Business and Commerce are very popular degrees, and there are a lot of similar courses offered in these areas. Lots of students choose to apply for these courses despite having little or no experience in the area, but it makes sense given that the types of topics you would cover and the things you would learn would be helpful in most careers, even if you choose to follow a different path later on. Let’s take a closer look at the two degrees.

What’s the difference?

Most people use Business and Commerce interchangeably, and there are a lot of similarities between the courses. They both offer subjects in similar areas, like accounting, business analytics and marketing, however they look at the same topic through a slightly different lens.

Commerce takes a more scientific approach, and looks at the bigger picture. It focuses on the economy and the way it works, and has more of a focus on numbers and calculations, with majors offered in areas such as econometrics, finance and actuarial studies.

Business looks more at the way a single business would work, focusing in on the information you need to understand to successfully run a business yourself or work cohesively with other areas of a business. Within a Business degree, you could major in things like marketing, accounting or human resource management.

What prerequisites do I need?

You should always check the particular courses to make sure that you have the required prerequisites, but in general Business and Commerce degrees only require English and a Maths (or sometimes Maths Methods or Specialist Maths). There’s no assumed knowledge from VCE subjects like Accounting or Economics, so you won’t be disadvantaged if you haven’t done these subjects, however if you have done them you will have a better understanding of what you’re interested in and can focus earlier on what you will major in.

What else could I consider?

Commerce and Business both work really well as part of a double degree, because of the transferable skills that can be applied to almost any career. For example, if you did Commerce and Engineering then you would have a better understanding of some of the restraints around building new equipment for a business, or if you did Business and Arts you could get add some more breadth to your degree with a closer look at international studies.

Some universities also offer more specific courses like a Bachelor of Economics or Accounting, so if you know you want to major in those areas you could look at those courses instead.

If you are looking at Business and Commerce, you could also consider courses like Actuarial Science (where you use high level maths to calculate things like risk), Business Administration or Entrepreneurship.

Also, remember that the lowest selection rank from last year is simply a popularity contest for the course, so just because a course has a higher lowest selection rank doesn’t make it a better fit for you. Before you choose to apply for a course, find out more information like whether they have close connections with industry and offer internships, or if there are opportunities for travel.