About the data

Where college numbers come from

The tool covers 2,326 colleges: every currently operating, degree-granting main campus in the 50 states and Washington, D.C. whose main award is a bachelor's or associate degree. Community colleges are included so 2+2 transfer plans work here too; purely vocational and certificate-only schools are not.

Baseline figures — acceptance rate, SAT and ACT middle-50% ranges, in-state and out-of-state tuition, room and board, average net price, retention, and 4- and 6-year graduation rates — come from the U.S. Department of Education's College Scorecard institution file, which is built from IPEDS reporting. Those pages are labeled "IPEDS 2025-2026".

86 schools that students apply to most also carry a hand-entered Common Data Set layer with detail federal reporting doesn't publish: average admitted GPA, testing policy, percent of demonstrated need met, merit-aid share, student-faculty ratio, application deadline, and application fee. Those pages are labeled with their CDS year (2024-2025, 2025-2026, collin.edu, dallascollege.edu) — always the newest edition the school itself has published, checked most recently in September 2026. Some schools post their new set months later than others, which is why the years differ. You can narrow the college list to just these using the "Data detail" filter.

A handful of schools do not post a Common Data Set publicly at all, or their newest public edition is several years old. Rather than show stale detail as if it were current, those pages are labeled "IPEDS 2025-2026 (estimated)": federal figures carry the page and the remaining fields are best-available estimates you should confirm with the school.

A third, smaller layer fills gaps: many test-blind or test-optional schools (all of the University of California and Cal State campuses, for example) no longer report GPA or test ranges to the federal government, which left them unscoreable. For those schools we hand-entered the figures published on their U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges profile. Each college page names U.S. News and links the exact profile the number came from, and these values only ever fill a blank — federal numbers always win when both exist.

Anything a school did not report shows as "Not reported" instead of a guess, and CDS values were rounded for readability. Before you build an application list or a budget, confirm the figures with the school. Example search phrase: Abilene Christian University Common Data Set IPEDS 2025-2026 (estimated).

How the fit score works

Your overall score out of 100 is a blend of four sub-scores, each shown on the college page and in your recommendations:

• Academic fit — compares your GPA, SAT/ACT score, and class rank with the middle-50% ranges the college reported, adjusted for how selective it is.
• Affordability — compares the college's average net price (what students actually pay after aid) with the yearly budget you entered, and factors in how much demonstrated need the school typically meets.
• Preferences — location (local, in state, out of state), campus size, city vs. suburban vs. rural setting, whether your intended major is offered, and your in-state preference.
• Program strength — where the school sits in national undergraduate program rankings for your intended major (the "best colleges for X" tables published by U.S. News and similar outlets). We track 37 program areas across 178 schools, and map majors like "pre-med", "graphic design", or "software engineering" onto the closest ranked area. Schools with no ranking in your major aren't penalized much — the sub-score simply carries less weight.

Rankings are reputation-based opinion data, not Common Data Set or federal reporting, so they are labeled separately and weighted the least of the four sub-scores. The top recommendations are the schools with the best combination of academics, affordability, preferences, and program strength — not the highest-ranked schools.

Each college page also shows a summary of item C7 of the Common Data Set — the grid where a school states how much weight it gives each factor (coursework rigor, class rank, GPA, test scores, essays, recommendations, interviews, extracurriculars, volunteer work, level of interest, and more) as Very important, Important, Considered, or Not considered. We have C7 summaries on file for 78 schools; where a summary is missing, the page links you to the school's own Common Data Set. Schools revise C7 every year, so treat ours as a starting point and confirm against the school's published PDF.

Reach, Target, and Likely labels come from the academic sub-score only. They describe how your numbers compare with admitted students — not your odds. Holistic review means essays, recommendations, coursework rigor, and context all matter and cannot be scored here. Recommendation lists are deliberately balanced so you always see Likely options, not just the most selective schools.

How scholarships are matched

The 396 scholarships here are described by structured eligibility rules — GPA minimums, test scores, class rank, majors, first-generation status, citizenship or DACA eligibility, income band, service hours, leadership, athletics, military family status, heritage, Texas residency, and essay requirements.

A strong match means every rule we can check passes. A possible match means nothing disqualifies you but some detail is still missing from your profile. Not eligible yet means at least one stated requirement is not met. Each award lists the individual checks so you can see what to fix.

Every link and every date was re-checked against the provider's own page on September 8, 2026. Recurring programs store the month and day they open and close, so a passed deadline rolls forward to the next cycle instead of showing an expired date, and a program whose window has not started yet is marked "Not accepting applications yet" with the date it opens. When a provider has not published next year's dates, the card says so in plain language instead of guessing. Programs run by partner colleges or community foundations are labeled as such, because those dates are set locally. When a program shuts down it is removed from the list. Providers do occasionally move a date, so confirm on their site before planning around it.

353 of these awards come from Bold.org, a free scholarship platform that publishes each award's requirements, amount, and closing date on a public page. Those pages were read on 2026-09-08, kept only where the award was still marked open, and every card links straight to Bold.org's own application page — nothing is re-hosted here. Bold.org's site rules permit reading those pages. Niche and Scholarships.com are not included: both require an account and their terms do not allow their listings to be copied.

Privacy and limitations

• Your profile, saved colleges, and dismissed scholarships stay in your own browser. There is no account and nothing is sent to a server, so clearing your browser data or switching devices clears your work. Use Compare's export to keep a copy.
• The college list is curated, not exhaustive. A school missing here is not a school to rule out — bring it to your counselor.
• Net price is an average. Your actual cost depends on your FAFSA or TASFA results, merit aid, and family circumstances.
• This tool supports conversations with your counselor; it does not replace them.