What You'll Actually Pay
Price after grants
$9,211 to $31,272 a year for in-state students, depending on income.
College Scorecard 2024 estimate · in-state rates
See the price at your income ↑Sticker price
Full cost before aid: $41,238 a year in-state. Average need-based aid package: $29,627.Aid and debt
51.2%
receive need-based grants
$17,466
average debt at graduation
1,453
students got merit aid
about 5% of undergraduates
$7,889
average merit award
Getting In
A note for out-of-state applicants
University of California, Davis is bound by a California rule capping how much of its undergraduate class can come from outside the state. If you're applying from outside California, you're competing for a limited, separately-capped share of seats — a different picture than the admit rate above shows.
Key dates
Test scores
SAT composite range not reported by this school.
ACT composite range not reported by this school.
What they value
- Very important
- Course rigor (AP/IB)
- GPA
- Important
- Personal essay
- Extracurriculars
- Special talent
- Character
- Volunteer work
- Considered
- First-gen status
- Where you're from
- In-state residency
- Work experience
- Not considered
- Class rank
- SAT/ACT scores
- Recommendations
- Legacy status
- Demonstrated interest
What this means for you
UC Davis rates course rigor as Very Important, and your essay and your activities 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 depth and leadership in a few activities matter more than a long list.
UC Davis doesn't consider demonstrated interest in admissions at all — visits and follow-up emails won't move the needle here.
Source: Common Data Set 2025–26, Section C7 (admissions factors)
UC Davis just showed you what it values in an application. Use that to write a Why-UC Davis essay that's actually about you — not a template.
Get sourced starting points for your essayStudent Life
28.7% of UC Davis classes have fewer than 20 students.
28.7%
under 20 students
40.8%
20 to 49
30.5%
50 or more
Every class section counts, labs and seminars included; first-year courses tend to be larger. UC Davis CDS 2025–26, I-3.
22:1
student:faculty ratio
Campus life
6.1%
first-years from out of state
34.5%
live on campus
Who attends
- Asian31%
- Hispanic26.4%
- White19.5%
- Multiracial6.7%
- Unknown / other2.2%
- Black1.9%
Enrolled undergraduates; international students are counted separately and not included. UC Davis CDS 2025–26, B2.
Popular majors
Will They Graduate?
69.8% of UC Davis students graduate in 4 years.
69.8%
finish in 4 years
Entered fall 2019
86%
finish in 6 years
Entered fall 2019
92.9%
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
82.6% finish in 6 years, against 86% of all students.
A 3.4-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 Davis.
Davis is a small, flat, bicycle-obsessed college town in the Sacramento Valley, and the university is the reason it exists at its current size.
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The city has more bicycles than residents and was the first in the country to paint bike lanes on its streets, so the practical difference from most public campuses is that a car is genuinely optional. It is quiet — a farming valley on three sides — and that cuts both ways: Sacramento is twenty minutes east for a city evening, San Francisco about ninety minutes south-west, and Lake Tahoe two hours the other way. Rent is cheaper than the coastal UC towns but not cheap.
The City
College town
Davis, CA
Best For
Notable alumni
Notable Alumni
Ann Veneman
Served as US Secretary of Agriculture from 2001 to 2005, the first woman to hold the office, and afterwards led UNICEF. She earned her bachelor's degree in political science here.
Martin Yan
Host of Yan Can Cook, which ran for decades on public television and made him one of the best-known chefs on American TV. He received a Master of Science in food science here in 1975.
Class of 1975
Ken O'Brien
NFL quarterback taken in the first round of the 1983 draft — the class of Elway and Marino — and a decade-long starter for the New York Jets. He played his college football here after transferring from Sacramento State.
Alumni selected for name recognition and range of fields. Not from the Common Data Set.
Traditions
Traditions
Picnic Day
A student-run open house held every April since 1909, with a parade, the Doxie Derby dachshund races and the veterinary school opening its doors — one of the largest student-run events in the country.
The Egghead sculptures
Five bronze heads by Robert Arneson installed around campus since the 1990s, including one buried face-down outside the law school, and the campus's most photographed landmark.
Bike circles
The campus's traffic circles are built for bicycles rather than cars, and learning to merge into one is a genuine rite of passage in the first week.
The Whole Earth Festival
A student-run arts and sustainability festival held on the Quad every Mother's Day weekend since 1969.
Weekend escapes from Davis
Weekend Escapes
Within driving distance from Davis
Sacramento
About 20 minutesThe state capital, with concerts, professional basketball and an airport, close enough to be an ordinary evening out.
San Francisco and the Bay Area
About 1.5 hours, or direct on AmtrakThe nearest major city, reachable by train from a station in downtown Davis.
Lake Tahoe
About 2 hoursSkiing in winter and alpine lakes in summer, the standard weekend trip east on I-80.
Napa Valley
About 1 hourWine country, and a short drive for a campus with one of the country's leading viticulture programmes.
Getting there and game days
Getting There & Game Days
Nearest airport
Sacramento International (SMF)
About 25 minutes from campus
For international flights: San Francisco International (SFO) — about 1.5 hours.
Pro sports nearby
- Sacramento Kings NBA
- Sacramento River Cats MiLB
- Sacramento Republic FC USL
Internships and jobs nearby
Career Proximity
Davis is a research town rather than a job market, and the pairing that matters is proximity: state government and health care in Sacramento twenty minutes east, and the Bay Area's biotech and technology employers about ninety minutes south-west.
Top Industries Nearby
Major Employers
- UC Davis Health
- California state agencies
- Mars Wrigley Science and Technology
- Bayer Crop Science
- Nugget Markets
Sacramento — about 20 minutes by car, with Amtrak service from downtown Davis
Who thrives here
Who Thrives Here
Davis admits 44.3% — a genuinely different proposition from the UC campuses that turn away nine applicants in ten — and like every UC campus it does not read SAT or ACT scores. The academic shape follows the land-grant history: biological sciences are 16.69% of degrees conferred, psychology 13.54% and social sciences 12.78%, with engineering at 8.64%. What a family should weigh is the finishing rate — 69.8% graduate in four years, well below the 86% who finish within six, so the realistic plan here is often five years rather than four, and 92.9% return for a second year. Aid covers 79.5% of need and graduates who borrow leave owing $17,466. Classes are big: 28.7% of sections have under 20 students and there are 22 students per faculty member, the sort of scale where office hours have to be sought out rather than stumbled into. Campus life is unusually self-contained for a public this size — 34.5% of undergraduates live in university housing, the town is built around bicycles rather than cars, and Sacramento sits twenty minutes east when Davis is too small.