Bowdoin College
Bowdoin publishes 6.8% (Fall 2025 entering class). Early Decision applicants got in at 15%; everyone else at 5.5%.
Acceptance rate
What Bowdoin's 6.8% is made of
The published rate averages groups with very different odds. These are the splits Bowdoin reports itself.
By application round
Fall 2025 entering class (Class of 2029)
Read the full decomposition →Part of Real Acceptance Rates, our series decomposing published rates from each school's own Common Data Set.
Testing
Test-Optional for 2026-27
- Policy
Bowdoin has been test-optional since 1969 (it pioneered the policy) and its official test-optional-policy page confirms this remains current, with no submission requirement and no disadvantage for non-submitters. No future required-testing change found.
- SAT middle 50%
- 1470–1550sum of section 25th–75th percentiles
- ACT middle 50%
- 33–35
- Average HS GPA
- Not published by the school
Applying
Deadlines, essays and AI policy
- Early deadlines
- Nov 15, 2026 (ED1); Jan 5, 2027 (ED2)
- Regular decision
- Jan 5, 2027Source
- Supplemental essays
- None beyond the personal statement
Bowdoin's two 250-word Bowdoin Supplement essays ('The Offer of the College' and 'Navigating through Differences') are OPTIONAL, not required. Confirmed twice via independent fetches of the official bowdoin.edu application page: 'Both essays are described as optional components of the application, meaning neither is required for submission.'
- AI use in essays
Limited Use Allowed — applies to Application essays, including the Bowdoin Supplement and the 'Navigating through Differences' essay
“your writing should reflect your own ideas, experiences, and perspective [...] you should not use AI to draft, write, or generate your responses [...] you should not use AI to rewrite portions of your work or modify your tone [...] you should not use AI or another tool to translate your written work from a different language into English [...] Submitting AI-generated writing (such as copy-and-pasting generated material) or embellishing or falsifying any part of your application is antithetical to Bowdoin's values of honesty and integrity.”
Full cycle calendar: Application Deadlines.
At a glance
Size and cost
- Undergraduate enrollment
- 1,873
- Tuition (out-of-state)
- $67,832
- Category
- Liberal Arts
- Admissions site
- www.bowdoin.edu
What should this school mean for your list?
A published rate is one input. Working out what it means alongside the rest of your list is the part that actually changes an application. Free 25-minute call, no commitment.
Sources
- Bowdoin test policy (2026-27)
- Bowdoin deadlines
- Bowdoin AI-use policy
- Bowdoin admissions pages
- Bowdoin admissions pages
- Acceptance rate, test-score percentiles, enrollment and tuition: U.S. Department of Education College Scorecard, pulled 2026-08-19.
Test policy and deadlines last verified 2026-08-17.
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