collageGet more information regarding Harvard Restrictive Early Action, harvard restrictive early action acceptance rate, harvard restrictive early action deadline, harvard restrictive early action decision date, harvard application, harvard requirements for international students & Harvard early decision.
The numbers are in. Harvard has admitted approximately 5.2% of applicants for the class of 2021. This number is not much different from last year, nor from the most selective universities in the US. Yet when we look at the students who applied early action compared to those who applied in the regular decision round, the numbers tell a different story. On every level, Harvard is still one of the most difficult universities to get into. However, understanding how many students are admitted in early action and how they prepare can provide insight into your own student’s future. Are you in the process of applying for college or starting your college preparation? Vitae.me (get it here for iOS or Android), the only app you’ll need to help you keep track of your application to-dos and tasks, is here to help (whether you are applying to Harvard or any other US-based university).
Harvard early decision
Take the next step in your academic journey.
We seek promising students who will contribute to the Harvard community during their college years, and to society throughout their lives.
While academic accomplishment is important, the Admissions Committee considers many other factors—strong personal qualities, special talents or excellences of all kinds, perspectives formed by unusual personal circumstances, and the ability to take advantage of available resources and opportunities.
What is “early action?”
Harvard College’s Early Action option means two major things:
- You will submit your application two months before regular decision applicants. The early action deadline is November 1, and applicants usually hear about an admissions decision in mid- to late December, even before the regular decision deadline on January 1.
- You may not apply early action (or anything similar) to any other schools. This ban includes all schools public, private, and outside the US. If an early action applicant is accepted to Harvard, they may still apply to and consider other schools under regular decision deadlines only. They may even accept another school’s offer over Harvard. This is common to all schools that offer early action admission programs. However, they may not apply early action or early decision to any other schools.
Harvard’s early action option is not a binding contract. Early decision, on the other hand, is binding, but Harvard does not offer early decision as an option. We will go over the differences between early action and early decision in an upcoming post
First-Year Application Requirements
All first-year applicants—both international and U.S. candidates—must complete the Common Application or the Coalition Application along with the required supplements. You will need to submit:
- Common Application or Coalition Application
- Harvard College Questions for the Common Application or Coalition Application Harvard supplement
- $75 fee (or request a fee waiver)
- SAT or ACT (with or without writing)* optional for 2021-2022 applicants
- Optional: AP or other examination results
- School Report (which includes a counselor letter) and high school transcript
- Teacher Report (2)
- Midyear School Report (after your first semester grades)
- Final School Report (for admitted students only)
Application Timeline
You may apply to Harvard under either our Restrictive Early Action or our Regular Decision program, both of which allow you to compare admission and financial aid offers from other institutions and to wait until May 1 to make a final college choice.
- Restrictive Early Action candidates apply by November 1 and receive notification by mid-December.
- Regular Decision candidates apply by January 1 and receive notification by the end of March.
First-year Timeline Questions
- View detailed application timelineSpring (prior to the year you apply)
Begin taking the following tests:- Required: SAT or ACT (with or without writing)Fall (of the year you apply)
As early in the fall as possible, please submit:
- Your application to Harvard, via the Common Application or the Coalition Application. This is needed to open your admissions file, track your documents, and set up an interview.
- The $75 application fee or a fee waiver request.You may send the application supplements at a later date.October 31
Restrictive Early Action applicants: If you are submitting test scores, we request that you submit them by the end of October. However, you are still eligible to apply using the November series as they should reach us in time for consideration.Early November
Restrictive Early Action applicants: Last acceptable testing date. If you are applying Regular Decision, we recommend that you submit standardized test scores from the November series or earlier.November 1
Restrictive Early Action applicants: Deadline for all application materials. Early Action applicants are also permitted to apply at the same time to any public college/university or to foreign universities but are restricted from applying to other private universities’ Early Action programs.Also submit your financial aid application so that if you are admitted, we will be able to send you financial aid information in mid-December when decisions are released.Mid-December
Restrictive Early Action applicants: Decisions released.
Last acceptable SAT testing date for Regular Decision consideration.January 1
Final deadline for all Regular Decision application materials. You must send all application materials by this deadline for Regular Decision consideration.February 1
Notify the Admissions Office if you have not received your application confirmation email.Submit your financial aid application (if you have not already done so), so that if you are admitted, we will be able to send you financial aid information in late March when decisions are released.Mid-February
Last ACT testing date for Regular Decision consideration.
