Admissions & selectivity
College of the Holy Cross Acceptance Rate & Admissions
What is the acceptance rate at College of the Holy Cross?
College of the Holy Cross’s reported acceptance rate is 17.6%.
- Acceptance rate · Fall 2024
- 17.6%
Source: College Scorecard · Fall 2024 admissions. Acceptance rates can change from year to year; this figure does not predict the current or next admission cycle.
How to interpret the acceptance rate
College of the Holy Cross admits 17.6% of applicants, a rate far below the median of 71.2% for comparable institutions (same type and size).
What SAT and ACT scores do College of the Holy Cross students report?
The middle half of enrolled students who submitted SAT scores earned between 1,240 and 1,410. For those who submitted ACT scores, the middle half fell between 27 and 32.
These figures describe the twenty-fifth and seventy-fifth percentiles of recent score submitters, not a minimum for admission or a profile of every enrolled student. An applicant comparing their own results to these ranges should treat them as a snapshot of the scores recent submitters brought, not as a threshold the university sets.
The ranges below describe enrolled students who submitted test scores at College of the Holy Cross. Use them as academic context, then check the university’s current testing policy for your application cycle.
- Approximate lower endpoint
- 1240
- Approximate upper endpoint
- 1410
Enrolled students who submitted scores. This range is not an admission cutoff. The endpoints add section percentiles; they are not verified composite-score percentiles. A separate SAT-equivalent average is not plotted as a median. Source: College Scorecard; sum of section 25th/75th percentiles; enrolled score-submitters.
- 25th percentile
- 27
- 75th percentile
- 32
Enrolled students who submitted scores. This range is not an admission cutoff.
Figures cover fall 2024.
Who enrolls at College of the Holy Cross?
- Pell Grant recipients
- 14.8%
- Entering students outside the first-time, full-time group
- 4.8%
- First-year retention
- 94.8%
Retention source: College Scorecard; full-time first-year retention.
About these student measures
The entering-student group includes part-time entrants as well as other attendance patterns.
College of the Holy Cross enrolls 3,106 undergraduates, with 14.8% receiving Pell Grants and an estimated 4.8% entering as transfers or part-time students. The student body is drawn mostly from first-time entrants, with a modest share of Pell recipients.
The admission rate is 17.6%, against a median of 71.2% for comparable institutions (same type and size). SAT scores range from 1,240 to 1,410, or ACT scores from 27 to 32.
Pell-eligible and transfer applicants can use the cost calculator to estimate their own grant-adjusted price.
Of full-time students who start at Holy Cross, 94.8% return for a second year, above the peer median of 83.4%. The six-year graduation rate is 87.3%, also above the peer median of 68.8%.
Pell recipients in the entering cohort complete at 87.9%, which is 0.6 percentage points above the overall rate. The university's Pell students finish at a rate that slightly exceeds the rate for the cohort as a whole.
Enrolled students can expect strong persistence and completion outcomes that run ahead of comparable institutions, with Pell recipients completing at a rate on par with their peers.
Data & methodology
Sources and reporting periods: methodology.
Analysis and methodology by Daniel Rogers, founder of College Azimuth.
Explanatory text is AI-assisted drafting checked against those figures; it is not an additional data source.
Admission rates describe past applicants, not an individual’s chance of admission; confirm requirements and deadlines with the institution.
Figure notes link to sources and limitations. About College Azimuth.