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Vanderbilt University Data & Information Overview

468 awards Ranking Badges
Great Price Value for Your Money
7% Acceptance Rate
Want the scoop on Vanderbilt University? We’ve put together a comprehensive report on the school that covers what majors Vanderbilt offers, how the school ranks, how diverse it is, and much more.
All you need to do to learn more about a stat is click on its tile, and you’ll be taken to another page that analyzes that data more closely. Also, you can use the links below to scroll to any section of this page.

How Well Is Vanderbilt University Ranked?

#19 Best Colleges in Nation
#1 Best Colleges in TN
Nursing Highest Ranked Major
Quality Badge

2024 Rankings

College Factual recognizes the best colleges and universities in its annual rankings. These rankings include categories for best overall colleges, best colleges for each major, best value schools, and much more.

Vanderbilt University was awarded 468 badges in the 2024 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is nursing.

Explore Best Ranked Schools for You

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Overall Quality

Vanderbilt landed the #19 spot in College Factual's 2024 ranking of best overall colleges in the United States. The higher ed experts analyzed 2,217 colleges and universities across the nation to determine this ranking. This puts it in the top 1% of all schools in the nation! This is an improvement over the previous year, when Vanderbilt held the #21 spot on the Best Overall Colleges list.

Vanderbilt also holds the #1 spot on the Best Colleges in Tennessee ranking.

See all of the rankings for Vanderbilt University.

Is It Hard to Get Into Vanderbilt?

7% Acceptance Rate
52% Of Accepted Are Women
25% Submit SAT Scores

Acceptance Rate

With an acceptance rate of 7%, Vanderbilt is one of the most selective schools in the country. Good grades and high test scores alone may not be enough to get you into the school, so do your best to submit a stellar application.

Average Test Scores

About 25% of students accepted to Vanderbilt submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 720 and 770. Math scores were between 760 and 800.

SAT Reading and Writing Scores for Vanderbilt University  ( 720 to 770 )
200
800

SAT Math Scores for Vanderbilt University  ( 760 to 800 )
200
800
Vanderbilt received ACT scores from 32% of accepted students. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, ACT Composite scores ranged between 34 and 35.

ACT Composite Scores for Vanderbilt University  ( 34 to 35 )
1
36

Learn more about Vanderbilt University admissions.

Vanderbilt University Faculty

8 to 1 Student to Faculty
81% Full Time Teachers

Student to Faculty Ratio

The student to faculty ratio at Vanderbilt is an impressive 8 to 1. That's quite good when you compare it to the national average of 15 to 1. This is a good sign that students at the school will have more opportunities for one-on-one interactions with their professors.

Percent of Full-Time Faculty

In addition to the student to faculty ratio, some people look at what percentage of faculty members are full-time as a sign of how much time professors will be able to spend with their students. This is because part-time teachers may not be be on campus as much as their full-time counterparts.

The full-time faculty percentage at Vanderbilt University is 81%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.

Full-Time Faculty Percent  81 out of 100
0
100

Retention and Graduation Rates at Vanderbilt University

97% Freshmen Retention
88% On-Time Graduation Rate

Freshmen Retention Rate

The freshmen retention rate of 97% tells us that most first-year, full-time students like Vanderbilt University enough to come back for another year. This is a fair bit higher than the national average of 68%. That's certainly something to check off in the good column about the school.

Freshmen Retention Rate  97 out of 100
0
100

Graduation Rate

Students are considered to have graduated on time if they finish their studies within four years. At Vanderbilt the on-time graduation rate of first-time, full-time students is 88%. That is great when compared to the national average of 33.3%

On-Time Graduation Rate  88 out of 100
0
100

Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at Vanderbilt University.

Vanderbilt University Undergraduate Student Diversity

6,983 Full-Time Undergraduates
43.5% Racial-Ethnic Minorities*
51.3% Percent Women

During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 7,057 undergraduates at Vanderbilt with 6,983 being full-time and 74 being part-time.

How Much Does Vanderbilt University Cost?

