AdmitMe

The U.S. News top 100 national universities

Find out which colleges actually want what you have.

Put in your grades, courses and activities once. Get a real list — reach, target and safety — with the reason each college is on it, taken from what that college itself publishes about how it decides.

Check my chances Browse the colleges

Where a figure could not be read from a published source, the college is marked Estimated rather than quietly filled in.

100the U.S. News top 100 national universities — every one, in rank order
19admission factors each college publicly rates itself on
37read straight from the college's own published document, each one linked
0ads, trackers, or data sold

Where the numbers come from

Every figure on this site traces to a document you can open yourself. Where we couldn't read a source, the college is labeled Estimated rather than quietly filled in.

The Common Data Set

Every college publishes one. Section C7 is the college stating, on its own four-point scale, how much it weighs GPA, course rigor, test scores, essays, recommendations, activities, talent, character, legacy, state residency and demonstrated interest. That table is our model's weighting — we don't invent it.

Acceptance rates, SAT and ACT ranges come from the same documents. Verified colleges link straight to the PDF or spreadsheet they came from.

U.S. News & World Report

Used for one thing only: deciding which colleges appear here. The list is their top 100 national universities — all of it, nothing else — and each card shows its rank. Nothing in the odds model uses the ranking; a college's position doesn't change how it reads your application.

U.S. News ties six schools at #98. Showing exactly 100 means breaking that tie, so we take them alphabetically and stop at 100.

Wikimedia Commons & Wikidata

Campus photos are freely licensed, and each one credits its photographer and license on the college's card. Logos come from each institution's own Wikidata entry, so it's that college's mark rather than whatever a search turns up.

Where a college's profile comes from

Not from us, and not from a model guessing at a school's character. Every college fills in section C7 of its Common Data Set — nineteen admission factors, each rated on its own four-point scale. That table is the personality. It is why the desk you are talking to answers differently at every school, and why it can tell you when it does not know.

1

They rate themselves

"Very important", "important", "considered", "not considered" — nineteen times, in a document they publish. We read it out of the PDF, and every card links to the one it came from.

2

It becomes a voice

A school rating four soft factors at the top reads your whole file, and says so. One rating them all at the bottom tells you plainly that the transcript decides it. They are not the same conversation, because they did not give the same answers.

3

It never exceeds the document

Ask about a deadline, a major, or a professor and it will tell you it has nothing to go on — because inventing an answer in a real university's voice is how a student ends up acting on something that was never true.

How your odds are worked out

1

Measured against that college's own pool

Your GPA and score are compared to the college's reported average and middle 50%. Activities and essays are re-centered by selectivity — club president is a strong record at a college admitting 85%, and unremarkable at one admitting 5%.

2

Weighted the way that college says it weighs

A college rating essays "very important" leans on your essay. One rating them "considered" barely does. UNC weighs state residency very heavily; the University of Georgia decides on the transcript alone. Same student, different answers.

3

Anchored to the real acceptance rate

This is the part other calculators skip. A flawless application still comes out a reach at a college admitting 4%, because it is one — and nothing that admits under 60% of its applicants is ever called a safety, for anyone. A school rejecting six in ten is not a safety however good your odds look, and if you have none, we say so rather than quietly promoting a target.

What you get

Five things, and the edge of each one. Nothing here is a prediction of a decision.

Colleges

All 100, each with the nineteen factors it rates itself on, its admit rate, test range, average GPA and net price — and an admissions desk you can put questions to, answering as that college from those same ratings.

Stops at the document: ask it a deadline, a major or a professor and it tells you the college has never published that, rather than inventing an answer.

My chances

Every one of the 100 sorted into reach, target and safety for you, plus the single change to your application worth the most — measured by re-running the whole model with that one thing different.

Anchored to real acceptance rates, so nothing admitting under 60% is ever called a safety. It shapes a balanced list; it does not predict a decision.

My counselor

A conversation about what you actually want — subject, cost, distance, size, how bold a list you want — that ends in one built around your answers, with the reason on every line. It keeps what you tell it, and you can read and delete all of it.

Records only what you actually said: anything it cannot quote back to your own words is thrown away rather than guessed at.

Essay lab

Clichés, telling instead of showing and flat rhythm, flagged with your own sentences quoted back, and read against the rest of your application so it can say what your file does not yet.

The analysis runs entirely in this browser and no essay is ever sent to a model. Signed out, nothing leaves your device at all; signed in, pressing Save stores the draft text on your account so it follows you between devices.

My list

Round, deadline and status for every application in one place, with a warning when your list has no genuine safety on it.

The deadlines are the ones you enter. We do not publish application dates, for the same reason the desks refuse them.

What this can't do

It can't read your file

No model sees your actual essays, who reads your application, or a college's priorities that year. Treat a number here as a way to shape a balanced list, never as a prediction of a decision.

