Hardest Colleges to Get Into
Acceptance rate is the simplest measure of selectivity: the share of applicants who receive an offer. This ranking lists four-year colleges that admit the smallest share, excluding open-admission schools that do not report a rate.
We ranked 1,300 four-year colleges with at least 500 undergraduates and a reported acceptance rate, and show the 50 that admit the fewest. The lowest rate is 3%, the school in 50th place is at 14%, and the median across all of them is 77%. California Institute of Technology ranks first. California has the most entries with 9. The median SAT average among qualifying schools that report it is 1,180.
A low acceptance rate reflects demand, not teaching quality, and it moves from year to year. Several schools here are test-optional, so the SAT column may be empty. Read our guide to acceptance rates before treating selectivity as quality.
If you apply to schools on this list, balance them with colleges where your odds are better, and check how many of the top earners and graduates come from schools that admit most applicants.
How this list is built
A college appears here only if it meets every condition below.
- Colleges considered
- All 4-year colleges (public, private nonprofit and for-profit)
- Ranked by acceptance rate, lowest first. Ties are broken by larger undergraduate enrollment, then by name.
- Main campuses only, with at least 60% of core data fields reported
- At least 500 undergraduate students enrolled (fall 2024)
- A reported acceptance rate value (schools without one are not ranked)
- Data period
- Acceptance rate: fall 2024 applicants admitted.
- SAT average: total of math and reading for fall 2024 students who submitted scores.
- Net price: average for students receiving aid, academic year 2023-24.
- Graduation rate: first-time, full-time students who started in fall 2018 (4-year) or fall 2021 (2-year), finishing within 150% of normal time.
- Earnings: median earnings four years after completing, measured in 2022 and 2023 for the 2017-18 and 2018-19 cohorts, in 2024 dollars.
- Source: U.S. Department of Education College Scorecard, June 2026 release.
Showing the top 50 of 1,300 qualifying schools. Select a column heading to re-sort the table.
| 1 | California Institute of Technology Pasadena, CA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 3% | — | $16,075 | 94% | $152,843 |
| 2 | Stanford University Stanford, CA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 4% | 1,553 | $13,807 | 92% | $136,959 |
| 3 | Harvard University Cambridge, MA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 4% | 1,553 | $19,066 | 97% | $134,794 |
| 4 | Yale University New Haven, CT Private nonprofit · 4-year | 4% | 1,534 | $23,777 | 96% | $112,971 |
| 5 | Columbia University in the City of New York New York, NY Private nonprofit · 4-year | 4% | 1,553 | $21,590 | 96% | $115,519 |
| 6 | University of Chicago Chicago, IL Private nonprofit · 4-year | 4% | 1,554 | $14,860 | 95% | $127,757 |
| 7 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology Cambridge, MA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 5% | 1,560 | $20,111 | 96% | $161,961 |
| 8 | Princeton University Princeton, NJ Private nonprofit · 4-year | 5% | 1,553 | $6,128 | 97% | $108,590 |
| 9 | Northeastern University Boston, MA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 5% | 1,497 | $30,915 | 90% | $101,903 |
| 10 | Brown University Providence, RI Private nonprofit · 4-year | 5% | 1,546 | $25,184 | 96% | $94,678 |
| 11 | University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia, PA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 5% | 1,553 | $28,699 | 97% | $124,586 |
| 12 | Dartmouth College Hanover, NH Private nonprofit · 4-year | 5% | 1,534 | $29,519 | 96% | $111,883 |
| 13 | Duke University Durham, NC Private nonprofit · 4-year | 6% | 1,548 | $29,612 | 96% | $115,722 |
| 14 | Vanderbilt University Nashville, TN Private nonprofit · 4-year | 6% | 1,549 | $15,846 | 93% | $101,204 |
| 15 | Johns Hopkins University Baltimore, MD Private nonprofit · 4-year | 6% | 1,553 | $18,809 | 94% | $117,419 |
| 16 | Colby College Waterville, ME Private nonprofit · 4-year | 7% | 1,501 | $17,180 | 89% | $77,429 |
