What You'll Actually Pay
Price after grants
$0 to $54,230 a year, depending on income.
College Scorecard 2024 estimate
See the price at your income ↑Sticker price
Full cost before aid: $87,072 a year. Average need-based aid package: $79,797.Aid and debt
41.1%
receive need-based grants
$26,395
average debt at graduation
131
students got merit aid
about 2% of undergraduates
$87,775
average merit award
Getting In
Admit rates
5.2%
admitted overall
17.3%
admitted Early Decision
4.2%
admitted Regular Decision
Early Decision
Early Decision applicants were admitted at more than 4x the Regular Decision rate, and Early Decision is binding: you commit to attend if admitted.
MoreLess
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: 1510–1570 · 48% of the class submitted
ACT, middle 50% of those who submitted: 34–35 · 27% of the class submitted
92% were in the top 10% of their high school class.
What they value
- Very important
- Course rigor (AP/IB)
- GPA
- Recommendations
- Extracurriculars
- Special talent
- Character
- Important
- Class rank
- Personal essay
- Considered
- SAT/ACT scores
- First-gen status
- Legacy status
- Where you're from
- In-state residency
- Volunteer work
- Work experience
- Demonstrated interest
What this means for you
Duke rates course rigor, your recommendations, and your activities as Very Important, and your essay as Important.
MoreLess
Rigor means AP, IB, and dual enrollment carry real weight — make sure your mix of AP or IB courses is strong. Choose recommenders who can be specific about you, not just confirm your transcript. Depth in a few activities beats a long list. And a strong essay can differentiate an otherwise average application.
Duke rates demonstrated interest 'Considered' — it can tip a close decision, without being decisive.
Source: Common Data Set 2025–26, Section C7 (admissions factors)
Duke just showed you what it values in an application. Use that to write a Why-Duke essay that's actually about you — not a template.
Get sourced starting points for your essayStudent Life
71% of Duke classes have fewer than 20 students.
71%
under 20 students
21.5%
20 to 49
7.5%
50 or more
Every class section counts, labs and seminars included; first-year courses tend to be larger. Duke CDS 2025–26, I-3.
7:1
student:faculty ratio
Campus life
67.7%
first-years from out of state
85%
live on campus
30%
of men in fraternities
42%
of women in sororities
Who attends
- White32.8%
- Asian22.8%
- Hispanic11.6%
- Black8.4%
- Unknown / other6.9%
- Multiracial5.9%
Enrolled undergraduates; international students are counted separately and not included. Duke CDS 2025–26, B2.
Popular majors
Will They Graduate?
84.9% of Duke students graduate in 4 years.
84.9%
finish in 4 years
Entered fall 2019
96.1%
finish in 6 years
Entered fall 2019
97%
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
91.1% finish in 6 years, against 96.1% of all students.
A 5-point gap: Pell Grant students finish less often than students overall.
City & Culture
Beyond the data — what it's actually like to spend four years in Durham.
Durham has grown from a tobacco town into one of the South's most interesting small cities, with a walkable downtown built inside restored brick warehouses and a food scene that punches well above its size.
MoreLess
Campus has plenty of its own gravity too, between the Gothic quad and the 55-acre Duke Gardens. It suits students who want a real city attached to their college experience without the scale of Boston or Chicago; campus, downtown, and the Research Triangle are all short drives apart, so a bike plus a rideshare habit goes a long way.
The City
Mid-size city
Durham, NC
Best For
Notable alumni
Notable Alumni
Tim Cook
CEO of Apple since 2011, after earning his MBA at Duke's Fuqua School of Business.
Melinda French Gates
Co-founded the Gates Foundation and later Pivotal Ventures; earned both her bachelor's degree and her MBA at Duke.
Grant Hill
Won two national championships at Duke, then played 19 NBA seasons and entered the Basketball Hall of Fame.
Ken Jeong
Actor and comedian known for The Hangover and Community, who practiced medicine before moving to comedy full-time.
Elizabeth Dole
Served as U.S. Secretary of Transportation, Secretary of Labor, and a U.S. Senator from North Carolina.
Judy Woodruff
Anchored PBS NewsHour for over a decade and has covered every presidential election since 1976.
Alumni selected for name recognition and range of fields. Not from the Common Data Set.
Traditions
Traditions
Krzyzewskiville
Before the home basketball game against UNC, students pitch tents outside Cameron Indoor Stadium and live there for weeks to claim seats. Tenting groups take shifts through the January cold, and a student-run committee runs periodic checks to keep it fair.
Cameron Crazies
Duke's student section packs the floor-level bleachers at Cameron Indoor and runs coordinated chants for the full game. The arena holds only about 9,000, so students sit close enough to the court that visiting players routinely call it the loudest venue they play in.
Last Day of Classes
The final day of spring classes turns into a campus-wide outdoor concert with a headliner booked by the student programming board. Classes technically still meet that morning, and attendance is famously thin.
Weekend escapes from Durham
Weekend Escapes
Within driving distance from Durham
Asheville & the Blue Ridge Mountains
3.5 hoursMountain hiking and waterfalls, plus a small city with one of the densest brewery scenes in the country.
Wrightsville Beach
2.5 hoursThe closest stretch of Atlantic coast, and the standard warm-weather road trip for anyone with access to a car.
Raleigh
30 minutesThe state capital, with free state museums, a bigger concert circuit, and NHL hockey at the Hurricanes' arena.
Getting there and game days
Getting There & Game Days
Nearest airport
Raleigh-Durham International (RDU)
20 minutes from campus
Flies international — you can start a trip abroad from here.
Pro sports nearby
- Carolina Hurricanes NHL
- North Carolina Courage NWSL
Internships and jobs nearby
Career Proximity
Duke sits 20 minutes from Research Triangle Park, one of the largest research campuses in the country, which makes term-time internships unusually easy to reach.
Top Industries Nearby
Major Employers
- IBM
- Cisco Systems
- Duke University Health System
- Red Hat
- Epic Games
Research Triangle Park — about 20 minutes from campus
Who thrives here
Who Thrives Here
Duke pairs the research depth of a major university with the feel of a much smaller one — 85% live on campus and 71% of classes have fewer than 20 students. Campus life is all-in rather than optional: students camp in tents for weeks to get into the basketball game against UNC, and about a third of men and 42% of women join Greek life.