Waitlists function as a standby pool of applicants for colleges to draw on when they fail to meet target enrollment numbers from the pool of applicants accepted from a combination of Early Decision, Early Action and Regular Decision rounds. Colleges draw applicants off the waitlist as a way to maintain a consistent class size for their incoming freshman class.

The chances of clearing a waitlist at any one college are unpredictable at best and the data from the highly selective colleges bears out this volatility.

2021 Waitlist Admit Rates

The admit rate from waitlists fell dramatically across the 61 highly selective colleges for the freshman class of 2021, compared to 2020, 2019 and 2018, based on the data we compiled data from the Common Data Sets. The average waitlist admit rate for the highly selective colleges decreased from 16% in 2020 to a paltry 3% in 2021.

Of the 38 highly selective colleges in 2021 which disclosed waitlist data, 10 of them admitted no students from their waitlists and 2 admitted one student each off their waitlists.

The 10 colleges who admitted no applicants from their waitlists in 2021 include Amherst College, California Institute of Technology, Colorado College, Dartmouth College, Hamilton College, Harvey Mudd College, Pitzer College, Tufts University, Tulane University and Wellesley College despite offering a total of 20,057 waitlist spots to applicants. Boston University admitted one applicant off their waitlist despite offering 14,991 waitlist spots to applicants for admission in Fall 2021. Williams College offered out 2,371 waitlist spots but admitted only one applicant off their waitlist.

Tulane University stands out in never having admitted an applicant off their waitlist from 2018 to 2021 despite offering between 5,000 and 12,000 waitlist spots each year.

University of Southern California is unique among the highly selective colleges in not offering waitlist spots to applicants at all.

Of the remaining 25 highly selective colleges with disclosed waitlist data in 2021, 12 of them admitted less than 1% of applicants from their waitlists, another 5 colleges admitted between 1% and 3% of applicants from their waitlists, 4 colleges admitted between 3% and 6% of applicants from their waitlists and the remaining 4 colleges admitted between 9% and 15% of applicants off their waitlists.

University of California Berkeley and University of California Los Angeles, both of which admitted substantial numbers of applicants from their waitlists in 2019 and 2020, saw their waitlist admit rates drop to 5.2% and 2.2% in 2021, a stunning reversal from their historical trend.

The colleges that stand out as going against trend are Princeton University and Vassar College.

Princeton increased their waitlist admit rate from 0.1% in 2019 to 4.3% in 2020 and tripled its waitlist admit rate to 15% in 2021 with an intake of 150 waitlisted applicants.

Vassar College more than doubled its waitlist admit rate from 5.1% in 2019 to 13.9% in 2020 and increased its waitlist admit rate again to 15.1% in 2021 by admitting 96 applicants from its waitlist, going against the trend set by the other highly selective colleges.

It is notable that 12 of the 61 highly selective colleges have followed consistent policies of non-disclosure in not sharing any waitlist data despite offering waitlists spots to applicants between 2018 and 2021. These 12 colleges include Boston College, Bowdoin College, Colby College, Columbia University, Davidson College, Grinnell College, Harvard University, Johns Hopkins University, Northeastern University, New York University, University of Chicago and Wake Forest University. The reasons given for non-disclosure have focused on the unpredictability and volatility of the waitlist admit numbers.

Table 1 - Percentage of students admitted from those who accepted a position on the waitlist from 2018 to 2021.

Data compiled exclusively from the Common Data Sets. ND means that while the college maintained waitlists, it did not disclose or has not yet disclosed all relevant data for calculating percentages.

Waitlist admit rates vary widely by college and are volatile

Table 2 below shows that the waitlist offers and waitlist admit rates for each of the colleges fluctuate quite widely from year to year.

