Class of 2029 Acceptance Rates & Admissions Data

May 28, 2025

The high school Class of 2025 (college Class of 2029) has faced some huge challenges, including attending school through the COVID-19 pandemic and applying to college in an incredibly competitive era. However, these hardworking students have left nothing on the table. Want to find out how they fared? We’ve compiled the overall Class of 2029 acceptance rates below for many schools that have released the data.

What trends can be observed from the Class of 2029 acceptance rates?

There are some remarkable differences in the acceptance rates and trends of the schools that have released data. For starters, many schools have seen an uptick in applications in the last few years, but have also aimed to keep their incoming class sizes roughly the same. Tightening admissions rates have become very common. That also means that the admissions process is getting more competitive.

Many schools are also maintaining a test-optional admissions process, preferring a holistic accounting of a student’s performance and potential over their SAT or ACT scores. However, with competition rising, many students are opting into the SAT and ACT again—and some colleges and universities are returning to the metric as a way to guide admissions.

Finally, some schools have actually seen a drop in applications. While budget cuts and the uncertainty about an “enrollment cliff” might have some administrators concerned for the future of higher education, dropping applicant numbers may see some colleges and universities doing even more to vie for prospective students in the coming years.

Overall Class of 2029 Acceptance Rates — By School

Amherst College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 7.43%
Record-high 15,818 applications
1,175 admitted
Fast fact: 25% of admitted students identify as the first in their family to attend a four-year college.

Boston College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 12.6%
39,681 applications
5,000 admitted
Fast fact: 95% of admitted students rank within the top 10% of their graduating classes.

Bowdoin College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 6.78%
14,045 applications
952 admitted
Fast fact: This is a slight decrease from Bowdoin’s class of 2028 acceptance rate and the lowest in its history.

Brown University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 5.65%
42,765 applications
2,418 admitted
Fast fact: This is the smallest pool of applicants since the class of 2024; typically applicant numbers hover around 50,000.

Colby College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 7%
Record-high 20,144 applicants
1,410 admitted
Fast fact: The Class of 2029 will be the first to benefit from Colby’s expanded Fair Shot Fun, a program of financial aid benchmarks designed for families based on their total income.

College of the Holy Cross

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 17%
More than 10,000 applicants
Approximately 1,700 admitted
Fast fact: This is a record-breaking number of applications for Holy Cross: 6% higher than 2024 and 17% higher than 2023.

Columbia University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 4.29%
59,616 applications
2,557 admitted
Fast fact: Beyond admitting students from all 50 states, as well as American Samoa, the District of Columbia, Guam, the Mariana Islands, and Puerto Rico, Columbia has also accepted students from 115 foreign countries.

Cornell University

Number of Accepted Students: 5,824
13.3% increase in accepted students from 5,139 in 2024
Fast fact: Beyond admitting students from all 50 states, Cornell has also admitted students from 115 foreign countries. That’s twice as many countries as are represented in the Class of 2028.
Note: Cornell has not released data on the number of applicants. The overall acceptance rate is therefore also not available.

Dartmouth College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 6.03%
28,230 applications
1,702 admitted
Fast fact: This year signaled an 11% drop in total applications to Dartmouth College.

Denison University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 19–20%
12,000 applications
Approximately 2,340 admitted
Fast fact: While this is Denision’s fourth-highest number of applicants, it is down from 15,000 last year.

Duke University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 4.8%
58,698 applications
1,953 admitted
Fast fact: The Duke Chronicle reports that the university’s highly selective 4.8% acceptance rate is a record low.

Emory University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 14.95%
37,855 applications
4,327 admitted regular decision; 995 admitted Early Decision I; 336 admitted Early Decision II
5,658 total admitted
Fast fact: Despite some schools leaving the policy behind, Emory has decided to continue with its test-optional policy.

Fairfield University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 25%
21,290 applications
1,450 admitted
Fast fact: Fairfield has a commitment to maintaining an incoming first-year class size of 1,450 students. This means that, while its total number of applications has increased by 38% since 2023, its acceptance rate has had to drop.

Florida State University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 33%
In-state: 41%
Out-of-state and international: 21%
Approximately 82,000 applications
Approximately 19,700 admitted
Fast fact: FSU’s top areas of study for the Class of 2029 are business, engineering, biology, exploratory majors, and psychology.

Georgetown University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 12%
Approximately 26,800 applications
Approximately 3,200 admitted
Fast fact: Georgetown will begin accepting the Common Application from aspiring students during the Fall 2026 application cycle.

Georgia Tech

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 12.74%
In-state: 29.3%
Out-of-state and international: 8.93%
Nearly 67,000 applications
More than 8,500 admitted
Fast fact: Obviously, not every admitted student will accept. Georgia Tech aims to enroll 4,000 students in the Class of 2029, a 3% uptick from last year.

Lafayette College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 29.48%
10,547 applications
3,108 admitted
Fast fact: The Lafayette admissions team expects fewer than one-third of those admitted to accept. They expect 735 students to enroll.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 4.52%
29,282 applications
1,324 admitted
Fast fact: MIT’s new financial aid policy permits undergraduate students whose families have incomes of fewer than $200,000 to attend MIT tuition-free.

