What is the Northwestern acceptance rate?

Northwestern's Common Data Set for 2025-26 reports 52,676 first-year applicants and 3,933 admitted, an acceptance rate of 7.5%. It was 7.7% in 2024-25 and 7.2% in 2023-24.

What is the Northwestern early decision acceptance rate?

In 2025-26, 1,212 of 5,939 early decision applicants were admitted (20.4%), against 7.5% of all applicants. Early decision applicants are a different pool who commit to enroll, so the two rates are not a like-for-like comparison.

What SAT scores do Northwestern students have?

In 2025-26, the middle half of enrolled first-year students who submitted the SAT scored 1520 to 1560, and ACT submitters scored 34 to 35. 48.0% of enrolled students submitted an SAT score.

How many students get off the Northwestern waitlist?

In 2025-26, Northwestern offered an unpublished number of applicants a place on the waitlist; the number who accepted is not published, and 167 were admitted from it.

Official acceptance rates

Northwestern acceptance rate and admissions statistics

Northwestern admitted 3,933 of 52,676 first-year applicants in its 2025-26 Common Data Set, an official acceptance rate of 7.5%. Every number below comes from the college’s own Common Data Set, each year linked to its document; a figure the college leaves blank says “Not published”, and the notes at the foot of the page say where a total is the sum of rows the college printed.

What did admitted applicants have? How to get into Northwestern counts the grades, scores and activities they posted.

Northwestern acceptance rate by year

Common Data Set section C1, first-year applicants
CDS year	Applied	Admitted	Acceptance rate	Enrolled	Yield
2025-26	52,676	3,933	7.5%	2,139	54.4%
2024-25	49,474	3,806	7.7%	2,105	55.3%
2023-24	51,769	3,739	7.2%	2,111	56.5%

Acceptance rate is admitted divided by applied; yield is enrolled divided by admitted. Both are computed by Aristo Scholars from the two counts printed beside them.

Early decision at Northwestern

Common Data Set section C21
CDS year	ED applicants	ED admitted	ED admit rate	Overall rate
2025-26	5,939	1,212	20.4%	7.5%
2024-25	5,154	1,186	23.0%	7.7%
2023-24	5,207	1,174	22.5%	7.2%

Northwestern waitlist

Common Data Set section C2
CDS year	Offered a place	Accepted a place	Admitted from it	Admitted, of those who accepted
2025-26	Not published	Not published	167	Not published
2024-25	Not published	Not published	59	Not published
2023-24	Not published	Not published	55	Not published

Northwestern SAT and ACT scores

Common Data Set section C9, enrolled first-year students who submitted scores
CDS year	SAT 25th to 75th	ACT 25th to 75th	Submitted an SAT
2025-26	1520 to 1560	34 to 35	48.0%
2024-25	1510 to 1560	34 to 35	46.0%
2023-24	1500 to 1560	33 to 35	50.0%

What Northwestern says matters in admission

In section C7 each college rates its own admission factors as Very Important, Important, Considered or Not Considered. These are the factors Northwestern rated in the top two tiers.

2025-26: Very important: Rigor of secondary school record, Class rank, Academic GPA, Application essay, Recommendations, Extracurricular activities, Talent/ability, Character/personal qualities; Important: None recorded
2024-25: Very important: Rigor of secondary school record, Class rank, Academic GPA, Application essay, Recommendations, Extracurricular activities, Talent/ability, Character/personal qualities; Important: None recorded
2023-24: Very important: Rigor of secondary school record, Class rank, Academic GPA, Application essay, Recommendations, Extracurricular activities, Talent/ability, Character/personal qualities; Important: None recorded

Northwestern testing policy for students applying in 2026-27

Test-optional: 'Northwestern is test-optional and does not require ACT or SAT scores.' The page gives cycle dates of a Nov 1, 2026 ED deadline and a Jan 4, 2027 RD deadline, i.e. fall 2027 entry.

From Northwestern’s admissions site, read 2026-11-05. Policies change; the college’s page is the authority.

How these numbers were read

C1 prints no total row, so applied, admitted and enrolled are the sums of the printed sex and gender rows. C2 prints only the number admitted from the waitlist.

Northwestern acceptance rate questions

What is the Northwestern acceptance rate?: Northwestern's Common Data Set for 2025-26 reports 52,676 first-year applicants and 3,933 admitted, an acceptance rate of 7.5%. It was 7.7% in 2024-25 and 7.2% in 2023-24.
What is the Northwestern early decision acceptance rate?: In 2025-26, 1,212 of 5,939 early decision applicants were admitted (20.4%), against 7.5% of all applicants. Early decision applicants are a different pool who commit to enroll, so the two rates are not a like-for-like comparison.
What SAT scores do Northwestern students have?: In 2025-26, the middle half of enrolled first-year students who submitted the SAT scored 1520 to 1560, and ACT submitters scored 34 to 35. 48.0% of enrolled students submitted an SAT score.
How many students get off the Northwestern waitlist?: In 2025-26, Northwestern offered an unpublished number of applicants a place on the waitlist; the number who accepted is not published, and 167 were admitted from it.
Does Northwestern require the SAT or ACT for students applying in 2026-27?: Test-optional: 'Northwestern is test-optional and does not require ACT or SAT scores.' The page gives cycle dates of a Nov 1, 2026 ED deadline and a Jan 4, 2027 RD deadline, i.e. fall 2027 entry.

Applying to Northwestern?

An acceptance rate describes the whole pool, not one student. A Specialist can read your student’s file against what Northwestern says it weighs.

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Source: Northwestern Common Data Set, sections C1, C2, C7, C9 and C21, each year linked above, read 2026-11-05. Aristo Scholars is not affiliated with Northwestern. All official acceptance rates