Data · National
The national numbers.
LSAT test-taker volumes and score trends, MBE national means, and the bar passage benchmarks — the playing field for law school admissions and licensure, with year and source on every figure.
Unofficial guide. This site is independent — not affiliated with the ABA, LSAC, NCBE, or any law school. These are national figures from the official published sources, summarized here with citations. Your school has its own numbers, which it reports to you directly.
LSAT test-taker volume
Law school interest runs in cycles — and the cycles are dramatic. LSAC testing years run August through June, and the swings track the economy: recessions push people toward law school, booms pull them away.
- 2020–21: roughly 170,000 tests delivered across eight administrations — the pandemic-era surge (LSAC, Keeping Up to Data, March 2022).
- 2024–25: test takers up 11.6% year over year, with every administration up versus the prior year (LSAC, Keeping Up to Data, August 2025).
- The long trend: the share of scores in the 120–145 range has been falling for about eight years, while the share in the 160–180 range has been rising for about seven (LSAC, Keeping Up to Data, April 2026).
LSAC publishes its volume data in interactive dashboards that don't expose text tables; absolute totals for the intervening years aren't published in text form, so we report what LSAC states outright rather than estimating.
LSAT score distribution
The LSAT is scored 120–180. LSAC's official percentile table (pooled across the 2023–2024, 2024–2025, and 2025–2026 testing years) shows how steep the top of the scale is:
| Score | % of test takers scoring below | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| 170 | 94.48% | Roughly 1 in 18 test takers scores 170+ |
| 160 | 71.06% | Roughly 3 in 10 score 160+ |
| 155 | 54.03% | The median sits just below 155 |
Source: LSAC LSAT Percentiles (pooled 2023–2026 testing years). LSAC's 2024 Knowledge Report adds: among all 2023–2024 test takers, the middle 50% of scores fell between 145 and 160.
MBE national means
The Multistate Bar Examination is scored on a 200-point scale, and the NCBE publishes the national mean after every administration. February sittings skew toward repeat takers and score lower nationally.
| Administration | National mean scaled score | Examinees |
|---|---|---|
| July 2026 | 140.7 | 44,472 (10 NextGen jurisdictions excluded) |
| February 2026 | 131.2 | 18,063 |
| July 2025 | 142.4 — the highest July mean since 2013 | 46,959 |
| February 2025 | 130.8 | — |
Source: NCBE: national mean, July 2026 MBE; NCBE: national mean, February 2026 MBE; July history (2021–2025) from the NCBE 2025 Year in Review.
Bar passage benchmarks
The ABA's March 2026 release set the national comparison points every school is measured against:
| Measure | Figure | Cohort |
|---|---|---|
| Aggregate first-time passage rate | 84.10% | 2025 first-time takers (up from 83.02% in 2024) |
| Ultimate passage rate (within two years) | 92.15% | 2023 graduates who sat (up from 90.52% for 2022 graduates) |
| Accreditation floor (ABA Standard 316) | 75% | Ultimate rate within two years of graduation |
Source: ABA Section of Legal Education, March 2026 bar passage release, via ABA Journal.
Our read: the gap between the 75% floor and the ~92% national ultimate rate is where school quality lives. A school near the floor is flirting with non-compliance; a school near the national average is ordinary; the number that should impress you is the first-time rate — see how to read bar passage data.
Employment benchmarks
The ABA's employment release is the outcome number that matters most after licensure — the share of graduates in full-time, long-term jobs requiring bar admission:
| Measure | Class of 2024 | Class of 2023 |
|---|---|---|
| Total graduates | 38,937 (+10.6%) | 35,215 |
| Full-time, long-term, bar admission required | 81.4% (31,681) | 79.3% (27,933) |
| Bar admission required/anticipated (all) | 82.2% | 80.2% |
| Unemployed and seeking | 4.7% | 5.0% |
Source: ABA Employment Outcomes as of March 17, 2025 (Class of 2024 graduates) — official online table. The April 2026 release (class of 2025) reported 87.7% in long-term full-time employment including school-funded positions — a slight dip from 2024, with roughly 2,500 fewer graduates in that category (Law.com, on the ABA release).
Applicant and admissions trends
Law school applications come in waves. After the pandemic-era boom faded, the 2024–25 cycle roared back — LSAC called it the highest volume in over ten years:
| Admissions cycle | Applicants | Applications |
|---|---|---|
| 2022–23 | Just under 61,000 (−1.9%) | 415,700 (−3.1%) |
| 2023–24 | 64,291 (+5.7%) | ~428,000 (+2.6%) |
| 2024–25 | 76,609 (+18.3%) | 523,263 (+22.3%) |
| 2025–26 (in progress) | 75,000+ (+10.3%) | ~550,000 (+12.4%) |
Source: LSAC Keeping Up to Data — August 2023, September 2024, August 2025, April 2026; 2024–25 finals via LSAC #trending, October 6, 2025. Cycle counts cover applicants to ABA-approved law schools for the given fall. LSAC does not publish a national acceptance rate — acceptance is school-level, in the 509 reports.
