News

MIT admits 7.4 percent of EA applicants

MIT offered 707 students early admission to the Class of 2023 on Dec. 15, according to data released on the admissions website.

There were 9,600 students who applied. 6,812 students (71.0 percent) were deferred and will be considered again “without prejudice” as part of the regular action process. An additional 2,483 students (25.9 percent) were rejected. The remaining students withdrew or failed to sufficiently complete their application.

This year’s acceptance rate of 7.4 percent is slightly up from last year’s record low 6.9 percent, the first such increase since 2014.

The applicant pool was also larger than last year’s 9,557 students, setting a record high for at least the fourth year in a row. But, the increase is far more modest than in previous recent years, which saw hundreds more applicants with each cycle.

MIT’s early admissions rate tends to be much lower than that of peer institutions, who mostly use restricted early action (students can only apply to one private institution) or early decision (students are bound to attend if admitted) instead of MIT’s more flexible early action policy.

Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, for example, all had similar acceptance rates of 13.4, 13.2 and 13.9 percent this year, respectively.