students use financial aid, according to the Office of Admissions. Texas One Stop expects to release financial aid packages around next March for incoming freshmen and shortly after for current students, said Jennifer Love, associate vice president for student enrollment and support services, who oversees financial aid at Texas One Stop.
This year the form had its earliest launch date ever, according to the U.S. Department of Education.
“We’re now starting to get into some consistent practices with the FAFSA application,” Love said. “Students for the last two years have been able to expect that it opened Oct. 1 or sooner.”
Alongside easier-to-read language and QR code invites for guardians, the FAFSA form now also has automatic prefilled information for students who completed it last year.
When America Serrano, a youth and community studies sophomore, filled out the FAFSA, she said her Student Aid Index, which determines how much her family can financially contribute, appeared two to three minutes after filling out her parents’ contributor forms. She said in previous years, it took two to three business days to get the report back.
“This year, it was just way quicker because they already had established information from the past two times that I filled it out,” Serrano said.
Love said it is too early to confirm when financial aid packages will come out because many factors influence packages, such as budgets and state financial aid deadlines.
“There’s just a lot of different factors, and we want to make sure that we put our first offer, best offer, out there for our students,” Love said.