What You'll Actually Pay
Price after grants
$28,055 to $48,089 a year, depending on income.
College Scorecard 2024 estimate
See the price at your income ↑Sticker price
Full cost before aid: $76,835 a year. Average need-based aid package: $45,007.Aid and debt
4,223
students got merit aid
about 34% of undergraduates
$21,696
average merit award
Not reported by this school: share receiving need-based grants, average debt.
Getting In
Admit rates
69.9%
admitted overall
78.3%
admitted Early Decision
69.8%
admitted Regular Decision
Early Decision
Early Decision applicants were admitted at 1x the Regular Decision rate, and Early Decision is binding: you commit to attend if admitted.
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Some of that gap reflects who applies early (recruited athletes, legacy applicants and highly committed students concentrate in that pool), so it isn't proof that applying early would raise any one student's own odds.
Key dates
Test scores
SAT, middle 50% of those who submitted: 1260–1430 · 35% of the class submitted
ACT, middle 50% of those who submitted: 28–33 · 4% of the class submitted
31.8% were in the top 10% of their high school class.
What they value
- Very important
- Course rigor (AP/IB)
- Class rank
- GPA
- SAT/ACT scores
- Important
- Personal essay
- Recommendations
- Character
- Considered
- Extracurriculars
- Special talent
- First-gen status
- Legacy status
- Volunteer work
- Work experience
- Demonstrated interest
- Not considered
- Where you're from
- In-state residency
What this means for you
Drexel rates course rigor as Very Important, and your essay and your recommendations as Important.
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Rigor means AP, IB, and dual enrollment carry real weight — make sure your mix of AP or IB courses is strong. A strong essay can differentiate an otherwise average application. And recommendations matter here too — a recommender who knows you well helps.
Drexel rates demonstrated interest 'Considered' — it can tip a close decision, without being decisive.
Source: Common Data Set 2025–26, Section C7 (admissions factors)
Drexel just showed you what it values in an application. Use that to write a Why-Drexel essay that's actually about you — not a template.
Get sourced starting points for your essayStudent Life
44.8% of Drexel classes have fewer than 20 students.
44.8%
under 20 students
45.5%
20 to 49
9.7%
50 or more
Every class section counts, labs and seminars included; first-year courses tend to be larger. Drexel CDS 2025–26, I-3.
9:1
student:faculty ratio
Campus life
39.8%
first-years from out of state
16%
live on campus
12%
of men in fraternities
8%
of women in sororities
Who attends
- White38.4%
- Asian25.8%
- Black10.4%
- Hispanic9.4%
- Multiracial4.9%
- Unknown / other2.2%
Enrolled undergraduates; international students are counted separately and not included. Drexel CDS 2025–26, B2.
Popular majors
Will They Graduate?
30.5% of Drexel students graduate in 4 years.
30.5%
finish in 4 years
77.9%
finish in 6 years
88.5%
return after first year
Finishing late means paying for extra semesters, so the 4-year rate is the one that shows the cost.
Students with Pell Grants
76.3% finish in 6 years, against 77.9% of all students.
Pell Grant students finish at about the same rate as everyone else.
4-year graduation rate from College Scorecard (2024) — not reported in Drexel's 2025–26 Common Data Set.
City & Culture
Beyond the data — what it's actually like to spend four years in Philadelphia.
Drexel is a city university with almost no separation between campus and street: its buildings are interleaved with University City, the West Philadelphia district it shares with Penn, and Center City is one bridge east. 30th Street Station — the main Amtrak hub on the Northeast Corridor — is on the edge of campus, which makes New York and Washington genuinely reachable for a weekend.
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The upside is a student who leaves with four years of living in a major city and a transit pass instead of a car. The downside is that there is no gated, green, self-contained college experience here, and students who want one tend to feel it.
The City
Major city
Philadelphia, PA
Best For
Notable alumni
Notable Alumni
Paul Baran
Invented packet switching, the idea the internet is built on, after an electrical engineering degree at what was then Drexel Institute of Technology.
Class of 1949
Christopher Ferguson
NASA astronaut and mechanical engineering graduate who commanded the final Space Shuttle mission, STS-135, in 2011.
Class of 1984
Raj Gupta
Chemical engineering graduate who became chairman and chief executive of Rohm and Haas and later chaired Aptiv and Avantor.
