LLB, FLK, QLD, "law degree" - which is which?

There are a lot of terms flying around about Law courses, creating much confusion. Here's an attempt to clear up what the various terms mean.

A law degree is, strictly speaking, any degree in the subject of Law. However, it is sometimes used in a narrower meaning for a specific qualification required to practice as a lawyer, not least because of usage in the United States.

An LLB is a Bachelor of Laws degree (the abbreviation is from the Latin Legum Baccalaureus; for reasons known to those who understand Latin the double-L abbreviation indicates a plural). In the United Kingdom nearly all Bachelor's degrees in Law are LLBs though there are exceptions, mainly at Cambridge (which offers a "Bachelor of Arts in Law") and Oxford (which has an undergraduate "Bachelor of Arts in Jurisprudence" and a very confusingly named postgraduate "Bachelor of Civil Law"). In and of itself a Bachelor of Laws degree is simply a degree concentrating on the subject of Law. However, many LLB programmes are specifically designed to meet the requirements of the legal profession. Exceptions are known as academic pathways or liberal law degrees or some similar terms.

A QLD is a Qualifying Law Degree. This means that the degree meets the requirements of, and is recognised by, the Bar Council as completing the academic stage of becoming a barrister. Formerly a QLD also met the academic requirements of the Solicitors Regulation Authority to become a solicitor; however the route for qualification as a solicitor has heavily changed in recent years. A QLD will include the Foundations of Legal Knowledge (FLK) and also must be completed within six years.

A GDL is a Graduate Diploma in Law. For those graduates who either did not study Law or did not take all the right courses on their degree, the GDL is a route by which they can obtain the relevant legal knowledge without taking a second whole degree. It includes the full FLK.

The FLK or Foundations of Legal Knowledge is a term for the core subjects a student must study to qualify as a barrister (and, in years past, a solicitor) in England and Wales. The core subjects can vary in exact name but they include Contract Law, Criminal Law, Equity and Trusts Law, EU Law, Land or Property Law, Public or Constitutional Law and Tort Law. To qualify as a barrister or solicitor in Northern Ireland the same seven subjects must be taken along with Evidence Law. It's not possible to give full justice to the FLK in this post so I'll devote one to it specially in due course.

The SQE or Solicitors Qualifying Examination is a pair of exams that must be taken to qualify as a solicitor. Along with holding a bachelor's degree in any subject (not necessarily Law though it will help) and two years' cumulative qualifying work experience, this is the modern route for qualification following a recent review.

An LLM is a Master of Laws degree (the abbreviation is from the Latin Legum Magister), a postgraduate degree. An LLM is normally an academic focused degree and generally not a Qualifying Law Degree; however there are some conversion LLMs that function as QLDs such as Birkbeck's LLM Qualifying Law Degree and Wolverhampton's LLM Law Conversion.

An MLaw is a Master's in Law degree (note the difference). This is an integrated Master's degree that combines the content of a Bachelor's degree in law with an additional year at Master's level covering preparation for the SQE exams. Integrated Master's degrees are better known in Science and Engineering courses. (The Open University does not currently offer such a degree in Law; however it does offer them in several other subjects.) As a single degree they can offer better funding options than taking things separately.

An LLD is a Doctor of Laws degree (the abbreviation is from the Latin Legum Doctor). This is awarded by universities in one of two ways. Either it is given as an honorary degree or it is awarded as a "higher doctorate" to an established academic based on a formal assessment of their existing portfolio of published research.

A DCL is a Doctor of Civil Law degree which is awarded in much the same way as a Doctor of Laws.

And one I only thought about after generating the graphic...

A JD is a Juris Doctor, the name for the standard degree required to qualify in some countries. Normally a degree taken by graduates, it seems to be functionally similar to a Bachelor of Laws, or at least a graduate entry one. In some countries it co-exists with the first degree LLB, in other countries it has replaced it. In the UK it appears to have only been offered on its own at Queen's University Belfast and not currently (at least when I checked their entry for Graduate Degrees in the QUB School of Law), but some other universities offer a joint LLB/JD or LLM/JD programme in collaboration with overseas universities.

(Image created with Microsoft 365 Copilot.)