The Medical Counselling Committee published the Round 2 schedule for NEET UG 2026 on 27 August. Registration and payment open on 3 September and close at 3:00 PM on 8 September. The Round 2 result is due on 11 September.
Round 2 covers the 15% All India Quota, all deemed and central universities, AFMC, the AIIMS institutions and JIPMER (Puducherry and Karaikal), for MBBS, BDS and B.Sc Nursing.
All India Quota Round 2 dates
| Stage | Dates (2026) |
|---|---|
| Verification of tentative seat matrix by participating institutes | 1 and 2 September |
| Registration and payment | 3 September to 8 September, registration closes 3:00 PM on 8 September |
| Choice filling | 3 September to 10:00 AM on 9 September |
| Choice locking | 4:00 PM on 8 September to 10:00 AM on 9 September |
| Processing of seat allotment | 9 and 10 September |
| Result | 11 September |
| Reporting and joining at the allotted college | 12 September to 18 September |
| Verification of joined candidate data by institutes | 19 September |
All times in the schedule are server time, not the clock on your phone.
Two deadlines on 8 September that are not the same deadline
Registration shuts at 3:00 PM on 8 September. The payment window stays open until 6:00 PM the same day. Those three hours are for candidates who have already registered and still have to pay, not a grace period for starting the process. If you have not registered by 3:00 PM, the open payment gateway is of no use to you.
Choice locking has its own window. It opens at 4:00 PM on 8 September and closes at 10:00 AM on 9 September, which is also when choice filling ends. MCC’s information bulletin states that choices left unlocked are locked automatically as per the schedule, so an unlocked list is not a blank list. It is your list, frozen where you left it.
State counselling gets five days, not fifteen
The companion schedule sets the state quota Round 2 window at 7 September to 11 September. In Round 1, state counselling ran from 13 August to 27 August, a fifteen-day window. Round 2 gives states five days.
The sequencing matters more than the length. AIQ registration opens on 3 September and state Round 2 opens on 7 September, so candidates who are in both tracks will be committing to All India Quota choices before most state portals open. The last date of joining is 18 September for both tracks, and both MCC and the state authorities verify joined candidate data on 19 September.
MCC has repeated its standing instruction that all Saturdays, Sundays and gazetted holidays are to be treated as working days by participating institutes.
What Round 2 changes
The revised information bulletin dated 20 August confirms four online AIQ rounds this year: Round 1, Round 2, Round 3 and the stray vacancy round. It also states that no seats will be reverted to the participating states after Round 2 is completed. Upgradation stays available up to Round 3, and candidates cannot resign from a Round 3 allotted seat.
That makes Round 2 the last round in which an AIQ seat you decline can still go back to a state pool, and the last comfortable point to change your mind.
Official links
- UG Round 2 AIQ Counselling Schedule 2026, dated 27.08.2026 (PDF)
- AIQ and State Schedule for Round 2, UG 2026, dated 27.08.2026 (PDF)
- Revised UG Counselling 2026 Information Bulletin, dated 20.08.2026 (PDF)
- MCC UG Medical Counselling portal
Related on neet2seat
- MCC Round 1 final result and what moved against the provisional list
- NEET 2026 seat allotment tracker: which authorities have declared
- All India Quota closing ranks by college and category
- Gujarat NEET UG 2026 round 1 allotment and reporting
Source: Medical Counselling Committee, mcc.nic.in, schedules dated 27.08.2026 and the revised UG 2026 information bulletin dated 20.08.2026.