MATCH Day

Match Day is a milestone in medical education. It’s a day when medical students and residents learn where they match for residency and fellowship, respectively. For the uninitiated, Match Day often seems like a peculiar process.

The National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) is a program responsible for matching students and residents to residency and fellowship programs. Always scheduled on the third Friday of March, Match refers to the day when the NRMP releases the main residency results, identifying the residency programs where medical and osteopathic students have matched.

However, long before Match Day, students and residents begin researching programs, meeting with advisors, writing personal essays, and requesting letters of recommendation, among a multitude of tasks. Each task brings them closer to registration for the Main Residency Match, which opens in mid-September. Indeed, it is a long haul between when the centralized online application service (ERAS) opens, registration begins, rank is finalized, and Match Day results are received.

Match week starts on the third Monday of March. During the day, students are notified whether or not they “matched” into one of their ranked programs. Yet, even knowing they matched involves waiting until the third Friday to find out where. In other words, students learn they’ve matched, which is great, but they don’t know where, and that suspends learning if they’re moving from one state to another, finding housing, or will be acquiring new protocols in a new hospital with regional differences, as they begin a new chapter in life.

For students who do not match and are eligible for the Supplemental Offer and Acceptance Program (SOAP), the period between Monday and Friday is equally long and uncertain. During this time unmatched applicants submit a new rank order list to unmatched or partially matched programs. SOAP-eligible applicants can apply to the participating programs during the SOAP process. There are rules and regulations for SOAP, including an application limit. The limit includes new and previous programs that the applicant applied to during their ERAS application season. More waiting!

On the third Friday, unmatched students can participate in a series of SOAP rounds during which they re-certify their program preference list, await a program offer, and accept or reject the offer. This process repeats itself several times, until 9:00 pm Eastern Time. After 9:00 pm, unmatched applicants may begin contacting all remaining unfilled programs.

Resources

SOAP ERAS Schedule

SOAP – R3 System

Main Residency Match Program Directory 2025

LAS Medical Coaching to prepare for Step 2, Step 3, and upcoming In-Training Exams