by our College Data Analytics Team
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.
Western Michigan University was awarded 109 badges in the 2025 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is teacher education subject specific.
Explore the best ranked schools for the programs you are most interested in.
College Factual ranked WMU as #322 out of 2,152 colleges and universities in the country on its 2025 Best Colleges list. This puts it in the top 20% of all schools in the nation. This is an improvement over the previous year, when WMU held the #335 spot on the Best Overall Colleges list.
Out of the 56 colleges in Michigan, WMU is ranked at #4.
When it comes to admittance, Western Michigan University is somewhat selective. Its acceptance rate is 85%, which means you'll face some strong competition during the admissions process. Do what you can to make your application stand out.
About 46% of students accepted to WMU submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 500 and 610. Math scores were between 490 and 610.
The student to faculty ratio at Western Michigan University is about average at 16 to 1. This ratio is often used to gauge how many students might be in an average class and how much time professors will have to spend with their students on an individual level. The national average for this metric is 15 to 1.
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 Western Michigan University is 64%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.
Western Michigan University has a freshmen retention rate of 77%. That's a good sign that full-time students like the school and their professors enough to want to stick around for another year. It's also a sign that the admissions team did a good job in choosing applicants who were a good fit for the school.
The on-time graduation rate is the percent of first-time, full time students who obtain their bachelor's degree in four years or less. This rate is 27% for first-time, full-time students at WMU, which is lower than the national rate of 33.3%.
Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at Western Michigan University.
During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 15,969 undergraduates at WMU with 13,296 being full-time and 2,673 being part-time.
| $0-30 K | $30K-48K | $48-75 | $75-110K | $110K + |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $11,928 | $15,061 | $19,705 | $22,682 | $24,944 |
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 WMU, see our tuition and fees and room and board pages.
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 WMU, approximately 54% of students took out student loans averaging $8,367 a year. That adds up to $33,468 over four years for those students.
Get more details about paying for Western Michigan University.
See which majors at Western Michigan University make the most money.
Get more details about the location of Western Michigan University.
Contact details for WMU are given below.
| Contact Details | |
|---|---|
| Address: | 1903 W Michigan Ave, Kalamazoo, MI 49008-5200 |
| Phone: | 269-387-1000 |
| Website: | https://wmich.edu/ |
| Facebook: | http://www.facebook.com/wmich |
| Twitter: | http://twitter.com/wmunews |
| Most Popular Majors | Bachelor’s Degrees | Average Salary of Graduates |
|---|---|---|
| Business Administration & Management | 331 | $55,660 |
| Marketing | 277 | $53,081 |
| Air Transportation | 214 | $34,872 |
| Accounting | 203 | $47,464 |
| Finance & Financial Management | 194 | $50,787 |
| Other Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies | 181 | $38,754 |
| Rehabilitation & Therapeutic Professions | 174 | NA |
| Teacher Education Subject Specific | 170 | $42,468 |
| General Biology | 165 | $35,955 |
| Health & Physical Education | 154 | $26,676 |
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 2022-2023, 10,537 students took at least one online class at Western Michigan University. This is a decrease from the 13,186 students who took online classes the previous year.
| Year | Took at Least One Online Class | Took All Classes Online |
|---|---|---|
| 2022-2023 | 10,537 | 1,811 |
| 2021-2022 | 13,186 | 2,770 |
| 2020-2021 | 18,156 | 7,025 |
| 2018-2019 | 5,652 | 1,236 |
Learn more about online learning at Western Michigan University.
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.