Just Released: University of Notre Dame’s Acceptance Rate

See highlights from Notre Dame’s official announcement below:

Applicants around the world logged onto the Notre Dame application status portal at 6:42 p.m. EST last Thursday, the time serving as a nod to the University’s founding year of 1842.

Notre Dame admitted a total of 3,399 students to the class of 2027 in this year’s cycle, combining 1,701 restrictive early application (REA) applicants with 1,698 regular decision (RD) applicants. Drawing from a pool of 28,351 applicants, the University hit an 11.9% acceptance rate, “the lowest in Notre Dame history” according to vice president for undergraduate enrollment Micki Kidder. 

While the regular decision cycle saw a 2% increase from the previous year, the REA cohort saw a 25% growth. 

The University maintained a test-optional policy for this year’s application, seeing a 3% increase in applications where students remained test-optional.

Kidder said that admissions continues to measure the impact of test-optional applications, and will be releasing a public determination on the future of test-optional admissions. 

“We are currently doing a review and analysis to understand what the impact of this has been in the classroom at Notre Dame. And so I anticipate that within the next probably three months, we will announce what our practice will be moving forward. That may be on an interim basis that may be in a more permanent basis. It depends on how this analysis goes and how comfortable I feel in placing any type of permanency to that policy,” Kidder said.

Kidder said that applicants continue to be evaluated on a holistic basis, looking at compatibility with the University’s character and mission.

More detailed statistics about the class of 2027 will be published in May after students have accepted their offers.

TTA Takeaway: The 25% growth in the Restricted Early Action round is a considerable increase and indicates the University’s ongoing recruiting efforts. Applying REA, however, is still a risk since a student applying Restrictive Early Action to Notre Dame may not apply to any college or university (private or public) in their binding Early Decision 1 program.