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Stanford University Data & Information Overview

3,153 awards Ranking Badges
Great Price Value for Your Money
5% Acceptance Rate
Find out more about how Stanford University ranks, how diverse it is, what majors it offers, and other essential facts below. All you need to do to learn more about a stat is click on its tile, and you’ll be taken to another page that analyzes that data more closely. Also, you can use the links below to scroll to any section of this page.

How Well Is Stanford University Ranked?

#2 Best Colleges in Nation
#1 Best Colleges in CA
Sociology Highest Ranked Major
Quality Badge

2023 Rankings

In its yearly rankings, College Factual analyzes over 2,000 colleges and universities to determine which ones are the best in a variety of categories, such as overall value, quality, diversity, which schools are the best for each major, and much more.

Stanford University was awarded 3,153 badges in the 2023 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is sociology.

Overall Quality

Stanford is ranked #2 out of 2,241 schools in the nation for overall quality on College Factual's 2023 Best Colleges list. This puts it in the top 1% of all schools in the nation! This is an improvement over the previous year, when Stanford held the #3 spot on the Best Overall Colleges list.

Stanford also holds the #1 spot on the Best Colleges in California ranking.

See all of the rankings for Stanford University.

Is It Hard to Get Into Stanford?

5% Acceptance Rate
52% Of Accepted Are Women
72% Submit SAT Scores

Acceptance Rate

Even if you have the best grades and high test scores, that may not be enough to get into Stanford since the school has one of the most selective in the country. Its acceptance rate is a mere 5%, so there's no shame if you don't get in. Be sure to apply to other schools just in case.

Average Test Scores

About 72% of students accepted to Stanford submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 700 and 770. Math scores were between 720 and 800.

SAT Reading and Writing Scores for Stanford University  ( 700 to 770 )
200
800

SAT Math Scores for Stanford University  ( 720 to 800 )
200
800
Stanford received ACT scores from 45% of accepted students. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, ACT Composite scores ranged between 31 and 35.

ACT Composite Scores for Stanford University  ( 31 to 35 )
1
36

Learn more about Stanford University admissions.

Stanford University Faculty

4 to 1 Student to Faculty
99% Full Time Teachers

Student to Faculty Ratio

The student to faculty ratio at Stanford is an impressive 4 to 1. That's quite good when you compare it to the national average of 15 to 1. This is a good sign that students at the school will have more opportunities for one-on-one interactions with their professors.

Percent of Full-Time Faculty

When estimating how much access students will have to their teachers, some people like to look at what percentage of faculty members are full time. This is because part-time teachers may not have as much time to spend on campus as their full-time counterparts.

The full-time faculty percentage at Stanford University is 99%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.

Full-Time Faculty Percent  99 out of 100
0
100

Retention and Graduation Rates at Stanford University

86% Freshmen Retention
75% On-Time Graduation Rate

Freshmen Retention Rate

The freshmen retention rate of 86% tells us that most first-year, full-time students like Stanford University enough to come back for another year. This is a fair bit higher than the national average of 68%. That's certainly something to check off in the good column about the school.

Freshmen Retention Rate  86 out of 100
0
100

Graduation Rate

The on-time graduation rate for someone pursuing a bachelor's degree is typically four years. This rate at Stanford for first-time, full-time students is 75%, which is better than the national average of 33.3%.

On-Time Graduation Rate  75 out of 100
0
100

Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at Stanford University.

Stanford University Undergraduate Student Diversity

5,752 Full-Time Undergraduates
60.4% Racial-Ethnic Minorities*
51.0% Percent Women

During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 6,366 undergraduates at Stanford with 5,752 being full-time and 614 being part-time.

How Much Does Stanford University Cost?

$12,894 Net Price
7% Take Out Loans
$47,060 Total Student Loans
The overall average net price of Stanford is $12,894. The affordability of the school largely depends on your financial need since net price varies by income group. See the table below for the net price for different income groups.

Net Price by Income Group for Stanford

$0-30 K $30K-48K $48-75 $75-110K $110K +
$1,233 $1,581 $7,081 $13,623 $46,746

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 Stanford, see our tuition and fees and room and board pages.

Student Loan Debt

While almost two-thirds of students nationwide take out loans to pay for college, the percentage may be quite different for the school you plan on attending. At Stanford, approximately 7% of students took out student loans averaging $11,765 a year. That adds up to $47,060 over four years for those students.

The student loan default rate at Stanford is 0.5%. This is significantly lower than the national default rate of 10.1%, which is a good sign that you'll be able to pay back your student loans.

Get more details about paying for Stanford University.

How Much Money Do Stanford Graduates Make?

$97,798 Avg Salary of Grads
High Earnings Boost
Yearly salaries vary depending on what you major in, but on average, bachelor's degree recipients from Stanford make around $97,798 per year during the early years of their employment. This is good news for future Stanford graduates since it is 130% more than the average college graduate's salary of $42,485 per year.

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See which majors at Stanford University make the most money.

Location of Stanford University

California State
5,752 Full-Time Undergraduates
Suburb Campus Setting
Located in Stanford, California, Stanford University is a private not-for-profit institution. Stanford is considered a suburb and offers tranquility and safety near the excitement of a city center.

Get more details about the location of Stanford University.

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Contact details for Stanford are given below.

Contact Details
Phone: 650-723-2300
Website: www.stanford.edu/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/stanford
Twitter: http://twitter.com/stanford

Stanford University Majors

76 Majors With Completions
1,511 Undergraduate Degrees
3,293 Graduate Degrees
During the most recent year for which we have data, students from 76 majors graduated from Stanford University. Of these students, 1,511 received undergraduate degrees and 3,293 graduated with a master's or doctor's degree. The following table lists the most popular undergraduate majors along with the average salary graduates from those majors make.

Most Popular Majors Bachelor’s Degrees Average Salary of Graduates
Computer Science 260 $136,126
Human Biology 104 $40,010
Other Engineering 86 $55,933
Economics 82 $60,475
Engineering-Related Fields 67 $77,180
Cognitive Science 67 NA
Science, Technology & Society 63 NA
General Biology 61 $36,722
Political Science & Government 59 $46,407
Mathematics 54 NA

Learn more about the majors offered at Stanford University along with which ones have the highest average starting salaries.

Online Learning at Stanford

6% Take At Least One Class Online

Online courses area a great option for busy, working students as well as for those who have scheduling conflicts and want to study on their own time. As time goes by, expect to see more and more online learning options become available.

In 2019-2020, 936 students took at least one online class at Stanford University. This is an increase from the 903 students who took online classes the previous year.

Year Took at Least One Online Class Took All Classes Online
2019-2020 936 0
2018-2019 903 0
2017-2018 877 0
2016-2017 962 0
2015-2016 767 0

Learn more about online learning at Stanford University.

If you’re considering Stanford University, here are some more schools you may be interested in knowing more about.

Curious on how these schools stack up against Stanford? 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!

Notes and References

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.

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