Yale University

How it scores

Research and Alumni outcomes are percentiles among 2,287 universities; alumni outcomes are counted per student. Admissions & earnings is the position among universities in the same country (United States).

Admissions, outcomes and alumni

Admit rate

3.9% src

Average SAT

1,534 src

Yield (admits who enrol)

70% src

Median earnings 10 years after entry

$100,533 src

40-year return on investment (Georgetown CEW)

$3.38M src

Average net price per year

$23,777 src

Graduation rate (6 years)

96% src

Rhodes Scholars, 2021–26

18 src

Alumni founders of VC-backed companies (PitchBook)

887 src

Billionaire alumni

24 src

Alumni worth $30M+ (Altrata estimate)

4,300 src

Internationally notable alumni (Wikidata)

340 src

Heads of state or government (Wikidata)

19 src

Students (undergraduate headcount / total FTE, IPEDS)

6,758 / 14,930 src

Each figure links to its source. Admissions and earnings figures are comparable only within a country.

Research Index

Percentiles among 1,305 ranked universities. Rank on quality alone: =20. On strength alone: 31. The Research Index scores research only; admissions, earnings and alumni outcomes are scored in the overall ranking where data exists.

The numbers behind it (2020–2023)

Papers in the top 10% of their field

16.6% (16.2%–17.1%)

Papers in the top 1% of their field

2.3% (2.1%–2.5%)

Top-10% papers (fractional count)

2,484

All papers (fractional count)

14,940

International co-authored

44.4%

Open access

72.6%

Papers from 2020–23 since retracted

16 (0.39 per 1,000)

Core publications, fractional counting, field-normalised citation shares. Brackets show Leiden’s stability interval. Collaboration and open-access shares use full counting and aren’t field-normalised. Retraction counts come from the Retraction Watch database and include publishers’ mass retractions as well as honest-error retractions; a retraction is not by itself evidence of misconduct, and the count is never scored.

By field

Position over time

The same method applied to each 4-year publication window. The number of ranked universities grows from period to period, so position is shown as a share of the field.