The University of California offered seats to a record number of Californians this year, according to new figures released Wednesday, as it faces intense scrutiny of its admissions practices, including pressure from Sacramento to enroll more state residents and investigations by the Trump administration.
UC admitted 102,031 California first-year students for the fall, an increase of 1,458 from last year. In another record, it offered seats to 29,372 transfer students from California community colleges.
Overall, the nine-undergraduate campus system accepted 78% of the Californians who applied as first-year students. But acceptance rates varied widely at campuses across the state.
UC Berkeley and UCLA each admitted about 1 in 10 applicants. UC Davis took nearly half of those who applied. Merced admitted nearly everyone who met UC’s academic requirements.
A university compact with the state ties its funding increases to enrollment growth. The system must add at least 1% more California undergraduates each year. UC is outpacing that, and says it is on track to reach its goal of enrolling 217,000 California resident undergraduates by 2030. There were 200,532 California undergraduates who attended UC last fall, out of a total of 237,616 undergraduates and 301,093 students overall.
“For generations, a University of California education has been one of the state’s most powerful engines of social mobility, opening doors for talented students from every background and region of the state,” UC President James B. Milliken said in a statement. “The record number of California students we’re welcoming this year reflects UC’s enduring commitment to expanding opportunity while preparing the next generation of leaders, innovators, educators and public servants.”
Race, income and the federal investigations
The admissions figures reflect the first full admissions cycle UC has conducted since federal investigators began examining its use of race in admissions. The Justice Department opened inquiries into the Berkeley, Irvine and Los Angeles campuses in March 2025.
In addition, the department this year accused the UCLA, Davis and San Diego medical schools of favoring Black and Latino applicants over white and Asian American ones, and joined a federal suit against UCLA over the accusation. UC denies the charges and said it follows California’s ban on affirmative action, which has stood for nearly three decades.
The racial makeup of the latest class of admits barely changed year over year. Black, Asian and white students rose slightly. Latino students, still the largest group at 38%, dropped by 37 students. Native American and Pacific Islander admits, the two smallest groups, each fell by about 7%.
Campus-by-campus numbers showed greater year-over-year shifts.
Berkeley admitted 87 fewer Black California students, a drop of 17%. Black students made up 4.4% of Berkeley’s California admits. San Diego admitted 699 fewer Latino students, a drop of 10%, while its Asian admits rose by 642. Davis admitted 1,232 fewer Californians, including fewer Black, Latino, white and Asian students. Santa Cruz admitted 1,249 more Black students.
UC said it admitted a larger share of students from low-income families, 43%, an increase of 1 percentage point from last year. But part of that comes from a change in how low-income is defined. This year, a family earning at or below $85,000 was considered low-income. Last year, the cutoff was $75,000. UC sets the line at the 30th percentile of California household income, recalculating each year using U.S. Census Bureau and Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
The share of admits who would be the first in their families to attend college declined by 1 point to 41%. Overall, UC admitted 42,277 first-generation Californians.
What the 78% overall rate means
The 78% acceptance rate reflects the percentage of California residents who applied for first-year admission and were admitted to any of the nine campuses, not necessarily their first choice.
Across all applicants, including transfer students, out-of-state and international students, UC admitted 74%.
Berkeley admitted 10.5% of all its first-year applicants. UCLA admitted 10.8%. San Diego took 27% and Irvine 30%.
At Santa Barbara and Davis, the admit rates for all applicants were 44% and 46%, respectively. Santa Cruz accepted 82%, Riverside 89% and Merced 97%.
This year, Berkeley was narrowly the hardest UC campus to get into. For much of the last decade, UCLA has been the system’s most selective, including last year with a 9.4% acceptance rate. This year UCLA admitted 2,243 more first-year students while Berkeley admitted 484 fewer.
Among only Californian applicants, UCLA remains the tougher campus, at 10% against Berkeley’s 12%.
Two factors pushed the systemwide admission rate up. First, the applicant pool all but stopped growing. UC received just 273 more first-year applications than last year, and applications from Californians fell by 496.
Second, the campuses with the most room to grow have, over the years, changed how they recruit. In recent years, Riverside and Merced have increased their numbers by going after students who met UC’s admissions requirements but did not include those campuses in their UC fall applications. Riverside and Merced invite the students to add the schools at no cost in December, weeks after the deadline closes and before any campus releases decisions. Those students are then reviewed and notified alongside everyone else who applied in the fall. Santa Cruz joined that practice this year.
Santa Cruz admitted 54,157 California first-year students, 45% more than last year. Riverside admitted 55,914, up 4%. This year, Merced admitted 636 fewer Californians.
Californians often hold offers from several campuses before choosing one, and many pick less selective campuses as backups while holding out for UCLA and Berkeley seats.
Transfer admissions increased markedly this year. UC admitted 29,372 community college transfer students, 6% more than last year. California community colleges supply almost all of UC’s transfers, as they have for years.
“There is no singular path to UC Berkeley, but we are particularly proud that over 93% of our incoming transfer students hail from California community colleges,” said John Marfield, Berkeley’s assistant vice chancellor and director of undergraduate admissions.
Emily D. Engelschall, associate vice chancellor for enrollment services at UC Riverside, pointed out that the campus admitted 13% more community college transfers.
“With our transfer population, it is absolutely intentional to do what we can to grow that population of students that’s applying,” she said.
Engelschall said the Inland Empire’s community colleges were slow to recover after the pandemic but have begun to rebuild their transfer pipelines. “I think we’re finally starting to see that open up a little bit more,” Engelschall said.
At Santa Monica College, which has sent more students to UC than any other community college for decades, administrators said UC’s appeal remains strong.
“Individuals and families still see transferring to one of their campuses as a great cost saving strategy and pathway to an excellent education,” said Janet Robinson, SMC’s transfer faculty leader.
International students
UC admitted more international students for a third straight year. Offers to international first-year applicants rose 6% to 23,569, up from 17,420 in 2023. Last year they rose 17%.
But system leaders expect fewer of them to set foot on campus.
Trump administration policies have tightened visa rules, restricted financial aid and increased monitoring of international students, and made them less likely to enroll. Campuses have attempted to make up for the losses by giving more seats to the group that pays full nonresident tuition. Last year about 27% of admitted international students ended up enrolling, compared with about 42% of admitted Californians.
Riverside has less room to absorb that risk, Engelschall said, and it cut international first-year admits by 3%.
Berkeley and San Diego also cut international admits. Santa Barbara increased its numbers, from 8,998 international first-year admits to 12,024.
Times graphics editor Sean Greene contributed to this report.
