What are Harvard’s admission requirements? While there are a lot of pieces that go into a college application, you should focus on only a few critical things:

• GPA requirements
• Testing requirements, including SAT and ACT requirements

School location: Cambridge, MA

This school is also known as: Harvard College, Harvard University

If you want to get in, the first thing to look at is the acceptance rate. This tells you how competitive the school is and how serious their requirements are.

The acceptance rate at Harvard is 4.7%. For every 100 applicants, only 5 are admitted.

This means that the school is very selective. Meeting their GPA requirements and SAT / ACT requirements is important to screen through their first round and prove your academic readiness. If you do not meet their expectations, you get almost zero chance.

After crossing this hurdle, you need to impress the readers of the Harvard app through their other apps, including extracurricular, essays and letters of recommendation. We’ll cover more below.

Harvard GPA Requirements

Many schools have a minimum GPA requirement, but this is usually only the minimum minimum to submit an application without being rejected immediately.

The really important GPA requirement is the GPA you need for the opportunity to actually get in. To this end, we look at the average GPA of school-in-school students.

The average GPA at Harvard is 4.18

With a 4.18 GPA, Harvard requires you to be the best in your class. You need to compete with other applicants in almost straight A’s in all classes. In addition, you should strive to attend classes-AP or IB courses-to show college-level academics is a matter of light breeze lifting.

If you are currently a junior or senior, IT is difficult for your GPA to change university applications in a timely manner. If your GPA is at or below the school average of 4.18, you’ll need a higher SAT or ACT score to compensate. This will help you compete effectively with other applicants with a higher GPA.

SAT and ACT Requirements

Each school has different requirements for standardized tests. Most schools require an SAT or ACT test, and many require an SAT Subject Test.

You must take the SAT or ACT to submit an application to Harvard. What’s more, you need to do well to have a powerful application.

Harvard SAT Requirements

Many schools say they don’t have a SAT score cutoff, but the truth is there is a hidden SAT requirement. This is based on the average score of the school.

The average SAT score composite at Harvard is a 1510 on the 1600 SAT scale.

This score makes Harvard Extremely Competitive for SAT test scores.

Harvard SAT Score Analysis (New 1600 SAT)

The 25th percentile New SAT score is 1460, and the 75th percentile New SAT score is 1580. In other words, a 1460 on the New SAT places you below average, while a 1580 will move you up to above average.

SAT Score Selection Policy

The score selection policy at your school is an important part of your test strategy.

Harvard has a”top-of-the-line” score selection policy.”

This is also known as ” superscoring.”This means that you can choose to send the SAT test to the school. Of all the scores they receive, your app reader will consider the highest scores for all SAT test dates you submit.

Therefore, if your SAT superscore is currently below a 1580, we strongly recommend that you consider prepping for the SAT and retaking it. You have a very good chance of raising your score, which will significantly boost your chances of getting in.

Even better, because of the Superscore, you can focus all your energy on a single section at a time. If your Reading score is lower than your other sections, prep only for the Reading section, then take the SAT. Then focus on Math for the next test, and so on. This will give you the highest Superscore possible.

Harvard ACT Requirements

The average ACT score at Harvard is 34. This score makes Harvard Extremely Competitive for ACT scores.

The 25th percentile ACT score is 33, and the 75th percentile ACT score is 35.

Even though Harvard likely says they have no minimum ACT requirement, if you apply with a 33 or below, you’ll have a very hard time getting in, unless you have something else very impressive in your application. There are so many applicants scoring 34 and above that a 33 will look academically weak.

ACT Score Sending Policy

If you’re taking the ACT as opposed to the SAT, you have a huge advantage in how you send scores, and this dramatically affects your testing strategy.

Here it is: when you send ACT scores to colleges, you have absolute control over which tests you send. You could take 10 tests, and only send your highest one. This is unlike the SAT, where many schools require you to send all your tests ever taken.

This means that you have more chances than you think to improve your ACT score. To try to aim for the school’s ACT requirement of 35 and above, you should try to take the ACT as many times as you can. When you have the final score that you’re happy with, you can then send only that score to all your schools.

ACT Superscore Policy

By and large, most colleges do not superscore the ACT. (Superscore means that the school takes your best section scores from all the test dates you submit, and then combines them into the best possible composite score). Thus, most schools will just take your highest ACT score from a single sitting.

We weren’t able to find the school’s exact ACT policy, which most likely means that it does not Superscore. Regardless, you can choose your single best ACT score to send in to Harvard, so you should prep until you reach our recommended target ACT score of 35.