It isn't your counselor

Use it to work out which colleges are worth the application fee, then talk to someone who knows you.

Your work stays yours

Essays are analyzed in your browser, and no essay is ever sent to a model. Signed out, nothing leaves your device. Signed in, a draft you press Save on is stored on your account so it follows you between devices — and you can export or delete all of it. We don't sell data, run ads, or train anything on your writing.

We're not affiliated with any college

Nor with U.S. News. We quote their published data and link to it so you can check us.

Start with my stats Who built this, and why

Your college list

Edit my stats

Reach

Under 40% — apply if you love them, never count on them.

Target

40–75% — squarely in their range. Most of your list belongs here.

Safety

Over 75% for you, at a college admitting 60% or more of everyone who applies — and one you'd be glad to attend.

Colleges

The U.S. News top 100 national universities, each scored the way it says it scores you. Cards marked Verified have their criteria read from that college's own Common Data Set and link to it; cards marked Estimated could not be read from a source and use a profile based on the type of college, which we say rather than quietly filling in. This page starts on the verified ones — untick the box to see all 100.

Columbia University

#13 in the U.S. News national universities · NY · Private · 4% admitted · SAT middle 50% 1510–1560 · average GPA 3.93

Columbia weighs class rank and recommendations above its peers, and ignores demonstrated interest, which most colleges do consider.

Rates GPA, course rigor, class rank and essays at the top of its own scale.

What Columbia says it weighs
Class rankvery important
Recommendationsvery important
Charactervery important
Activitiesvery important
Essaysvery important
Demonstrated interestnot considered
Test scoresconsidered
Legacyconsidered

Read from Columbia University's own Common Data Set (2024-25).

About AdmitMe

Who made this, why, and what you should not trust it with.

Why it exists

Every US college publishes a Common Data Set, and section C7 of it is that college stating, on its own four-point scale, how much it weighs nineteen different parts of an application. It is public. It is specific. Almost nobody reads it, because it is buried in a PDF on an institutional-research page and there are hundreds of them.

Meanwhile the advice a student actually gets is generic — write a great essay, take hard classes, show interest — as though every college wanted the same thing. They demonstrably do not, and they say so in writing. UNC Chapel Hill rates state residency very important. The University of Georgia rates essays, activities and character merely considered. Carnegie Mellon rates volunteer work above talent. A student applying to those three the same way is wasting two of the three applications.

AdmitMe is that table, read for the top 100 national universities and turned into something you can use: a list split into reach, target and safety, with the reason each college is on it.

Who built it

One person, working on it directly — not a company, not a counseling service, and not a business that makes money when you apply somewhere. There is no sales call at the end of this. Nobody here gets paid more if you pick a particular college, because nobody here gets paid at all.

What we will not do

  • We do not invent a number. Where a college's document could not be read, the profile is marked Estimated and says what it is based on. Currently 37 of the 100 are read straight from the source and link to it. That number is on the front page because it is the honest one, not because it is the flattering one.
  • We do not sell or share your data, run ads, or train anything on your writing.
  • We do not pretend to predict a decision. No model can see your actual essays, who reads your file, or a college's priorities that year. A number here shapes a balanced list. That is all it does.
  • We are not affiliated with any college, or with U.S. News. We quote published data and link to it so you can check us.

What to use instead of us, and when

This is a planning tool, not a counselor. It cannot know that you light up talking about marine biology, that your family situation changed in October, or that the teacher writing your recommendation has known you since you were twelve. Use this to work out which applications are worth the fee and the weekend — then take the shortlist to someone who knows you.

Corrections

If a figure here disagrees with a college's own Common Data Set, the college is right and we want to know. Every verified card links to the document it came from, so the disagreement is checkable in one click.

Check my chances Browse the colleges

That page isn't here

The address you followed doesn't match anything on this site. It may have been a typo, or a link from an older version.

Nothing lives at .
Back to the start Browse the colleges Check my chances

Essay lab

Analyzed in your browser — the essay is never sent to a model. It checks the craft signals admissions readers complain about; it cannot tell you whether your story is good, and a plain essay about something real can trip nothing at all and still be the best thing in the pile.

My list

Track every application in one place — round, deadline, and where it stands.

My counselor

A short conversation about what you actually want, then a list built around it — reaches, targets and safeties, each with the reason it is there.

My profile

Your academics

This is the part nearly every college weighs most. Answer honestly — an optimistic answer only buys you an optimistic list.

Grades

Takes 20 seconds
On a 4.0 scale. Reporting weighted only? Subtract roughly 0.3–0.5.
Plenty of schools don't rank — leaving this blank costs you nothing.

Course rigor

Colleges read this against what your school offers. Eight APs where thirty are offered is a weaker transcript than four where four are offered.

