Oral exams are a common practice at university.  They are usually part of a combination of written and oral exams, although there could also be courses where assessment is mainly based on oral exams.

In an oral exam the examiner will ask you a question about a programme, a paper or a project you are familiar with.

The purpose of oral exams is to confirm a student´s knowledge of a subject matter and/or confirm a grade.

There are two types of oral exams:

Closed answer oral exams: You are expected to have learnt and be able to reproduce the content in a programme.

Good memorization skills are an advantage in this type of oral exams.  There us little scope for creativity.

Open answer oral exams:  There are no set answers to questions.  Answers are based to a large extent on the candidate´s personal experience and their ability to prioritize information, analyze data, summarize information and think critically.

Completely different answers could be equally valid.