For example, Emory University did not admit anyone from the waitlist in 2018, and it admitted 4.5% of applicants (168 admitted) from the waitlist in 2019, 16% of applicants (477 admitted) from the waitlist in 2020 and 0.54% of applicants (21 admitted) from the waitlist in 2021 demonstrating a dizzying fluctuation in the number of applicants it draws from the waitlist. These fluctuations at Emory University took place while the college steadily increasing the number of waitlist spots offered to applicants each year from 4,679 spots in 2019 to 5,215 spots in 2020 and 6,539 spots in 2021.

Based on the waitlist positions offered to applicants, it is clear that the highly selective colleges act to protect their freshman class sizes by offering huge numbers of waitlist spots to applicants, far more positions than they could ever realistically admit no matter what.

Table 3 shows you the average waitlist admit rates for 2021, 2020, 2019 and 2018 respectively at 3%, 16%, 8.8% and 5.5% which means the chances of clearing a waitlist have never been great and these chances are unlikely to improve going forward.

A handful of universities in 2020 offered admission to an unusually large numbers of waitlisted applicants, most likely due to pandemic related shortfalls resulting from students choosing to defer their admission by a year. These universities included the University of Notre Dame which offered admission to 42.3% of waitlisted applicants, Stanford University which offered admission to 36.6% of waitlisted applicants, Washington University in St Louis which offered admission to 33.9% of waitlisted applicants, University of California Berkeley which offered admission to 32.7% of waitlisted applicants and Pomona College which offered admission to 29.7% of waitlisted applicants.

Table 2 - Waitlists at Highly Selective Colleges in 2021, 2020 and 2019

Data compiled exclusively from the Common Data Sets. ND means that while the college maintained waitlists, it did not disclose or has not yet disclosed all relevant data for calculating percentages.

Colleges increased their waitlists even as waitlist admits decreased

Based on data disclosed by the highly selective colleges in the Common Data Sets, colleges decreased the total waitlists spots offered by about 8% between 2018 and 2019, but from 2019 onwards, they collectively increased the total number of waitlists spots offered to applicants. Between 2019 and 2020, they increased the number of waitlist spots offered by 39% and between 2020 and 2021, they increased total waitlist spots offered by an additional 5%.

The waitlist admit rate almost doubled from 8.8% in 2019 to 16% in 2020 due to pandemic circumstances where large numbers of students opted to defer matriculation by a year and had to be replaced with applicants from the waitlist.

However, in 2021, the average waitlist admit rate fell dramatically to a low of 3% from 16% the prior year despite a record setting number of waitlists spots offered to applicants.

A total of 2,876 applicants were admitted off the waitlists in 2021 compared to 13,125 applicants who were admitted off the waitlist in 2020, a drop off of 78% in absolute numbers of admits.

Table 3 - Aggregate waitlist totals from the 61 highly selective colleges

Data is compiled and calculated from the Common Data Sets

Will writing heartfelt letters help get me off a waitlist?

Getting admitted from a waitlist is an event that neither the applicant nor the college appear to have much control over. Whether anyone gets admitted off a waitlist depends on whether the college hits its target enrolment numbers by the acceptance deadline for those admitted through Early Action and Regular Decision.

Given the overall volatility of admissions through waitlists, our view is that applicants should set their sights elsewhere for admission should they be placed on a waitlist. While they can accept a spot on the waitlist if offered, applicants need to understand that the chances of getting admitted are a long shot, at best.

The colleges do not disclose how they select applicants off a waitlist for admission, however none of the highly selective colleges rank the waitlisted applicants. Theoretically, this means everyone on the waitlist has an equal albeit tiny chance in the event that the college needs to draw on the waitlist to fill its incoming freshman class.

In 2021, 10 of the highly selective colleges met their yield targets and ended up admitting no one from their waitlists, while the rest of the highly selective colleges, with only 2 exceptions (Princeton and Vassar), offered very low chances of getting admitted off a waitlist.

Waitlisted applicants in 2021 had slim chances of getting admitted even with heartfelt letters.

That said, an applicant determined to give one last shot at admission to the dream college that waitlisted them, should write that heartfelt letter to stand out and enhance their chances of getting admitted off the waitlist should the opportunity arise.

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