What the Policia Nacional oposicion is
The Policia Nacional is Spain’s civilian national police force, responsible for policing towns and cities, issuing the DNI and passports, controlling immigration and documentation, and running the judicial and information police services. Entry at the base level is through the Escala Basica, categoria de Policia, convoked by the Direccion General de la Policia under the Ministerio del Interior through its Division de Formacion y Perfeccionamiento.
The process is an oposicion libre: there is no merit phase that rewards prior public service, and the ranking is built from the selection tests alone. Candidates who pass are admitted as alumnos of the Escuela Nacional de Policia in Avila, where they complete a training course followed by a period of supervised practice before being appointed.
The convocatoria cycle
The Escala Basica is convoked annually, by promotion number. Promocion 43 was convoked by a resolution of 7 July 2026 published in the BOE on 10 July 2026, with 2,704 plazas, of which a reserved quota corresponds to professional military personnel with at least five years of service and the remainder is filled by open oposicion.
The application window is short, fifteen working days: for the 2026 cycle it ran from 13 to 31 July 2026. The tasa de derechos de examen was 15.57 euros, halved for a familia numerosa of general category, with exemptions for several categories set out in the bases.
The tests
The 2026 cycle grouped the knowledge test, the psychotechnical aptitude tests, the personality questionnaire and the CIB into a single sitting held on 26 September 2026. The knowledge component combines a multiple choice test on the temario with an ortografia test.
The physical aptitude tests follow in a later block. There are three of them, scored against baremos grouped by sex and by age band, and the rule that decides most eliminations is not the average but the floor: a candidate needs an average of at least 5 points and cannot score 0 in any single test. A personal interview and a medical examination against the cuadro de exclusiones medicas complete the process.
Requirements and the language rule
Spanish nationality, a titulo de Bachiller or equivalent, and a minimum age of 18 are the standing requirements. The change worth noting in the 2026 cycle is the language rule: a candidate must accredit at least an A2 level of English or French, and the accreditation has to be in hand before the application period closes. It is a documentary requirement attached to the instancia, not something that can be produced later in the process.
The Avila course
Passing the tests admits a candidate to the Escuela Nacional de Policia in Avila rather than to a post. The course there runs an academic year and is followed by a practical module in a real posting. Only on completing both is the candidate appointed to the categoria de Policia. This matters for anyone comparing the Policia Nacional with an administrative oposicion: the commitment does not end with the exam, and the geography of the first year is fixed by the school, not by the candidate.
What candidates underestimate
The compressed calendar. Bases published in July, applications closing within the same month, the written sitting in late September and physical tests weeks later leaves no room to prepare one block after the other. The other recurring error is treating the CIB and the personality questionnaire as filler. They are part of the same sitting, they are scored, and candidates who answer them carelessly after two hours of test questions lose ground they cannot recover in the physical phase. The official links block above points to the convocatoria and to the Portal del Aspirante, where every subsequent resolution is published.