Middlebury College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 13.9%
11,831 applications
1,136 admitted
Fast fact: Middlebury’s applications have reached a five-year low while the acceptance rate continues to rise, according to The Middlebury Campus.

New York University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 7.7%
More than 120,000 applications
Approximately 9,240 admitted
Fast fact: The College of Arts and Science, the Leonard N. Stern School of Business, and the Rory Meyers College of Nursing are more selective than the university as a whole. Those schools offered admission to just 5% of applicants.

Northwestern University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 7%
More than 53,000 applications
Approximately 3,170 admitted
Fast fact: The Class of 2029 will be about 2,100 students, meaning Northwestern expects that about 1,000 of those admitted will go elsewhere.

Oberlin College

College of Arts and Sciences rate: 34%
College of Arts and Sciences applications: 10,427
College of Arts and Sciences admitted: 3,545
Conservatory of Music rate: 25%
Conservator of Music applications: 7,400
Conservatory of Music admitted: 1,850
Fast fact: 2029 is the first year that Oberlin has admitted students from the Houston chapter of the Posse Foundation, which helps diverse students become future leaders.

Rice University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 7.8%
36,777 applications
2.852 accepted
Fast fact: This year’s admission cycle signals the end of a five-year plan to expand the student body by 20%.

Swarthmore College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 7.43%
12,995 applications
965 admitted
Fast fact: Out of 965 students admitted, 27% are the first in their family to attend college.

Tufts University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 10.5%
33,400 applications
3,507 admitted
Fast fact: This is the second-largest share of Boston Public school students in recent history to be admitted to Tufts.

University of Florida

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 19.77%
91,896 applications
18,169 admitted
Fast fact: UF saw an increase of 22.8% in total applications between 2024 and 2025.

UGA (University of Georgia)

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 33%
Nearly 48,000 applications
More than 15,800 admitted
Fast fact: Admitted students come from 154 of Georgia’s 159 counties, which is six more counties than last year. UGA has recently increased its in-state recruiting.

University of Notre Dame

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 9%
Record-high 35,401 applications
3,186 admitted
Fast fact: The Class of 2029 is the first to benefit from Pathways to Notre Dame, an initiative to increase affordability and access by ensuring that financial circumstances don’t prevent talented students from attending.

USC (University of Southern California)

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 10.4%
83,500 applications
8,700 admitted
Fast fact: Despite a hiring freeze and major budget cuts, USC has increased its acceptance rate this year in order to meet higher enrollment goals.

University of Tennessee – Knoxville

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 38.32%
In-state rate: 62.76%
Out-of-state and international rate: 31.17%
Overall admitted: 23,187
In-state admitted: 8,595
Out-of-state and international admitted: 14,592
Fast fact: There were 6,313 Tennessee students who met the school’s Guaranteed Admission criteria.

University of Virginia

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 23%
Out-of-state and international rate: 12.5%
More than 64,000 applications
Target class size: 3,970
Fast fact: In its regular decision admissions phase, 3,519 applications came from Virginians and 14,000 came from students outside of the state.

Vanderbilt University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 4.7%
48,681 regular decision applications
1,411 admitted regular decision
2,302 admitted overall
Fast fact: The target number of enrollees for the incoming class has remained constant—around 1,620—in recent years. The number of applications, however, has increased, decreasing the acceptance rate.

Villanova University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 27.4%
26,306 applications
7,207 admitted
Fast fact: Villanova’s target class size is 1,770, a substantial decrease from the number of admitted students.

Wellesley College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 13.7%
8,700 applications
1,191 admitted
Fast fact: Among those admitted, 51% speak a language other than English in their homes.

Wesleyan University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 16.11%
Record-high 14,970 applicants
2,411 admitted
Fast fact: Wesleyan, a liberal arts school, maintains small incoming classes, and plans to enroll around 810 students into the Class of 2029.

William & Mary

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 36.33%
16,890 applications
6,136 admitted
Fast fact: William & Mary has been slowly increasing its number of Pell Grant recipients, with the goal of having 20% of the in-state students being Pell recipients. For the Class of 2028, William & Mary met that goal, and while the numbers have yet to be calculated for 2029, the school is hopeful.

Williams College

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 8.5%
14,261 applications
1,313 admitted
Fast fact: Williams College received 161 more applications this year than last and increased its target class size from 550 to 560 students.

Yale University

Class of 2029 acceptance rate: 4.59%
50,227 applications
2,308 admitted
Fast fact: In 2025, Yale announced that it would increase its undergraduate class size by 100 students. The change will bring class sizes to 1,650 each.

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Brittany Borghi

After earning a BA in Journalism and an MFA in Nonfiction Writing from the University of Iowa, Brittany spent five years as a full-time lecturer in the Rhetoric Department at the University of Iowa. Additionally, she’s held previous roles as a researcher, full-time daily journalist, and book editor. Brittany’s work has been featured in The Iowa Review, The Hopkins Review, and the Pittsburgh City Paper, among others, and she was also a 2021 Pushcart Prize nominee.