At a Glance
CU Boulder admits 70.7% of applicants.
What You'll Actually Pay
See what families at different income levels actually pay after aid.
What families actually pay, by income level
After grants and scholarships. Before loans. Public school prices shown at in-state rates.
Source: College Scorecard / IPEDS, 2024-25
Where the Sticker Price Goes
Based on average need-based grant. Actual cost varies by family income — see chart above.
Shown at in-state rates.
Debt at Graduation
Not reported by this school
receive need-based grant aid
$29,123
average debt at graduation
CU Boulder graduates carry an average of $29,123 in debt.
Merit Aid
12,246
students received merit aid
$11,041
average merit award
Getting In
CU Boulder admits 70.7% of applicants.
SAT — Middle 50% of those who submitted · 27% of the class submitted
ACT — Middle 50% of those who submitted · 6% of the class submitted
26.3% were in the top 10% of their high school class.
What They Value
Academic
Nonacademic
University of Colorado Boulder considers your essay Important — a strong essay can differentiate an otherwise average application. Demonstrated interest is Considered — showing genuine engagement with this school may help your application.
Student Life
39.6% of CU Boulder classes have fewer than 20 students.
Share of undergraduate class sections at each size, from CDS Section I-3. More red = more large lectures.
At CU Boulder, 39.6% of your classes will have fewer than 20 students.
Class size data reflects all undergraduate sections including labs, seminars, and lectures. Large research universities often have smaller upper-division and graduate-level sections that improve the overall distribution. First and second-year students typically experience larger classes than these averages suggest.
Source: Common Data Set 2025–26, Section I-3 (class sizes)
20:1
student:faculty ratio
Campus Life
From out of state (freshman class)
42.9%
Live on campus
26%
Men in fraternities
9%
Women in sororities
22%
Who Attends
Racial and ethnic breakdown of enrolled undergraduates, as reported in each school's Common Data Set. "Unknown / Other" includes students who did not report or selected "other."
CU Boulder's student body is 66.4% white.
Popular Majors
Will They Graduate?
CU Boulder graduates 57.5% of students in 4 years.
Graduating late means paying for extra semesters. The 6-year rate tells you who eventually finishes — the 4-year rate tells you what it actually costs.
CU Boulder graduates 57.5% of students in 4 years.
What finishing late actually costs
Based on each school's published cost of attendance. Public school costs shown at in-state rates.
CU Boulder
57.5%
4-yr grad rate
Extra year cost: $37,684*
* In-state cost of attendance. Out-of-state students pay significantly more.
Graduation rate data from Common Data Set 2025–26, Fall 2018 cohort (most recent available). 4-year rate = students completing in 4 years or less. 6-year rate = students completing within 6 years.
74%
Overall 6-yr rate
65%
Pell recipient rate
A 9 point graduation gap between lower-income and overall students suggests financial or academic challenges for some students.
Freshman Retention
91.2%
91.2% of first-year students return for sophomore year.
City & Culture
Beyond the data — what it's actually like to spend four years in Boulder.
Boulder is a small, expensive, unusually outdoorsy city that would exist without the university but is thoroughly shaped by it. The campus runs up against open space on one side and Pearl Street's pedestrian mall on the other, so the walk between a lecture and a trailhead is genuinely short. The trade-off is cost and scale: this is one of the priciest rental markets in the Mountain West, which is part of why 74% of undergraduates live off campus and why housing is the thing upperclassmen talk about most. Denver is close enough to be the pressure-release valve for anything Boulder is too small to offer.
Notable Alumni
Byron White
Served 31 years as a US Supreme Court Justice before retiring in 1993. He was student body president, class valedictorian, an all-American athlete and a Rhodes Scholar here, and CU's own 150th-anniversary list of notable graduates opens with him.
Class of 1938
Scott Carpenter
One of the original Mercury Seven astronauts and the second American to orbit the Earth, in 1962. He studied aeronautical engineering here around the turn of the 1950s, and later became the only person to be both an astronaut and an aquanaut.
Kalpana Chawla
The first woman born in India to fly in space, and a mission specialist on two Space Shuttle flights. She earned her aerospace engineering doctorate here in 1988 and died aboard Columbia in 2003; a CU scholarship and a campus memorial carry her name.
Class of 1988
Sarah Gillis
A SpaceX engineer who in 2024 became the youngest person to perform a spacewalk, on the Polaris Dawn mission. She trained as an aerospace engineer here — the most recent name on CU's own list of notable graduates.
Matt Stone
Co-creator of South Park, which he began making with Trey Parker while the two were students here. He took a double degree in mathematics and film in 1993; their first animated short was made in Boulder.
Class of 1993
Alumni selected for name recognition and range of fields. Not from the Common Data Set.
The City
Mid-size city
Boulder, CO
Best For
Traditions
Ralphie's Run
A live buffalo sprints the length of Folsom Field ahead of the football team, handled by a student crew who train for the job. The buffalo was chosen as the mascot through a student newspaper competition in 1934.
Conference on World Affairs
A week-long festival of free public panels running every year since 1948, where visiting writers, scientists and politicians are deliberately mixed into unlikely combinations. Students can walk into any of it without a ticket.
Colorado Shakespeare Festival
A professional repertory festival formally established in 1958 and staged on campus each summer, one of the longest-running Shakespeare festivals in the country.
The Flatirons backdrop
The sandstone slabs directly above campus are the university's unofficial landmark and its most-used recreation, with trailheads within walking distance of class.
Weekend Escapes
Within driving distance from Boulder
Rocky Mountain National Park
About 1 hourAlpine hiking, wildlife and the Trail Ridge Road high country — close enough to be an ordinary Saturday rather than a planned trip.
Denver
About 45 minutes, or a direct busConcerts, professional sport, museums and the airport. The Flatiron Flyer bus runs frequently, so a car is not required.
Winter Park and the I-70 ski corridor
1.5 to 2 hoursThe nearest cluster of major ski areas, reachable for a day trip and the reason many students own a season pass.
Getting There & Game Days
Nearest airport
Denver International (DEN)
About 50 minutes from campus
Flies international — you can start a trip abroad from here.
Pro sports nearby
- Denver Broncos NFL
- Denver Nuggets NBA
- Colorado Avalanche NHL
- Colorado Rockies MLB
Career Proximity
Boulder is a genuine employer in its own right rather than a commuter suburb — federal science labs, aerospace firms and a dense startup scene sit in town or just down US 36, with Denver's broader job market 45 minutes away.
Top Industries Nearby
Major Employers
- National Institute of Standards and Technology
- National Center for Atmospheric Research
- Ball Aerospace
- Lockheed Martin Space
- Google Boulder
Denver — about 45 minutes by car, with frequent direct bus service
Who Thrives Here
CU Boulder admits 70.7% of applicants, so getting in is rarely the hard part — the hard parts are finishing and paying. 91.2% come back for a second year and 74.0% graduate within six, but only 57.5% finish in four, and a fifth year at $44,748 out-of-state is a real line item rather than a footnote. Aid covers 72% of need and graduates who borrow leave with $29,123. What makes the place distinct is the geography and how the campus organises around it: the Flatirons sit at the edge of the grounds, and 74% of undergraduates live off campus, so the default is a bike or a bus to a house in Boulder rather than a dorm floor. Greek life is a minority option — 9% of men and 22% of women — which suits a student who wants their social life built around the outdoors instead. The academic culture leans research and space science: this is the only university to have sent instruments to every planet in the solar system, and its alumni include three astronauts. Classes are large for it, with 39.6% of sections under 20 and a 20-to-1 ratio, so a student who needs to be known by name has to go find that themselves.