After a couple of last-minute schedule tweaks, the Medical Counselling Committee has finally opened Round 1 choice filling for NEET UG Counselling 2026. Candidates who completed their registration can now log in at mcc.nic.in and start listing out the MBBS, BDS and AYUSH colleges they'd like a shot at. If you've been checking the portal daily waiting for this button to light up, it's live.

A Slightly Bumpy Start to Round 1

Choice filling wasn't originally supposed to open this late. It was first pencilled in for August 6, then pushed to August 8 after MCC cited a fresh notification from the National Medical Commission concerning Persons with Benchmark Disabilities candidates. In the end, MCC moved again and issued a notice confirming that choice filling for Round 1 would actually go live from 4 PM on August 7. If the shifting dates left you confused, you weren't imagining things, the schedule genuinely moved twice within a few days.

  • Round 1 registration and fee payment: August 5 to August 12, 2026
  • Choice filling window: Opened at 4:00 PM on August 7, 2026
  • Choice filling and locking deadline: August 13, 2026
  • Seats covered: 15% All India Quota MBBS/BDS seats, plus 100% seats at central universities and deemed universities
  • Courses included: MBBS, BDS, AYUSH and BSc Nursing
  • Roughly 1.10 lakh MBBS seats across around 710 medical colleges, plus about 21,000 BDS seats nationwide
This is to inform all candidates that the Choice Filling for Round-1 of UG Counselling 2026 will be available from 04:00 PM onwards on 07 August 2026.— Medical Counselling Committee, Official Notice

How to Actually Fill Your Choices

The mechanics haven't changed much from previous years, but it's worth walking through carefully since your choice order genuinely determines where you land.

  • Log in to your account at mcc.nic.in using your NEET UG counselling credentials
  • Open the Choice Filling section from your dashboard
  • Browse and select the colleges and courses you're interested in
  • Add each one to your preference list
  • Arrange your selections in the exact order you'd want to be considered, top choice first
  • Save your list, then go back through it once more before locking anything
  • Lock your final choices before the window closes

One thing worth flagging: if you don't manually lock your choices, MCC will lock whatever you've saved automatically once the window shuts. That's a safety net, but it also means an unfinished or poorly ordered list could get locked in by default, so it's smarter to finish and lock deliberately rather than leaving it to the system.

Before You Start: Check the Seat Matrix

MCC has already published the Round 1 seat matrix covering MBBS, BDS and BSc Nursing seats. It's genuinely worth downloading and going through this before you start filling choices, rather than after, since it tells you exactly which colleges and courses have seats available under the 15% AIQ pool this round. Building your preference list without checking it first is a common mistake that leads to wasted choices.

Category of SeatsCoverage
15% All India QuotaMBBS and BDS seats across participating state colleges
Central Universities100% seats at AMU, BHU, University of Delhi, and Faculty of Dentistry, Jamia Millia Islamia
ESIC and AFMCSeats reserved for wards of ESIC insured persons, and AFMC Pune
Deemed Universities100% seats across participating deemed medical and dental universities

What's Actually New This Year

MCC has rolled out a handful of changes to the counselling process this cycle that are genuinely worth knowing about, especially if you've been through NEET counselling before and are expecting things to work exactly the same way.

  • Candidates who mark themselves as 'willing to upgrade' no longer need to physically report to their allotted college just to hold on to that seat while waiting for a possible upgrade
  • An online seat resignation facility has been introduced, letting candidates surrender an allotted seat through the portal instead of doing it in person
  • Reservation for PwBD candidates has been increased from 3% to 5%
  • MCC has released video tutorials in both Hindi and English walking candidates through registration, choice filling, and document requirements

These changes are aimed squarely at cutting down on unnecessary travel and paperwork, which has historically been one of the bigger pain points of NEET counselling for candidates coming from smaller towns or far-off states.

What Happens Once Choice Filling Closes

Once the window shuts on August 13, MCC will process the seat allotment based on each candidate's NEET rank, category, the choices submitted, and seat availability at that point. The Round 1 result will follow after that, giving candidates their allotted institute and course, if any. From there, it's the usual next steps, document upload, and either freezing the seat or opting to float for a possible upgrade in Round 2.

Given how the schedule has already shifted twice this cycle, it's worth treating any date beyond what's officially confirmed as subject to change. Keep checking mcc.nic.in directly rather than relying on screenshots or forwarded messages doing the rounds on social media.

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Official Sources