How To Get Into Johns Hopkins

Johns Hopkins has an early decision program which requires your child to submit their application materials by either:

Crafting Your Strongest Application

we want to understand who you’ll be in our community.

Our students celebrate the exchange of perspectives, build on their experiences, and get inspired to try new things. As we review your application, we want to understand how you’ve thrived academically and contributed to your school environment, extracurricular activities, and community. Each part of the application gives us a sense of how your achievements and values align with Hopkins.

Find out more about our review process and what we look for in applicants, so you can craft your strongest application.

How We Review Your Application

We consider many different aspects of your experience, academic achievement, involvements, and personal qualities when deciding if you’re a match for Hopkins.

Your Hopkins Application: What We Consider

Academic Character

How you pursue your academics, contribute to the learning environment, and engage with your interests beyond the classroom. We typically find this in your transcripts, activities list, recommendations, and test scores (optional).

Impact & Initiative

The roles and impact you’ve had in clubs, organizations, jobs and internships, or within your own family and community. We typically find this in your activities list, recommendations, and essays.

Overall Match

Your values, goals, and how we believe you’d grow within the Hopkins community. We typically find this in your supplemental essay, personal statement, and overall application.

Important deadlines & requirements

Hopkins accepts both the Common Application and Coalition on Scoir. We share key dates and break down the process to make sure you and your family have all the information you need to submit your best application.

Admissions Tips & Advice for Your College Search

Our College Planning Guide has application tips videos, advice for your college search, and financial planning resources.

Additional Applicant Resources

Every student has different questions about the application process. Click the links below for helpful answers that may apply to you. Our Application Deadlines & Requirements page contains important dates for all applicants.

• First-Generation College Students

• International Applicants
• Prospective Athletes
• QuestBridge Applicants
• Students with DACA or Undocumented Status
• Transfer Students

• U.S. Military Veterans

Learn About Admissions at an Upcoming Event

Our events help you understand our admissions process and prepare you to craft your strongest application. Hear directly from our admissions team at a Q&A or application workshop, and get the answers you need to apply with confidence.

How to Get Into Johns Hopkins: Strategies and Essays That Worked

Learn the Johns Hopkins University acceptance rate and admissions strategies, plus a Johns Hopkins essay that worked

Part 1: Introduction

Part 2: Johns Hopkins admissions requirements

Part 3: Applying to Johns Hopkins early decision vs. regular decision

Part 4: 2023–2024 Johns Hopkins supplemental essay (examples included)

Part 1: Introduction

If your child excels in high school, particularly in the sciences or economics, they might have Johns Hopkins University on their radar. The university is the alma mater of world-renowned scientists, businesspeople, and even a former U.S. president, and it should be considered by any high-performing student.

Johns Hopkins is probably most famous for its elite premed education. The university’s steadfast dedication to health dates back to the institution’s founding; Johns Hopkins University’s eponymous founder was a philanthropist passionate about improving public health and public education. Each year, Johns Hopkins students are accepted to medical school at a far higher rate than the national average—premed graduates today enjoy an 80 percent med school acceptance rate.

While Johns Hopkins is renowned for its reputation in medicine, its other programs should not go overlooked. The Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts & Sciences houses one of the nation’s earliest creative writing programs and its French department was named a “Center of Excellence” by France itself. Alumni of the Whiting School of Engineering often go on to work at companies like Amazon, Google, or Accenture, or receive prestigious fellowships like Fulbrights. Students with an entrepreneurial spirit benefit from Johns Hopkins’ FastForward U program, which provides up to $30,000 in funding to students working on their own startup.

On that note, if a Johns Hopkins alum says that they are working on a startup, they should be taken seriously. In 2014, Johns Hopkins Technology Ventures was founded to help translate research done within the Johns Hopkins’ ecosystem into the market. Since then, their portfolio has come to include over 130 companies that have collectively raised over $3 billion in venture funding.

No matter what course of study your child pursues, Johns Hopkins is likely a strong choice. According to the Johns Hopkins website, only 6 percent of the class of 2021 was unemployed six months after graduation. Over half the class had joined the workforce, one-third had enrolled directly in grad school, and 5 percent were pursuing nontraditional employment, such as enlisting in the military or entrepreneurship.

As an “Ivy Plus” university with a student-faculty ratio of just 7:1, Johns Hopkins is understandably selective. Read the guide below to learn more about the university and how to be considered a competitive applicant.

Johns Hopkins University rankings

• Forbes: 13
• Niche: 24
• U.S. News & World Report: 7 (tie)
• Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education: 11

Where is Johns Hopkins?

Johns Hopkins is located in Baltimore, Maryland. The entire university is spread across four campuses throughout the city, with undergraduates studying in North Baltimore on the Homewood campus. Because they are separated from graduate students and have a campus to call their own, undergraduate students may feel a close-knit sense of community and belonging even amidst a large research institution.

Johns Hopkins student population

• Undergraduates: 5,253
• Graduate students: 25,231

Johns Hopkins acceptance rate

Let’s review the admissions statistics for Johns Hopkins’ class of 2026:

• Applications: 37,156
• Acceptances: 2,408
• Matriculants: 1,310
• Acceptance rate: 6.5%

Johns Hopkins tuition and scholarships

Johns Hopkins’ 2023–2024 cost of attendance (i.e., tuition, room, board, and fees) is $86,065.

