What You'll Actually Pay
Price after grants
$9,231 to $31,863 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: $41,573 a year in-state. Average need-based aid package: $31,234.Aid and debt
44.9%
receive need-based grants
$20,043
average debt at graduation
923
students got merit aid
about 4% of undergraduates
$8,594
average merit award
Getting In
A note for out-of-state applicants
University of California, Santa Barbara 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
- GPA
- Personal essay
- Important
- Course rigor (AP/IB)
- Considered
- Extracurriculars
- Special talent
- Character
- First-gen status
- Where you're from
- In-state residency
- Volunteer work
- Work experience
- Not considered
- Class rank
- SAT/ACT scores
- Recommendations
- Legacy status
- Demonstrated interest
What this means for you
UCSB rates your essay as Very Important, and course rigor as Important.
MoreLess
The essay is weighted like your GPA. AP, IB, and dual-enrollment classes strengthen an application here — a strong mix of them helps.
UCSB 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)
UCSB just showed you what it values in an application. Use that to write a Why-UCSB essay that's actually about you — not a template.
Get sourced starting points for your essayStudent Life
55.1% of UCSB classes have fewer than 20 students.
55.1%
under 20 students
25.4%
20 to 49
19.5%
50 or more
Every class section counts, labs and seminars included; first-year courses tend to be larger. UCSB CDS 2025–26, I-3.
18:1
student:faculty ratio
Campus life
37%
live on campus
Who attends
- White31.3%
- Hispanic28.7%
- Asian18.9%
- Multiracial8.1%
- Unknown / other2.6%
- Black1.6%
Enrolled undergraduates; international students are counted separately and not included. UCSB CDS 2025–26, B2.
Popular majors
Will They Graduate?
71.2% of UCSB students graduate in 4 years.
71.2%
finish in 4 years
Entered fall 2019
84%
finish in 6 years
Entered fall 2019
93.48%
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% finish in 6 years, against 84% of all students.
Pell Grant students finish at about the same rate as everyone else.
City & Culture
Beyond the data — what it's actually like to spend four years in Santa Barbara.
The campus sits on a bluff over the Pacific with a lagoon in the middle of it, ten miles from downtown Santa Barbara.
MoreLess
Almost everything social happens in Isla Vista, the student neighbourhood packed between campus and the beach — walkable, loud, cheap by California standards and entirely young. Santa Barbara proper is calmer, more expensive and a bus ride away.
The City
College town
Santa Barbara, CA
Best For
Notable alumni
Notable Alumni
Carol W. Greider
Shared the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery of telomerase. She took her biology degree here in 1983 through the College of Creative Studies, the small honours college that lets undergraduates work like graduate researchers.
Class of 1983
Michael Douglas
Two-time Academy Award winner, for producing One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and for acting in Wall Street. He graduated here in 1968 in drama.
Class of 1968
Jack Johnson
Sold more than 25 million records worldwide, beginning with Brushfire Fairytales. He came here to study film and graduated in 1997, and his early songs came out of the surf-and-beach world around the campus.
Class of 1997
Kathleen Kennedy
President of Lucasfilm and producer of more than 60 films, including E.T. and the Jurassic Park series. She graduated here in 1975.
Class of 1975
Alumni selected for name recognition and range of fields. Not from the Common Data Set.
Traditions
Traditions
Storke Tower
The 175-foot campanile at the centre of campus, the tallest freestanding structure in the county, with a carillon that students can learn to play.
The Lagoon and Campus Point
A saltwater lagoon and a surf break inside the campus boundary. Students check the surf between classes; the trail around the lagoon is the standard place to walk and think.
Isla Vista
The square mile of student housing next to campus where most undergraduates live after their first year. It is the social centre of the university and shapes the experience more than any single tradition.
Gaucho basketball at the Thunderdome
The Events Center is small, loud and close to the floor, and the Big West games against Cal Poly and UC Irvine are the ones students turn out for.
Weekend escapes from Santa Barbara
Weekend Escapes
Within driving distance from Santa Barbara
Downtown Santa Barbara and State Street
About 20 minutesRed-tiled Spanish downtown, the wharf and the county courthouse tower. The standard trip off campus when students want somewhere that is not a student neighbourhood.
Los Padres National Forest
About 30 minutesMountains directly behind the city, with hiking that climbs out of the fog into hot, dry chaparral and views back over the Channel Islands.
Channel Islands National Park
About an hour to the Ventura boatFive islands off the coast, reachable by a ferry from Ventura. Kayaking, sea caves and no development at all.
Los Angeles
About two hoursClose enough for a concert, a museum or an internship interview, far enough that it is a trip rather than a habit.
Getting there and game days
Getting There & Game Days
Nearest airport
Santa Barbara Airport (SBA)
About 10 minutes from campus
For international flights: Los Angeles International (LAX) — about 2 hours by car.
Pro sports nearby
- Los Angeles Dodgers MLBAbout 2 hours away
- Los Angeles Lakers NBAAbout 2 hours away
- Los Angeles Rams NFLAbout 2 hours away
Internships and jobs nearby
Career Proximity
A research campus with a small, unusually deep technology cluster around it, and Los Angeles two hours south.
Top Industries Nearby
Major Employers
- Appfolio
- Procore Technologies
- Raytheon
- The Trade Desk
- Sonos
Goleta and the Santa Barbara technology corridor, with Los Angeles about two hours south
Who thrives here
Who Thrives Here
Santa Barbara admits 38.2% and, like every UC campus, does not read SAT or ACT scores — the file is coursework, GPA, essays and what a student has actually done, which is worth knowing before spending a senior autumn on testing. It is a genuine research university at undergraduate scale: 23,091 undergraduates, an 18:1 student-faculty ratio, and 55.1% of class sections under 20. Outcomes are strong and the finishing rate is the number to price — 84.0% graduate within six years but 71.2% within four, so a fifth year is common enough to budget for. 93.5% come back for a second year. The honest catch is money: aid covers 80.5% of demonstrated need rather than all of it, and graduates who borrow leave owing about $20,043. The other thing to understand before applying is where students live. Only 37.0% are in university housing, and the rest are largely in Isla Vista, the dense square mile of student apartments between campus and the ocean. That arrangement defines the social life here more than any club or team does, and a student who wants a conventional dorm-and-quad four years should look hard at it.