Honours degree

An honours degree (Hons or BA (Hons), honors in the United States) is a research academic degree.

It consists of a single-year full-time or two years part-time research programme, which follows a bachelor's degree and is usually obtained in order to join a PhD programme; it is considered to stand between the undergraduate and the postgraduate level. An honours degree is generally entirely focused on research and research preparation, its structure being generally made by research workshop units and a thesis with original content and contribution. The honours degree is awarded in most anglophone countries, such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa and should not be confused with the undergraduate classification of general degrees, which also uses the word Honours to award a high academic standing (First Class Honours, Second Class Honours, Third Class).

The honours degree does not exist in most European, South American, Asian and African countries and is not included in the Bologna Process, therefore its utility in order to achieve a doctoral programme depends on the evaluation of the single university.