AP, IB, honors or dual-enrollment
Best guess is fine
Optional
I don't know the counts — let me describe it instead

Test scores

Most colleges are test-optional. Sending a score below a college's middle 50% usually hurts more than sending nothing.

Your activities

List them individually rather than rating yourself. Students are consistently bad at self-rating — give the facts and the tier gets worked out for you. Depth beats breadth: two excellent activities read better than ten memberships.

Start from your resume

Optional

Upload a resume and we'll suggest activities from it — you confirm each one before it counts. The file is read on your device and never uploaded; only the text is saved, and only if you're signed in.

PDF, Word (.docx) or plain text — a LinkedIn “Save to PDF” export works here too
Optional — checked and saved with your account
Scanned PDF, or nothing came through? Paste the text instead

Your activities

Depth beats breadth

List them individually rather than rating yourself. Two excellent activities read better than ten memberships.

Context colleges weigh

Not gaming the system — colleges state in their own Common Data Sets that they consider these.

Essays and recommendations

Rate these honestly. If you analyze a draft in the Essay lab, that score is used instead.

Essays
Recommendations

What you're looking for

Preferences filter and sort. They never change your admission odds.

About you

These change your odds

Changes your odds a lot at public universities.

Computer science, engineering, business and nursing are admitted separately at many colleges, and that changes your odds. Art, music, theatre, film and architecture usually turn on a portfolio or audition this model cannot see — we say so rather than guess.

What you're looking for

Filters and sorts only — never your odds
Regions — leave blank for anywhere
Campus size
Setting
Cost

Sticker price is rarely what families pay. If you'll file for aid we compare average net price instead.

Add a college that isn't on the list

Enter its numbers from its Common Data Set and it gets scored exactly like the rest.

Privacy

Plain English, because you should be able to tell what happens to your work.

What we keep

  • If you never sign in: nothing leaves your browser. Your stats, list and essays sit in this device's local storage and we cannot see them.
  • If you sign in with Google: we store your Google account id, email address, name and profile picture, plus whatever you save — your calculator answers, college list, essay drafts, LinkedIn URL and the text of any resume you import.
  • What My counselor sends. When you type to the counselor, that message is sent to Anthropic's Claude API purely to work out what you meant and to word a reply. Anthropic does not train on data sent through their API, and we do not store the message itself. The model is never asked about a college: every figure and every admission policy on this site is computed from published data before the model sees anything, and anything it reports about you is thrown away unless it can quote your own words back for it. What the counselor concludes about you — including any specific detail it keeps for essay ideas later — is saved to your profile, shown back to you there in full, and you can delete it in one click. If you would rather not send anything, the counselor still works with the connection off — it falls back to matching on your own words.
  • Your essays are never sent to a model. The essay lab's analysis runs entirely in this browser, as it always has — the text of your essay is never sent to us or to any model for analysis. The one thing that moves an essay off your device is you: if you are signed in and press Save, the draft text is stored against your account so it is there on your next device, and it appears in your export and is destroyed when you delete your account. Signed out, no essay ever leaves this browser.
  • Resume files are never uploaded. The file is read on your own device and only the extracted text is saved, so we never hold a document containing your address, phone number or employers.

What we never do

  • We do not sell or rent your data, and we do not run advertising.
  • We do not share your essays with colleges, or with anyone else.
  • We never store a password, because sign-in goes through Google and we never receive one.
  • We do not put essay text in our logs.

Your controls

  • Download everything we hold about you as a JSON file, any time.
  • Delete your account and every associated record. Deletion is immediate and permanent — we keep no shadow copy.
  • Signing out clears this device. Your stats, college list and essay drafts are removed from this browser when you sign out — they are saved to your account first, and come back when you sign in. This matters on a school or library computer.

Download my data

Age

AdmitMe is intended for students aged 13 and over. If you are under 13, please do not create an account. If we learn that an account belongs to a child under 13, we delete it.

Cookies

One cookie, used to keep you signed in. No analytics or advertising cookies.

Contact

Questions, or want your data removed? Email the address in the footer and we will action it.

Terms

What this is

AdmitMe estimates admission chances and gives feedback on essays. It is a planning tool, not advice, and not a prediction.

What it is not

  • Not affiliated with any college. Admissions data is quoted from each college's own published Common Data Set, and linked so you can check it.
  • Not a guarantee. No model can see your actual essays, who reads your file, or a college's priorities that year. Never treat a number here as a decision.
  • Not a substitute for your counselor. Use it to shape a balanced list, then talk to a human.

Your work stays yours

You keep all rights to essays you write. We store them only to show them back to you, and we do not use them to train anything.

Fair use

Do not upload other people's work, and do not scrape or resell the data here.