Admissions & selectivity
Kenyon College Acceptance Rate & Admissions
What is the acceptance rate at Kenyon College?
Kenyon College’s reported acceptance rate is 31.0%.
- Acceptance rate · Fall 2024
- 31.0%
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.
Source: Kenyon College Common Data Set 2025-26, C1 · first-time, first-year students.
How to interpret the acceptance rate
Kenyon College admits 31.0% of applicants, well below the median of 75.7% for comparable institutions (same type and size). In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, the university reported 7,091 first-year applicants and 2,138 admitted applicants, with 412 enrolling.
What SAT and ACT scores do enrolled Kenyon College students report?
In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, the university reported a 4.15 average high-school GPA among enrolled first-year students, based on the 93.7% who reported a GPA. The figure is an average of those who reported, not a cutoff.
The middle half of enrolled first-year students who submitted SAT scores earned between 1400 and 1495; 8% submitted SAT scores. For the ACT, the middle half of submitters scored from 31 to 34, with 8% submitting ACT scores.
Because the submitter shares are small, these ranges describe a narrow slice of the entering class. Applicants can use Kenyon's own 1400 to 1495 SAT range and 31 to 34 ACT range as context for recent score submitters, rather than as a minimum.
The ranges below describe enrolled students who submitted test scores at Kenyon College. Use them as academic context, then check the university’s current testing policy for your application cycle.
8% of entering students submitted SAT scores
- 25th percentile
- 1400
- Median
- 1430
- 75th percentile
- 1495
CDS 2025-26 · enrolled first-year score submitters. This range is not an admission cutoff.
8% of entering students submitted ACT scores
- 25th percentile
- 31
- Median
- 32
- 75th percentile
- 34
CDS 2025-26 · enrolled first-year score submitters. This range is not an admission cutoff.
Source: Kenyon College Common Data Set 2025-26, C9 · Enrolled first-time, first-year score submitters.
Who enrolls at Kenyon College?
- Pell Grant recipients
- 9.5%
- Entering students outside the first-time, full-time group
- 2.9%
- First-year retention
- 91.6%
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.
Kenyon College enrolls 1,732 undergraduates, a small residential body where the entry path is overwhelmingly as a first-year student. An estimated 2.9% arrive as transfers or part-time students, and 9.5% of undergraduates receive Pell Grants.
In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, the university reported 7,091 first-year applicants, 2,138 admitted, and 412 enrolled. For transfer students, 77 applied, 41 were admitted, and 11 enrolled.
The composition is a traditional liberal-arts campus: most students start and finish in Gambier, and the transfer and Pell populations are small shares of the whole.
In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, the university reported that 91% of the first-time, full-time fall 2025 entering class returned for a second year. The first-year retention rate for full-time bachelor's-seeking entrants is 91.6%, above the peer median of 74.2% for comparable institutions.
The six-year graduation rate is 82.3%, also above the peer median of 54.9%. Persistence and completion both run well above the peer medians, and the Pell completion rate sits close to the overall rate.
Enrolled students can expect a campus where most who start full-time finish, and where the gap between Pell recipients and the rest of the cohort is narrow.
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.