The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board has disclosed that the current ₦3,500 registration fee for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination may not be sustainable given prevailing economic realities, raising the possibility of a future review.

The Public Communication Adviser of JAMB, Dr Fabian Benjamin, disclosed during a dialogue organised by the Education Writers' Association of Nigeria via Zoom, themed "2026 Admission Policy Review and JAMB Scorecard: A Conversation with the Registrar." The session examined key issues surrounding admissions and tertiary education while reviewing Prof Ishaq Oloyede's decade long leadership of the board, which ends on 31 July 2026, ahead of Prof Segun Aina's resumption on 1 August 2026.

Benjamin clarified that his remarks reflected an economic analysis rather than an official position of the board, stating: "Based on the cost of things and the demands from service providers, one should not be surprised if there is an increase in the future. But that is not my position; the registrar and the management will make such decisions."

The current fee was reduced from ₦5,000 to ₦3,500 in 2018 following operational savings, and Benjamin maintained that JAMB still charges one of the lowest examination fees globally. "Our fee is ₦3,500. No examination body charges anything close to that. We are charging at the barest cost of running the examination," he stated.

He explained that a significant portion of the registration fee is shared with accredited Computer Based Test centres, most of which are privately owned, noting that JAMB directly owns fewer than 50 of the more than 1,000 accredited centres nationwide. According to him, many operators have complained that payments received are no longer sufficient due to rising costs of diesel, electricity and equipment maintenance.

Benjamin also revealed that JAMB has remitted over ₦50 billion as operating surplus to the Federal Government in the last 10 years, in compliance with regulations requiring government agencies to remit a percentage of their excess surplus. He stressed that this should not be misconstrued as evidence that JAMB was established to generate revenue, stating: "JAMB is not a revenue generating agency. But there is a regulation that every agency, whether revenue generating or not, must remit a certain percentage of its excess surplus."

He attributed much of the board's savings to technological reforms introduced under Oloyede, including the replacement of satellite based connectivity, which cost about ₦1.2 billion annually, with a telecoms based platform costing less than ₦100 million.