by our College Data Analytics Team
College Factual recognizes the best colleges and universities in its annual rankings. These rankings include categories for best overall colleges, best colleges for each major, best value schools, and much more.
George Washington University was awarded 103 badges in the 2025 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is criminal justice studies.
Explore the best ranked schools for the programs you are most interested in.
According to College Factual's 2025 analysis, GWU is ranked #25 out of 2,152 schools in the nation that were analyzed for overall quality. This lands it a coveted spot in the top 5% of all colleges and universities in the country. This is an improvement over the previous year, when GWU held the #49 spot on the Best Overall Colleges list.
GWU also holds the #2 spot on the Best Colleges in District of Columbia ranking.
If you're applying to George Washington University you'll face some tough competition, since the school's acceptance rate is only 49%. Definitely don't wait until the last minute to submit your application, since applying early may be in your favor.
About 31% of students accepted to GWU submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 670 and 740. Math scores were between 660 and 750.
The student to faculty ratio is often used to measure the number of teaching resources that a college or university offers its students. The national average for this metric is 15 to 1, but at GWU it is much better at 12 to 1. That's good news for students who want to interact more on a personal level with their teachers.
In addition to the student to faculty ratio, some people look at what percentage of faculty members are full-time as a sign of how much time professors will be able to spend with their students. This is because part-time teachers may not be be on campus as much as their full-time counterparts.
The full-time faculty percentage at George Washington University is 52%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.
George Washington University has a freshmen retention rate of 90%. That's a good sign that full-time students like the school and their professors enough to want to stick around for another year. It's also a sign that the admissions team did a good job in choosing applicants who were a good fit for the school.
Students are considered to have graduated on time if they finish their studies within four years. At GWU the on-time graduation rate of first-time, full-time students is 79%. That is great when compared to the national average of 33.3%
Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at George Washington University.
During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 11,763 undergraduates at GWU with 10,141 being full-time and 1,622 being part-time.
| $0-30 K | $30K-48K | $48-75 | $75-110K | $110K + |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $18,368 | $14,458 | $19,941 | $28,823 | $50,187 |
The net price is calculated by adding tuition, room, board and other costs and subtracting financial aid.Note that the net price is typically less than the published for a school. For more information on the sticker price of GWU, see our tuition and fees and room and board pages.
Almost 66% of college students who graduated with the class of 2018 took out student loans, but that percentage varies from school to school. At GWU, approximately 38% of students took out student loans averaging $10,893 a year. That adds up to $43,572 over four years for those students.
Get more details about paying for George Washington University.
See which majors at George Washington University make the most money.
Get more details about the location of George Washington University.
Contact details for GWU are given below.
| Contact Details | |
|---|---|
| Address: | 1918 F Street, Nw, Washington, DC 20052 |
| Phone: | 202-994-1000 |
| Website: | https://www.gwu.edu/ |
| Most Popular Majors | Bachelor’s Degrees | Average Salary of Graduates |
|---|---|---|
| Public Policy | 1,276 | NA |
| International Relations & National Security | 852 | $52,933 |
| Public Health | 573 | $44,809 |
| Law | 571 | NA |
| Nursing | 556 | $79,221 |
| Political Science & Government | 469 | $51,537 |
| Business Administration & Management | 365 | NA |
| Health & Medical Administrative Services | 288 | NA |
| Human Resource Management | 206 | $57,219 |
| Economics | 200 | $67,684 |
Online learning options are becoming more and more popular at American colleges and universities. Online classes are great for students who have busy schedules or for those who just want to study on their own time.
In 2022-2023, 6,549 students took at least one online class at George Washington University. This is a decrease from the 6,901 students who took online classes the previous year.
| Year | Took at Least One Online Class | Took All Classes Online |
|---|---|---|
| 2022-2023 | 6,549 | 4,979 |
| 2021-2022 | 6,901 | 5,340 |
| 2020-2021 | 6,868 | 5,311 |
| 2018-2019 | 6,791 | 5,374 |
Learn more about online learning at George Washington University.
If you’re considering George Washington University, here are some more schools you may be interested in knowing more about.
Curious on how these schools stack up against GWU? Pit them head to head with College Combat, our free interactive tool that lets you compare college on the features that matter most to you!
Footnotes
*The racial-ethnic minorities count is calculated by taking the total number of students and subtracting white students, international students, and students whose race/ethnicity was unknown. This number is then divided by the total number of students at the school to obtain the racial-ethnic minorities percentage.
References
More about our data sources and methodologies.