In the digital age, digital competence is becoming a factor of professionalism, and its formation is an urgent task of the education system at all levels. The purpose of the article is to present and discuss the results of a study conducted at one of the federal universities of Russia among students - future professionals, regarding the relevance and level of development of digital competence. Using the author's tools, it was revealed that, despite the critical importance of digital competence for future professional activity, the real level of digital competence proficiency is a quarter lower than desired; despite sufficient awareness of digital competencies, the level of their proficiency remains user, not professional; digital competence is a byproduct of online learning formats. All these patterns indicate the absence of a special, systemically organized process of digital competence formation embedded in the educational environment of the university, which makes it necessary to develop and implement a new strategy for achieving digital competence of graduates in order to solve the complex task of integrating professional competence, on the one hand, and digital competence, on the other.