The Supreme Court annuls the decree that reformed the creation and authorization of universities

The Third Chamber (Fourth Section) of the Supreme Court has upheld the contentious-administrative appeal filed by Máster del Conocimiento, SL and has annulled Royal Decree 905/2025, of October 7, which reformed the state framework for the creation, recognition, and authorization of universities and university centers. The judgment, issued on October 6, 2026, is published in the Official State Gazette (BOE) no. 263, of October 23, 2026, Section I, page 141863, with the official reference BOE-A-2026-22083. The ruling imposes costs on the State Attorney.

The ruling closes contentious-administrative appeal no. 377/2025, promoted by the legal representation of the plaintiff company against the regulation approved by the Government slightly over a year ago. The BOE reproduces only the operative part of the resolution, the full text of which was notified to the parties and incorporated into the legislative collection.

The ruling: full annulment and limited costs

The Chamber adopts three linked decisions. The first is the upholding of the appeal and the annulment of Royal Decree 905/2025, of October 7, without modulation of effects or retroactivity appearing in the published operative part.

• Upholding of the contentious-administrative appeal and annulment of Royal Decree 905/2025, of October 7.
• Imposition of costs on the State Attorney up to a maximum of 6,000 euros for all concepts.
• Order for the publication of the ruling in the Official State Gazette, which has been complied with in number 263 of 2026.

The resolution is signed by the president of the Chamber, Luis María Díez-Picazo Giménez, and by magistrates María del Pilar Teso Gamella, Antonio Jesús Fonseca-Herrero Raimundo, José Luis Requero Ibáñez, María Alicia Millán Herrandis, Manuel Delgado-Iribarren García-Campero, and Antonio Narváez Rodríguez.

A decree that affected four university regulations

Royal Decree 905/2025 was not an isolated regulation, but a transversal reform of the university regulatory block. According to the description provided by the BOE itself in subsequent provisions, it modified:

• Royal Decree 640/2021, of July 27, on the creation, recognition, and authorization of universities and university centers, and institutional accreditation of university centers.
• Royal Decree 1509/2008, of September 12, which regulates the Registry of Universities, Centers, and Degrees.
• Royal Decree 1002/2010, of August 5, on the issuance of official university degrees.
• Royal Decree 822/2021, of September 28, which establishes the organization of university education and the quality assurance procedure.

The most visible impact occurred in Article 14 of Royal Decree 640/2021, regarding the institutional accreditation of centers. The reform added two new requirements concerning faculty and the availability and characteristics of equipment and facilities, and incorporated criteria on students’ academic results and external academic internships to renew accreditation. This modification subsequently forced the General Secretariat of Universities to rewrite its instructions of March 3, 2022, a procedure that was published in September 2026.

Who is the plaintiff

Máster del Conocimiento, SL is the company that promoted the Fernando Pessoa University-Canaries (UFP-C), recognized as a private university of the Canarian university system by a law of the Parliament of the Canary Islands. The company, domiciled in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, assumed the corporate responsibilities derived from the effective operation of the university, headquartered in the municipality of Santa María de Guía, in Gran Canaria.

The annulment also arrives during a cycle of regional recognitions of new private universities in which the now-annulled decree was already operating as a regulatory reference: the recognition law of the University of Mallorca, published in May 2026, expressly invoked Royal Decree 905/2025 when describing the processing of the file.

The decision renders ineffective, in general terms, the regulatory reform that ordered the requirements for the creation, recognition, and accreditation of universities and centers, and returns the framework to the state prior to October 7, 2025. For the university sector, both public and private, the ruling reopens the discussion on the standards required of centers and on the procedures that the autonomous communities and the Ministry had been applying under the protection of the annulled regulation.

Source: Official State Gazette, no. 263, of October 23, 2026, Section I (General Provisions), page 141863 (official reference: BOE-A-2026-22083).