US Education Department Announces New Process to Launch 2025-26 FAFSA Form

The department has said that through the partnership of community and stakeholders and the FAFSA Student Support Strategy, the application success rates of students have significantly increased over the past six months.

Study in US: The U.S. Department of Education announced yesterday that the 2025-26 Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA® form) to be launched through the new process.

U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said, “Following a challenging 2024-25 FAFSA cycle, the Department listened carefully to the input of students, families, and higher education institutions, made substantial changes to leadership and operations at Federal Student Aid, and is taking a new approach this year that will significantly improve the FAFSA experience. Thanks to the partnership of our stakeholders, we’ve developed a better implementation process for 2025-26. I look forward to continuing to work with our partners to ensure this school year’s FAFSA implementation better serves our nation’s students.”

Details about testing period

Volunteers will be invited to participate in the testing period and the form will later be available to more participants. The applicants will start in hundreds initially and later they will expand to tens of thousands of applicants. The testing process is to find the issues and resolve them before making it available to the students.

FAFSA Executive Advisor Jeremy Singer said, "We've heard from students, families, higher education professionals and other stakeholders loud and clear: They want a better, simpler FAFSA process, and they want to know when they can reliably expect it. In close collaboration with partners, FSA is confident we will deliver not only a better product, but also a smoother process than last year. One that makes higher education more accessible and within reach for more Americans."

The department said that it will share regular updates with families, students and a broad range of community stakeholders to clearly understand the progress. The aim is to also increase the confidence of students and their families, state agencies, institutions and other stakeholders and partners.

"In the coming weeks, the Department will release more information about how this testing period will work. Our top priority is ensuring students have access to the maximum federal financial aid possible to reach their education goals, and we are working tirelessly to ensure students and our partners have a smooth experience with the 2025-26 FAFSA form," reads the official statement.

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