Short answer first. An acceptance rate is offers divided by applications, and across the 148 universities in our database that publish one, the typical rate is about 30 percent. That single average hides the shape of the thing: the published rates bunch into a selective block below 20 percent and a welcoming block between 40 and 60, with almost nothing at the open-door end. Here is the whole distribution, counted.
The 148 published rates, by band
| Band | Universities | Share of the 148 |
|---|---|---|
| Under 20% | 48 | 32% |
| 20 to 40% | 37 | 25% |
| 40 to 60% | 57 | 39% |
| 60% and above | 6 | 4% |
| Mean / median of all 148 | 30.6% / 29.4% | Range 2.6% to 77.8% |
The bottom-heavy shape is a property of the dataset before it is a property of the world. Our 500 universities are ranked institutions, the kind that appear in global league tables, and ranked institutions are disproportionately selective. A census of every college on earth would pile up at the top bands instead. Read the table as a map of the ranked-university world, which is the world most international applicants are actually choosing from.
The shape, drawn
One more caveat belongs with any band table: a rate is an institution-level average, and it hides the spread inside the university. A school at 35 percent overall can run a computer science program below 10 percent and humanities programs above 60, and the published figure will not tell you which side of it your application lands on. The bands are a first filter for building a list, not a personal probability. Program-level odds, where they exist at all, live in department pages, not in the headline rate.
Two practical readings. First, the 40 to 60 band is the largest single group, 57 universities: selective enough to signal quality, open enough to build a realistic shortlist around. Second, the famous sub-10 percent names are a thin tail of a tail; 48 universities sit under 20 percent, and the very hardest are a handful within that. Our companion piece on why the averages mislead covers the next trap, and the Balanced Shortlist Builder turns these bands into reach, match and safety slots.
Sources: explainer form modeled on Edvoy, What is an Acceptance rate? All counts recomputed from this site's dataset of 500 universities (148 with a published acceptance rate), November 5, 2026.