$19,970 Net Price
10% Take Out Loans
$36,336 Total Student Loans
The overall average net price of Vanderbilt is $19,970. The affordability of the school largely depends on your financial need since net price varies by income group. See the table below for the net price for different income groups.

Net Price by Income Group for Vanderbilt

$0-30 K $30K-48K $48-75 $75-110K $110K +
$3,176 $4,652 $7,694 $15,636 $40,509

The net price is calculated by adding tuition, room, board and other costs and subtracting financial aid.Note that the net price is typically less than the published for a school. For more information on the sticker price of Vanderbilt, see our tuition and fees and room and board pages.

Student Loan Debt

Almost 66% of college students who graduated with the class of 2018 took out student loans, but that percentage varies from school to school. At Vanderbilt, approximately 10% of students took out student loans averaging $9,084 a year. That adds up to $36,336 over four years for those students.

The student loan default rate at Vanderbilt is 0.9%. This is significantly lower than the national default rate of 10.1%, which is a good sign that you'll be able to pay back your student loans.

Get more details about paying for Vanderbilt University.

How Much Money Do Vanderbilt Graduates Make?

$79,872 Avg Salary of Grads
High Earnings Boost
Although some majors pay more than others, students who graduate from Vanderbilt with a bachelor's degree go on to jobs where they make an average salary of $79,872 in their early years. That's great news for Vanderbilt students since it is 88% more than the average college graduate's salary of $42,485 per year.

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See which majors at Vanderbilt University make the most money.

Location of Vanderbilt University

Tennessee State
6,983 Full-Time Undergraduates
Large City Campus Setting
Located in Nashville, Tennessee, Vanderbilt University is a private not-for-profit institution. Nashville is a great location for students who prefer city over country life.

Get more details about the location of Vanderbilt University.

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Contact details for Vanderbilt are given below.

Contact Details
Address: 2101 West End Avenue, Nashville, TN 37240
Phone: 615-322-7311
Website: www.vanderbilt.edu/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/vanderbilt
Twitter: http://twitter.com/vanderbiltu

Vanderbilt University Majors

88 Majors With Completions
2,364 Undergraduate Degrees
2,412 Graduate Degrees
During the most recent year for which we have data, students from 88 majors graduated from Vanderbilt University. Of these students, 2,364 received undergraduate degrees and 2,412 graduated with a master's or doctor's degree. The following table lists the most popular undergraduate majors along with the average salary graduates from those majors make.

Most Popular Majors Bachelor’s Degrees Average Salary of Graduates
Other Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies 286 $27,160
General Social Sciences 258 $56,276
Economics 211 $72,741
Computer Science 197 $101,714
Mathematics 134 $76,609
Neurobiology & Neurosciences 129 $21,492
Political Science & Government 89 $43,927
General Psychology 84 $28,292
History 62 $40,458
Romance Languages 58 $31,649

Learn more about the majors offered at Vanderbilt University along with which ones have the highest average starting salaries.

Online Learning at Vanderbilt

11% Take At Least One Class Online
5% Take All Classes Online

Online learning options are becoming more and more popular at American colleges and universities. Online classes are great for students who have busy schedules or for those who just want to study on their own time.

In 2020-2021, 1,519 students took at least one online class at Vanderbilt University. This is a decrease from the 11,264 students who took online classes the previous year.

Year Took at Least One Online Class Took All Classes Online
2020-2021 1,519 698
2019-2020 11,264 3,052
2018-2019 1,039 494
2017-2018 826 252
2016-2017 307 112

Learn more about online learning at Vanderbilt University.

If you’re considering Vanderbilt University, here are some more schools you may be interested in knowing more about.

Curious on how these schools stack up against Vanderbilt? Pit them head to head with College Combat, our free interactive tool that lets you compare college on the features that matter most to you!

Notes and References

Footnotes

*The racial-ethnic minorities count is calculated by taking the total number of students and subtracting white students, international students, and students whose race/ethnicity was unknown. This number is then divided by the total number of students at the school to obtain the racial-ethnic minorities percentage.

References

More about our data sources and methodologies.

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