Possible to Do PhD Part-time?

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Yes, but can be quite challenging. If you are interested in pursuing a part-time PhD, you need to identify and discuss with a potential PhD advisor, and you may need to talk to quite a few, because part-time PhDs are generally very rare. I am not aware of faculty members who are actively recruiting part-time PhD students.

Both the student and the advisor need to fully understand the great variety of challenges that can arise over the course of a part-time PhD. A good way to figure out what the challenges may be is for both parties to concretely discuss everything that needs to happen in the 1st semester, 2nd semester, etc. all the way until graduation. That is, both parties do a “dry run” of the whole (long!) process.

Funding support for the student is one consideration (the part-time PhD student likely will need to provide their own funding) but there are many other important factors too, including and not limited to:

1. Whether both parties are prepared for the very long journey, especially if the student is interested in a topic that rapidly evolves, such as machine learning or artificial intelligence (AI) related topics where paper rejections are common; many groups could be work on the same problem in parallel, which means spreading research activities over a longer period of time could significantly increase the chances that someone publishes your ideas before you do. A full-time PhD students in computer science in the United States typically take 4–6 years to complete; part-time could be significantly longer.
2. The feasibility of a part-time PhD program can vary significantly in the United States, depending on the program’s expectations and structure. In contrast, universities in the UK offer part-time PhD programs in machine learning and computer science that cater to students with full-time jobs. These programs tend to emphasize more pure research activities and involve less coursework.
3. Whether it is in the best interest of both parties for the student to pursue the PhD remotely. For example, the student may not receive enough support due to potentially more asynchronous nature of communication; and the advisor and other students in the group (i.e., the student’s academic siblings) may not be able to as easily collaborate with the student.
4. If the student will have the flexibility to travel and attend conferences and present papers. Frequently, the author is required to attend and present an accepted paper at an academic conference. Not only is this crucial for making progress during the PhD program but it is also an important experience to attend and meet other experts (and potentially future colleagues) in the field of study. If the student has a full-time job, will they be able to take time off without using precious vacation time? For students with families, they need to ensure that their partner and children are ok with extra trips and absences from home.