Class of 1972
Anne Stevens
Mechanical and materials engineer who ran Ford's North American vehicle operations and later led Carpenter Technology and GKN Aerospace.
Class of 1990
Justin Best
Two-time Olympian who won the United States' first gold medal in men's rowing in 64 years at the 2024 Games, having studied business and engineering here.
Class of 2019
Alumni selected for name recognition and range of fields. Not from the Common Data Set.
Traditions
Traditions
Co-op
Not a program so much as the shape of the degree: most students alternate six months of classes with six months of paid, full-time, major-related employment, up to three times, and each co-op appears on the transcript. It is a graduation requirement for most majors and the reason the standard Drexel degree runs five years.
Mario the Magnificent
The bronze dragon at 33rd and Market, sculpted by Eric Berg and dedicated in 2002 — fourteen feet long on a seventeen-ton granite base. It is the default meeting point, fundraising spot and photograph on campus, and it is named for a 1945 alumnus who went twenty years without missing a basketball game.
The Drexel Dragon since 1928
Drexel has been the Dragons for roughly a century, and the dragon mark has been redrawn repeatedly across that span — the university keeps and displays the earlier versions.
30th Street Station on your doorstep
Less a tradition than a fact of life that shapes one: the Northeast Corridor's Philadelphia hub is at the edge of campus, and weekend trips to New York or Washington are an ordinary part of the calendar.
Weekend escapes from Philadelphia
Weekend Escapes
Within driving distance from Philadelphia
New York City
1.5 hours by trainDirect from 30th Street Station at the edge of campus — close enough for a day, and the reason many Drexel students never bother with a car.
Washington, DC
2 hours by trainThe other direction on the same corridor, and equally doable in a weekend.
The Jersey Shore
1.5 hoursOcean City, Wildwood and Cape May — the standard Philadelphia summer and early-autumn escape.
The Poconos
2 hoursThe nearest mountains for hiking, skiing and a weekend out of the city.
Baltimore, MD
2 hoursHarbor, museums and a cheaper night out than Philadelphia, an easy drive or train ride south.
Getting there and game days
Getting There & Game Days
Nearest airport
Philadelphia International Airport (PHL)
20 minutes from campus
Flies international — you can start a trip abroad from here.
Pro sports nearby
- Philadelphia Eagles NFL
- Philadelphia Phillies MLB
- Philadelphia 76ers NBA
- Philadelphia Flyers NHL
Internships and jobs nearby
Career Proximity
Drexel does not have to sell students on internships, because employment is built into the degree — the co-op office places students into six-month, paid, full-time roles as a matter of course, and most graduate with a year and a half of professional experience already on the transcript. Philadelphia supplies the demand: it is one of the largest health-care and pharmaceutical metros in the country, with Comcast's headquarters, a substantial banking and insurance sector, and a pharmaceutical corridor running out into the New Jersey and suburban Pennsylvania suburbs. New York and Washington are each a short train ride from the station at the edge of campus, which widens the co-op map well past the city itself.
Top Industries Nearby
Major Employers
- Comcast
- Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
- Penn Medicine
- Merck
- Vanguard
Center City Philadelphia — about 10 minutes across the Schuylkill; 30th Street Station on the edge of campus puts New York and Washington within a co-op commute
Who thrives here
Who Thrives Here
Drexel occupies a set of blocks in University City, West Philadelphia, just across the Schuylkill from Center City, and only 16% of undergraduates live in university housing — so most of the student body rents nearby and treats the city as the campus. Greek life is small, 12% of men and 8% of women, which leaves the social center of gravity off campus in a way that suits a student who wants a city rather than a quad; Mario the Magnificent, the bronze dragon at 33rd and Market, is the closest thing to a single gathering point. What actually shapes the years here is co-op: six months of paid full-time work in your field, repeated up to three times. It is why 30.5% of students graduate in four years while 77.9% finish within six — a gap that reads as alarming until you know the five-year path is the designed one rather than the fallback, and worth checking against your own budget, since a fifth year is a fifth year of living costs. Classes stay reasonable for a school of 12,318 undergraduates — 44.8% of sections under 20 students, a 9:1 ratio — and 88.5% of first-years return. The rest of the cost picture is worth naming too: $65,448 in tuition and fees, only 71% of demonstrated need met, and Pell recipients finishing at 76.3% against the 77.9% overall.