At a Glance
Michigan admits 15.6% 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
$27,923
average debt at graduation
Michigan graduates carry an average of $27,923 in debt.
Merit Aid
3,758
students received merit aid
$6,270
average merit award
Getting In
Michigan admits 15.6% of applicants.
SAT — Middle 50% of those who submitted · 51% of the class submitted
ACT — Middle 50% of those who submitted · 18% of the class submitted
What They Value
Academic
Nonacademic
University of Michigan 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
51.8% of Michigan 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 Michigan, 51.8% 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 2024–25, Section I-3 (class sizes)
15:1
student:faculty ratio
Campus Life
Live on campus
25%
Men in fraternities
10%
Women in sororities
16%
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."
Michigan's student body is 46% white.
Popular Majors
Will They Graduate?
Michigan graduates 81.7% 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.
Michigan graduates 81.7% 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.
Michigan
81.7%
4-yr grad rate
Extra year cost: $34,654*
* In-state cost of attendance. Out-of-state students pay significantly more.
Graduation rate data from Common Data Set 2024–25, Fall 2018 cohort (most recent available). 4-year rate = students completing in 4 years or less. 6-year rate = students completing within 6 years.
93%
Overall 6-yr rate
89%
Pell recipient rate
There's a 4 point gap between overall and Pell Grant graduation rates. Worth asking the school about support resources.
Freshman Retention
97%
97% of first-year students return for sophomore year.
City & Culture
Beyond the data — what it's actually like to spend four years in Ann Arbor.
Ann Arbor is the classic best-of-both-worlds college town: a genuinely walkable downtown of bookstores, restaurants, and music venues that sits right against campus, wrapped in parks and river trails. It's small enough that students run into each other constantly and big enough to have a real arts and food scene of its own. It suits students who want campus and town to feel like one place; Detroit is 45 minutes away when you want a major city, and Metro Airport is close enough to make going home easy.
Notable Alumni
Larry Page
Co-founded Google after studying computer engineering at Michigan, and later led Alphabet as CEO.
Gerald Ford
The 38th President of the United States, who played center on Michigan's back-to-back national championship football teams.
Lucy Liu
Actor and director known for Charlie's Angels, Kill Bill, and Elementary, who studied Asian languages and cultures at Michigan.
Sanjay Gupta
Practicing neurosurgeon and CNN's chief medical correspondent, who earned both his undergraduate degree and his MD at Michigan.
Valerie Jarrett
Served as Senior Advisor to President Obama for all eight years of his administration, and now leads the Obama Foundation.
Tom Brady
Won seven Super Bowls across a 23-season NFL career after starting at quarterback for Michigan.
Alumni selected for name recognition and range of fields. Not from the Common Data Set.
The City
Mid-size city
Ann Arbor, MI
Best For
Traditions
Saturdays at the Big House
Michigan Stadium holds over 107,000 people, making it the largest stadium in the country, and home games regularly fill it. The whole town reorients around it — downtown restaurants open early and the campus walk to the stadium becomes its own event.
The Game
The season-ending football game against Ohio State is one of the oldest and most intense rivalries in American sports, dating to 1897. Rivalry week brings pep rallies, a campus-wide ban on saying the other school's name, and painted block M's everywhere.
Festifall
At the start of fall term, hundreds of student organizations set up tables across the Diag and the surrounding streets to recruit new members. With well over a thousand student groups on campus, it's how most first-years find their people.
Weekend Escapes
Within driving distance from Ann Arbor
Detroit
45 minutesThe Detroit Institute of Arts, Eastern Market, and four professional sports teams, all a short drive or commuter ride away.
Traverse City & Sleeping Bear Dunes
4 hoursLake Michigan beaches, towering dunes, and cherry orchards — the trip northern Michigan is famous for.
Chicago
4 hoursA full big-city weekend by car or Amtrak, and a common destination for internships and job interviews too.
Getting There & Game Days
Nearest airport
Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County (DTW)
30 minutes from campus
Flies international — you can start a trip abroad from here.
Pro sports nearby
- Detroit Lions NFL
- Detroit Tigers MLB
- Detroit Pistons NBA
- Detroit Red Wings NHL
Career Proximity
Michigan sits at the center of the country's automotive and mobility industry, with Detroit 45 minutes away and a growing tech presence in Ann Arbor itself.
Top Industries Nearby
Major Employers
- Ford Motor Company
- General Motors
- Michigan Medicine
- Rocket Companies
Detroit — about 45 minutes from campus
Who Thrives Here
Michigan offers the scale of a 34,000-student flagship with a campus culture built to match — 107,000 people fill the football stadium on home Saturdays, and over a thousand student organizations recruit at once each fall. The deciding factor is usually cost: about $18K in tuition in-state versus $61K out-of-state, and only 25% of undergraduates live on campus.