Acceptance Rate Calculator

There are many facets of life where you need to be accepted into, you can not simply join. One of the most popular being colleges. Calculate the acceptance rate of anything with this tool.

Required Information

Acceptance Rate:

What it is

What is Acceptance Rate?

Create Date: October 2, 2024

Last Modified Date: January 22, 2025

Acceptance rate is the percent of people that were accepted or approved out of the total number of people who applied. It is most commonly used to outline how much demand there is to join certain colleges and also outline how stringent they are on accepting people.

How to Calculate Acceptance Rate

Acceptance rate is a fairly simple thing to calculate. The only variables that you need to have the values of are: total accepted and total submissions. Then you can plug them into this formula:

An image showing the formula for calculating acceptance rate.

In this formula, AR stands for acceptance rate, and the rest is easy to follow and spelled out for ease of use.

Understanding Your Results

When you are using the acceptance rate calculator, there is only a single result. That is a percentage which represents the amount of people accepted out of the total applicants, according to the values you entered. If you are using this tool to evaluate a college, a lower acceptance rate typically signifies a school that is more desirable and elite, making it harder to get into. Whatever you are using this tool for, a good or bad acceptance rate is dependent on industry/field standards, as there is no universally good number.

How to Use the Acceptance Rate Calculator

To use our acceptance rate calculator, you just have to follow these easy steps:

  1. Enter the total number of applicants.

  2. Enter the total number of accepted applicants from that batch.

  3. Hit calculate and get the acceptance rate in under a second!

Calculation Example

You are evaluating colleges and trying to find out the best fit for you. You see a school you like but want to make sure it isn't nearly impossible to get into, so you decide to calculate the acceptance rate. The total number of applicants last semester was 24,750, and only 10,960 got accepted. You can enter this information into the formula or plug these values into the calculator. After hitting the calculate button, you find the acceptance rate to be 44.28%!

The History of Acceptance Rates

Acceptance rates go back to the 19th century and likely originated with colleges and universities, where we commonly still see and track acceptance rates today. Attendance rates were believed to be rather low as it was a step in setting its attendees apart from the rest of the population. However, as education became more accessible, acceptance rates would begin to creep up a little while some of the more prestigious destinations maintained a lower rate of acceptance.

Later in the 19th century, acceptance rates and values began to play a larger role in society. Specifically, hiring teams for companies began to look at acceptance rates and would adjust their hiring process if they deem their current system is too rigorous. The financial system as well saw acceptance rates become important.

With the way that technology has evolved the world and how it works, acceptance rates have become a thing in many different facets of life and society. There are dozens that can be pointed out. In general, it is safe to assume that this metric that has been tracked for over 100 years is here to stay due to its impact and widespread acceptance today.

Acceptance Rate - Frequently Asked Questions

A school with a 20% acceptance rate is generally considered to be on the more competitive side of schools.

A 5% acceptance rate means only 5% of all applicants get accepted. If there were 100 applicants, this would mean only 5 people got accepted.

If you just want to get accepted, a 100% acceptance rate is perfect for you! But if you are judging an institution on its acceptance rate, one with 100% is likely not a high-caliber institution.

According to College Advisor, Harvard and Caltech each are the most difficult to get into as they have a 3% acceptance rate.

There are times where acceptance rate can be zero. Let's say there is a school that is at maximum capacity, they may begin to deny everyone to avoid overloading the school, making the acceptance rate zero. If acceptance rate is ever zero, it will likely only be for a very short period of time, it is not something that can go on for long.

Page Glossary

Understanding acceptance rate can be difficult if some of the terms and keywords used are not ones you understand. Here we shed some more light on some of these terms.


Term Definition
Acceptance rate This is the percent of all people that apply to be a part of something that get accepted. This will almost always be a percentage, not another type of number or value.
Applicant An applicant is someone who applies to be a part of something, gain admission to somewhere, or another similar function.

Interesting Facts About Acceptance Rate

There are many interesting things that can be shared about acceptance rates. Here are some of our favorites.

Harvard is one of the most prestigious colleges in the world but there is one university with a more strict acceptance rate than them, IITs in India.

On ride-share apps like Uber and DoorDash, drivers are evaluated in part by their acceptance rate, or the rate at which they accept rides or delivery requests.

According to sources, only about 65% of all apps submitted to the Apple App Store are approved and allowed to go live, leaving about 35% to fail and be rejected.

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