Submit your Midyear School Report forms with your most recent grades.End of March
First-year admission decisions released. May 3
Reply deadline for admitted students. No deposit required.
- Required: SAT or ACT (with or without writing)Fall (of the year you apply)
Harvard Restrictive Early Action Acceptance Rate
Ivy League acceptance rates: Class of 2025
(Note: This table will be updated as new data are released. Princeton canceled early action for the Class of 2025.)
| Overall Acceptance Rates | Early Action/Early Decision Acceptance Rates | Regular Decision Acceptance Rates | |||||||
| Accepted | Applied | Acceptance Rate | Accepted | Applied | Acceptance Rate | Accepted | Applied | Acceptance Rate | |
| Brown* | 2,569 | 46,568 | 5.5% | 885 | 5,540 | 16.0% | 1,684 | 41,028 | 4.1% |
| Columbia* | 2,358 | 60,551 | 3.9% | – | 6,435 | – | – | 54,116 | – |
| Cornell* | 5,836 | 67,380 | 8.7% | – | – | – | – | – | – |
| Dartmouth* | 1,749 | 28,357 | 6.2% | 591 | 2,664 | 22.2% | 1,158 | 25,693 | 4.5% |
| Harvard^ | 2,320 | 57,786 | 4.0% | 747 | 10,086 | 7.4% | 1,573 | 47,700 | 3.3% |
| Penn* | 3,304 | 56,332 | 5.9% | 1,183 | 7,961 | 14.9% | 2,121 | 48,371 | 4.4% |
| Princeton^ | 1,498 | 37,601 | 4.0% | – | – | – | 1,498 | 37,601 | 4.0% |
| Yale^ | 2,169 | 46,905 | 4.6% | 837 | 7,939 | 10.5% | 1,332 | 38,966 | 3.4% |
| Total | 21,803 | 401,480 | 5.4% | – | – | – | – | – | – |
*Early decision schools | ^Single-choice early action schools
2021 Ivy League acceptance rates takeaways
The “Big Three” Ivy League schools, plus Columbia, continue to be the most selective
Harvard, Princeton, and Yale—known as the “Big Three”—are historically the three toughest Ivy League schools to get into. In recent years, they have been joined by Columbia in the top half of the most selective Ivy League schools. In 2021, Columbia edged past Princeton and Harvard to become the most competitive Ivy. While all four schools reported overall acceptance rates below 5%, with a 3.9% acceptance rate, Columbia is now the hardest Ivy League school to get into.
The remaining schools had overall acceptance rates ranging between 5.5% (Brown) and 8.7% (Cornell), meaning that, for the first time, acceptance rates for all Ivy League schools were in the single digits. The average acceptance rate across all eight schools was 5.4%.
Here is a list of the Ivy League schools in ascending order of overall selectivity:
1. Columbia (3.9%)
2. Harvard (4.0%)
2. Princeton (4.0%)
4. Yale (4.6%)
5. Brown (5.5%)
6. Penn (5.9%)
7. Dartmouth (6.2%)
8. Cornell (8.7%)
Selectivity is highly associated with Ivy League rankings; that is, the highest-ranked schools tend to have the lowest acceptance rates.
Early action and early decision applicants enjoy higher acceptance rates
It’s widely known that students who apply early action or early decision typically get accepted to Ivy League schools (and others, like Stanford and MIT) at significantly higher rates than regular decision applicants.
For instance, whereas 22.2% of early decision applicants got into Dartmouth in 2021, only 4.5% of regular decision applicants were accepted. These statistics tell a very different story from Dartmouth’s 6.2% overall acceptance rate.
However, the difference between the two types of acceptance rates fell at Harvard, where only 7.4% of early action applicants received an offer of admission. While that number is more encouraging than the mere 3.3% of regular decision applicants who got in, the difference is far less pronounced than in previous years (in 2020, Harvard’s early action and regular decision rates were 13.9% and 3.3%, respectively).
(Note: Princeton canceled early action for the Class of 2025, and Columbia and Cornell haven’t reported early-decision-specific statistics.)
Nevertheless, if your child knows that one of the Ivy League schools is their top choice, they should strongly consider applying early action or early decision to maximize their odds of getting in. Applying early demonstrates strong interest and is attractive to schools who want to protect their yield rate.
At the same time, it’s important to remember the following confounding variable: the early action and early decision applicant pool tends to be stronger than the regular decision pool. Therefore, it’s difficult to quantify the impact of applying early vs. the impact of a higher-achieving group of early applicants.
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