| 17 | Pomona College Claremont, CA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 7% | 1,534 | $19,285 | 93% | $77,544 |
| 18 | Bowdoin College Brunswick, ME Private nonprofit · 4-year | 7% | 1,520 | $14,398 | 95% | $79,722 |
| 19 | Swarthmore College Swarthmore, PA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 7% | 1,534 | $23,149 | 93% | $65,618 |
| 20 | Northwestern University Evanston, IL Private nonprofit · 4-year | 8% | 1,533 | $29,167 | 96% | $109,275 |
| 21 | Rice University Houston, TX Private nonprofit · 4-year | 8% | 1,553 | $13,370 | 95% | $110,080 |
| 22 | Williams College Williamstown, MA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 8% | 1,533 | $17,716 | 95% | $80,487 |
| 23 | Cornell University Ithaca, NY Private nonprofit · 4-year | 9% | 1,535 | $28,690 | 95% | $113,372 |
| 24 | Barnard College New York, NY Private nonprofit · 4-year | 9% | 1,520 | $28,800 | 93% | $72,527 |
| 25 | University of California-Los Angeles Los Angeles, CA Public · 4-year · Hispanic-Serving | 9% | — | $12,548 | 93% | $77,677 |
| 26 | Amherst College Amherst, MA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 9% | 1,533 | $23,367 | 94% | $79,243 |
| 27 | New York University New York, NY Private nonprofit · 4-year | 9% | 1,520 | $37,050 | 88% | $89,427 |
| 28 | Claremont McKenna College Claremont, CA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 10% | 1,527 | $28,849 | 93% | $110,798 |
| 29 | University of Southern California Los Angeles, CA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 10% | 1,495 | $32,740 | 92% | $95,739 |
| 30 | Stanbridge University Irvine, CA For-profit · 4-year | 10% | — | $45,372 | 72% | $67,498 |
| 31 | Emory University Atlanta, GA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 11% | 1,520 | $22,585 | 91% | $90,139 |
| 32 | Middlebury College Middlebury, VT Private nonprofit · 4-year | 11% | 1,508 | $31,483 | 92% | $71,188 |
| 33 | University of California-Berkeley Berkeley, CA Public · 4-year | 11% | — | $13,481 | 93% | $96,018 |
| 34 | Boston University Boston, MA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 11% | 1,480 | $24,402 | 89% | $83,615 |
| 35 | University of Notre Dame Notre Dame, IN Private nonprofit · 4-year | 11% | 1,520 | $26,780 | 96% | $100,684 |
| 36 | Tufts University Medford, MA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 11% | 1,513 | $39,998 | 93% | $97,474 |
| 37 | Carnegie Mellon University Pittsburgh, PA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 12% | 1,546 | $31,944 | 93% | $132,971 |
| 38 | College of the Ozarks Point Lookout, MO Private nonprofit · 4-year | 12% | 1,118 | $6,100 | 62% | $44,258 |
| 39 | Washington University in St Louis St. Louis, MO Private nonprofit · 4-year | 12% | 1,530 | $21,786 | 94% | $95,899 |
| 40 | Haverford College Haverford, PA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 12% | 1,513 | $25,314 | 90% | $64,523 |
| 41 | Harvey Mudd College Claremont, CA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 13% | 1,545 | $35,924 | 93% | $137,100 |
| 42 | Georgetown University Washington, DC Private nonprofit · 4-year | 13% | 1,487 | $40,815 | 95% | $119,773 |
| 43 | Bates College Lewiston, ME Private nonprofit · 4-year | 13% | 1,468 | $29,351 | 90% | $70,028 |
| 44 | Davidson College Davidson, NC Private nonprofit · 4-year | 13% | 1,469 | $17,379 | 91% | $72,718 |
| 45 | Hamilton College Clinton, NY Private nonprofit · 4-year | 14% | 1,506 | $28,985 | 91% | $79,130 |
| 46 | Colgate University Hamilton, NY Private nonprofit · 4-year | 14% | 1,508 | $28,786 | 91% | $77,917 |
| 47 | Washington and Lee University Lexington, VA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 14% | 1,498 | $23,781 | 94% | $100,514 |
| 48 | Tulane University of Louisiana New Orleans, LA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 14% | 1,448 | $39,949 | 88% | $73,816 |
| 49 | Wellesley College Wellesley, MA Private nonprofit · 4-year | 14% | 1,520 | $25,496 | 91% | $72,449 |
| 50 | Georgia Institute of Technology-Main Campus Atlanta, GA Public · 4-year | 14% | 1,480 | $12,116 | 93% | $119,180 |
States with schools on this list
Browse every college in these states.