Can you call a uni that doesn’t currently have vacancies just to register interest?

Maybe just ring them and give it ago you won’t know unless you ask

Yes absolutely, unis will sometimes have spaces available but not actually publish that or advertise them. This is usually for some very competitive courses like Medicine. It's up to the student to ring up and ask, in the hope that there are some spaces. This is now known as course-code only places - where the course won't be available on UCAS Clearing search but will appear when you enter the course code when adding a clearing choice (which you do once you've had a verbal offer, not before). This used to be known as secret clearing.

I'm mostly writing this out here for anyone else reading the thread at a later date too.

Oh wow thank you so much! I wasn’t sure if I’d be pestering them or not but I’m definitely just going to go for it now! I really appreciate this

What course is it you're looking for?

If it's something like English or Business then it's unlikely to be very relevant, if it's something much more competitive then I'd definitely recommend trying.

I’m trying for Psychology which I know for a fact can be a really popular course which is why I’m desperate to do anything I can to get in

Okay, Psychology isn't my area but I would advise a note of caution here, psychology is a competitive course in many universities and getting into such institutions can be difficult, however psychology cohort sizes are often quite big, and so universities with spare places may often have quite a few and so will advertise those on UCAS clearing as normal. I'm not saying there won't be any psychology places on course code only, but I wouldn't encourage you to expect many at all.

Yeah I’m kinda bummed because of how competitive that course is but I’m hoping with the decreased number of students attending uni this year with all that’s going on there might still be a chance. I have one grade below the requirements so I’m just staying positive. Do you think I should still ring to see or do you think if it’s not on the clearing list it really doesn’t have any vacancies? Thanks so much for all this info I massively appreciate it!

Oh always ring, there's never any harm that comes with ringing, just don't be too optimistic about what you hear.