Our read: applicant surges make every school more selective two years later — the 2024–25 wave is showing up in the 509 medians now. If you're applying into a surge cycle, the medians below are the number to beat, and a strong LSAT matters more than ever.
Per-school admissions medians
The 30 highest median LSATs in the country, from the ABA's official 2025 Standard 509 compilation (class entering fall 2025). Medians describe the middle of the entering class — half scored above, half below.
| # | School | Median LSAT | Median UGPA | Acceptance rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Washington University (St. Louis) | 175 | 3.96 | 19.0% |
| 2 | Chicago, The University of | 174 | 3.97 | 9.7% |
| 3 | Harvard University | 174 | 3.96 | 9.2% |
| 4 | Yale University | 174 | 3.96 | 4.1% |
| 5 | Columbia University | 173 | 3.92 | 11.8% |
| 6 | Cornell University | 173 | 3.92 | 18.2% |
| 7 | Northwestern University | 173 | 3.96 | 12.3% |
| 8 | Pennsylvania, University of | 173 | 3.95 | 8.1% |
| 9 | Stanford University | 173 | 3.96 | 6.1% |
| 10 | Virginia, University of | 173 | 3.99 | 10.2% |
| 11 | New York University | 172 | 3.92 | 13.4% |
| 12 | Texas, University of | 172 | 3.89 | 14.0% |
| 13 | California-Los Angeles, University of | 171 | 3.95 | 12.1% |
| 14 | Duke University | 171 | 3.91 | 12.9% |
| 15 | Georgetown University | 171 | 3.93 | 15.8% |
| 16 | Michigan, University of | 171 | 3.88 | 8.6% |
| 17 | Minnesota, University of | 171 | 3.88 | 26.7% |
| 18 | Boston University | 170 | 3.88 | 12.1% |
| 19 | Brigham Young University | 170 | 3.95 | 22.8% |
| 20 | California-Berkeley, University of | 170 | 3.92 | 14.8% |
| 21 | Notre Dame, University of | 170 | 3.89 | 16.1% |
| 22 | Vanderbilt University | 170 | 3.91 | 13.3% |
| 23 | California-Irvine, University of | 169 | 3.80 | 14.9% |
| 24 | Florida, University of | 169 | 3.91 | 16.5% |
| 25 | George Mason University | 169 | 3.93 | 15.9% |
| 26 | Georgia, University of | 169 | 3.92 | 12.7% |
| 27 | Southern California, University of | 169 | 3.91 | 11.2% |
| 28 | Texas A&M University | 169 | 4.00 | 12.1% |
| 29 | Boston College | 168 | 3.83 | 8.5% |
| 30 | Fordham University | 168 | 3.79 | 16.2% |
Source: ABA Section of Legal Education, 2025 Standard 509 Information Report compilation (class entering fall 2025; "All" 50th percentiles; acceptance rate = offers ÷ completed applications). Also at 168: George Washington (3.86), UNC (3.89), Ohio State (3.91). For any school's full report — including 25th/75th percentiles — use the Admissions Snapshot lookup or the ABA's 509 page directly.
What to do with the numbers
Admissions snapshot
Pick any ABA law school: acceptance rate, median LSAT, and median UGPA from its official 509 report.
Look up a school →Bar passage guide
First-time vs. ultimate rates, what Standard 316 requires, and how to compare schools fairly.
Read the guide →Employment outcomes
How to read the ABA employment reports — what "employed" actually counts and what to ask each school.
Read the guide →How to read these numbers
- First-time vs. eventual. Bar passage figures come in first-time and ultimate (two-year) versions — different numbers, different meanings. Never conflate them.
- Year matters. LSAT volume swings 20%+ year to year; never average across years in a way that hides a trend.
- Distance from national, not a fixed bar. The ABA's 75% ultimate-passage floor is a compliance minimum, not a quality signal. What matters is where a school sits relative to the ~84% first-time and ~92% ultimate national rates.
Sources
- LSAC — LSAT administration volumes and test-taker data.
- NCBE — MBE national mean scaled scores.
- ABA Section of Legal Education — statistics — bar passage releases, employment outcomes tables, and Standard 509 Information Reports.
Figures as published through 2026-10-02. The ABA, LSAC, and NCBE publish new data on their own schedules; check the official sites for the latest editions.