England's higher education regulator has warned universities that artificial intelligence has made it "close to impossible" to assess some coursework fairly, and that institutions which fail to redesign their assessments could face sanctions.

The Office for Students (OfS) published the warning on 11 November 2026 in a joint report with Advance HE, Making AI Work for Students: reflections on institutional practice. The report draws on conversations with more than 300 students and staff from over 120 higher education institutions, carried out between June and September 2026.

Students told researchers that some of their peers completed assessments using AI tools, sometimes in just a few minutes, and received similar grades to students who had done the work themselves. The report found that where assessments are unsupervised, it is frequently possible to complete them to a high standard using AI tools, with limited engagement from the student.

Detection is not the answer, the report says

The report is blunt about the limits of technology as a fix. It says AI-detection tools do not consistently and reliably identify AI use, and warns against using misconduct procedures to retrospectively fix assessments that were not designed to withstand AI use in the first place.

Josh Fleming, the OfS director of strategy and delivery, described AI as a generational risk for the sector. The regulator's practical answer is a shift towards assessment formats that AI cannot complete on a student's behalf: in-person written examinations, presentations, oral examinations known as vivas, and practical or performance-based tasks.

Many universities have already started moving in that direction, the report notes, bringing back closed-book exams and adding tasks in which students critique or edit AI-generated output rather than producing essays from scratch.

Sanctions for universities that fall short

Alongside the report, the OfS published guidance on how its quality conditions of registration apply to AI. Conditions B1, B2 and B4 require universities to deliver high-quality courses, support students to succeed, and assess them effectively, so that each assessment is valid and reliable and awards remain credible.

Institutions that fail to design valid and reliable assessments could breach those conditions. The regulator said it could respond with specific conditions of registration, monetary penalties, or the suspension of access to student support funding and OfS grant funding.

The report does not name any individual institution, and it does not set a deadline by which universities must redesign their assessment regimes. Advance HE said it would launch a programme of support for institutions early in 2027 to help them manage AI in learning and teaching.

The OfS said it also wants universities to teach students how to use AI well, including AI literacy and subject-specific AI skills, rather than simply policing its misuse. The report covers teaching and study practice, assessment, and AI literacy, and is based on round tables, workshops, listening events and interviews, including 91 students or student representatives and 244 staff from at least 127 institutions.

Sources: Office for Students and Wonkhe.