The university vows to meet 100 percent of demonstrated need, and financial aid packages do not include student loans. 54 percent of first-year students receive financial aid. The average grant for first-year students is $59,000.

Who gets into Johns Hopkins?

Each year, Johns Hopkins receives tens of thousands of applications from prospective undergraduates. What can we learn from those who were admitted? Here are some statistics for the class of 2026:

• 99% of admitted students ranked in the top 10% of their class
• Average GPA: 3.9
• Average SAT score:
  • 25th percentile: 1520
  • 75th percentile: 1560
  • 25th percentile: 34
  • 75th percentile: 35

  Part 2: Johns Hopkins admissions requirements

  Johns Hopkins academic requirements

  Johns Hopkins doesn’t list any specific coursework that’s required of prospective applicants. However, they do note that they look for qualities such as academic character, impactive and initiative, and personal contribution when reviewing applications (we’ll dig into these qualities further in the next section). They want to see students who are passionate about learning and who will enthusiastically participate and make an impact on JHU and the local Baltimore community.

  The university also reports that 98% of incoming students enter with pre-professional experiences. It’s hard to read into this too much, but you might interpret this statistic as an indication that Johns Hopkins is interested in students who apply their education to the real world. If your child is interested in attending Johns Hopkins, encourage them to find a way to put their interests into action, whether by researching in a lab, shadowing a doctor, or immersing in a local business or nonprofit.

  Johns Hopkins application requirements

  • Common Application or the Coalition Application
  • Johns Hopkin supplemental essay
  • Optional in 2023–2024: SAT or ACT scores
  • Two teacher letters of recommendation
  • Secondary school report including school counselor recommendation, transcript, and high school profile
  • Midyear report including updated transcript (due in mid-February)

  Johns Hopkins’ special programs

  When submitting their regular application, your child will also have the opportunity to apply for one of three special programs:

  • Direct Matriculation Programs
    • Qualified students can apply to one of two Johns Hopkins Master’s programs (Global Health or International Studies)
    • Through this program, students can earn both a Bachelor of Music from the Peabody Institute and a B.A or B.S. from Johns Hopkins.
    • This fellowship provides up to $10,000 in funding to B.A. students completing independent research.

    Part 3: Applying to Johns Hopkins early decision vs. regular decision

    Johns Hopkins has an early decision program which requires your child to submit their application materials by either:

    • November 1st (to receive a decision by December 15th)
    • January 2nd (to receive a decision by February 16th)

    This program is binding, which means your child cannot apply to any other early decision program. Furthermore, you, your child, and your child’s counselor must sign a contract, agreeing for your child to attend Johns Hopkins should they be admitted.

    Your child can also apply regular decision by January 2nd.

    How do you know if your child should apply to Johns Hopkins early?

    Your child should only apply to Johns Hopkins early decision if they are absolutely sure the university is their first choice. If that’s the case, they may be a good early decision candidate if they have strong test scores and grades by the end of junior year.

    In recent years, Johns Hopkins has accepted early decision applicants at a rate about three times higher than the university’s overall acceptance rate. However, it’s difficult to truly compare those two rates because students who apply early decision tend to be of the highest caliber; for example, they do not need an additional semester to raise their GPA or retake the SAT.

    Part 4: 2023–2024 Johns Hopkins supplemental essay (examples included)

    The good news is that Johns Hopkins requires just one supplemental essay. The slightly less good news: the Johns Hopkins supplemental essay is longer than most. So, let’s explore what the university is looking for and how to write a winning essay.

    Before we get into the nitty gritty of the essay, it’s important to first understand what qualities Johns Hopkins seeks in its applicants. Again, here are the three things Johns Hopkins is looking for in prospective students:

    • Academic character: This will be primarily demonstrated through your child’s transcript and test scores. That said, evaluations from teachers can shine light on what the university refers to as “the academic spirit” of your child.
    • Impact and initiative: The application includes room for your child to list their extracurricular activities, but the essay is another avenue through which your child can demonstrate their resourcefulness and drive.
    • Personal contributions: Johns Hopkins recognizes that a vital part of the college experience is the network of peers and teachers and mentors that come together to inform your child’s individual experience. They want people who excel individually and those that want to be part of something bigger. Your child gets to really show this off in this year’s supplementary essay.

    With that in mind, here’s the Johns Hopkins supplemental essay prompt:

    Founded on a spirit of exploration and discovery, Johns Hopkins University encourages students to share their perspectives, develop their interests and pursue new experiences. Use this space to share something you’d like the admissions committee to know about you (your interests, your background, your identity, or your community) and how it has shaped what you want to get out of your college experience at Hopkins. (300-400 words)

    This is a relatively open-ended prompt, so your child can approach writing this essay in a variety of ways. They might choose to discuss an aspect of themselves that is not well represented elsewhere in their application materials. On the flip side, they could use the essay to add further nuance and depth to an interest, identity, background, or community that they’ve already mentioned.

    Take note that the prompt is asking for your child to share a personal rather than academic aspect of themselves. This isn’t to say that your child shouldn’t discuss academic experiences, which certainly fall under the category of interests, but they should do so in the context of what the experience means to them. Since the admissions committee will have access to plenty of materials that document your child’s accomplishments, the point of this essay is for them to get to know your child better as a person.

    Your child can also view this prompt as a variation on the “Why us?” essay that we discuss in our supplemental essays guide. Whatever topic they choose to write about, the key is to link something unique about them to why they want to attend Johns Hopkins.