Information about fall 2025 enrollment, scholarships and other matters reported by Council-approved law schools to the Council of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar is now publicly available. The information is required to be made public under Standard 509 of the Standards and Rules of Procedure for Approval of Law Schools.
Several comprehensive spreadsheets, explanatory information and a multi-year archive of Standard 509 reports, as they are known, are available to the public at https://www.abarequireddisclosures.org/. Some of this information has been collected and summarized in the 2025 Standard 509 Data Overview document on the Statistics page of the section’s website.
The 196 law schools that are approved by the Council to confer the Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree, including two provisionally accredited law schools, reported a total J.D. enrollment of 120,039 for the fall 2025 term, an increase of 4,629 students (4%) from 2024. An additional 25,077 law students were enrolled in non-J.D. programs (LLM, master’s and certificate programs). This is a 6.3% increase over last year when law schools enrolled 23,583 non-J.D. degree students in fall 2024.
Together, total law school enrollment for fall 2025 increased 6,123 students (4.4% percent) to 145,116. Law schools reported 42,817 students began J.D. studies in the fall 2025 First-Year Entering Class (FY Enrollees). This is an increase of 3,128 students (7.9%) from the 2024 reporting cycle. By definition, FY Enrollees includes students who applied and enrolled in law school for the first time this year, deferred attendance after being admitted in a prior year and enrolled in first-year studies with no prior credit after discontinuing a prior enrollment.
Law schools also provided information regarding which test they accepted for each student admitted. There were 41,847 students accepted with LSATs, 531 with GREs, 127 with the JD-Next prep course and entrance test and 312 without a standardized test (a law school may admit up to 10% of an entering class without requiring a standardized test as long as the students meet certain criteria or under other circumstances if they have obtained permission to do so under a variance).
Women comprise 55.1% of the incoming First-Year class, along with 42.5% men, 1% another gender identity, and 1.4% preferred not to respond. The Data Overview includes additional information regarding the demographics of this year’s FY enrollees.
“One of the Council’s core principles of accreditation is to ensure that applicants and the public receive comprehensive and accurate information about law schools,” said Managing Director Jennifer Rosato Perea. “This vital work ensures transparency and consumer protection of prospective students, empowering them to make informed choices and assisting law schools and others in shaping the future of legal education.”
The material released today covers admissions, tuition and living costs, financial aid, class and faculty demographics and other areas. The data can be easily searched and sorted, allowing for school-by-school comparisons and analysis and should be useful to prospective law students, pre-law advisors, media outlets and others who study and write about legal education.
Bar passage data for 2024 bar examination outcomes are expected to be released in February 2026. Employment outcomes for the class of 2024 measuring law graduate employment on March 15, 2026 (approximately 10 months after spring graduation), are expected to be released in April 2026.
Several comprehensive spreadsheets, explanatory information and a multi-year archive of Standard 509 reports, as they are known, are available to the public at https://www.abarequireddisclosures.org/. Some of this information has been collected and summarized in the 2025 Standard 509 Data Overview document on the Statistics page of the section’s website.
The 196 law schools that are approved by the Council to confer the Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree, including two provisionally accredited law schools, reported a total J.D. enrollment of 120,039 for the fall 2025 term, an increase of 4,629 students (4%) from 2024. An additional 25,077 law students were enrolled in non-J.D. programs (LLM, master’s and certificate programs). This is a 6.3% increase over last year when law schools enrolled 23,583 non-J.D. degree students in fall 2024.
Together, total law school enrollment for fall 2025 increased 6,123 students (4.4% percent) to 145,116. Law schools reported 42,817 students began J.D. studies in the fall 2025 First-Year Entering Class (FY Enrollees). This is an increase of 3,128 students (7.9%) from the 2024 reporting cycle. By definition, FY Enrollees includes students who applied and enrolled in law school for the first time this year, deferred attendance after being admitted in a prior year and enrolled in first-year studies with no prior credit after discontinuing a prior enrollment.
Law schools also provided information regarding which test they accepted for each student admitted. There were 41,847 students accepted with LSATs, 531 with GREs, 127 with the JD-Next prep course and entrance test and 312 without a standardized test (a law school may admit up to 10% of an entering class without requiring a standardized test as long as the students meet certain criteria or under other circumstances if they have obtained permission to do so under a variance).
Women comprise 55.1% of the incoming First-Year class, along with 42.5% men, 1% another gender identity, and 1.4% preferred not to respond. The Data Overview includes additional information regarding the demographics of this year’s FY enrollees.
“One of the Council’s core principles of accreditation is to ensure that applicants and the public receive comprehensive and accurate information about law schools,” said Managing Director Jennifer Rosato Perea. “This vital work ensures transparency and consumer protection of prospective students, empowering them to make informed choices and assisting law schools and others in shaping the future of legal education.”
The material released today covers admissions, tuition and living costs, financial aid, class and faculty demographics and other areas. The data can be easily searched and sorted, allowing for school-by-school comparisons and analysis and should be useful to prospective law students, pre-law advisors, media outlets and others who study and write about legal education.
Bar passage data for 2024 bar examination outcomes are expected to be released in February 2026. Employment outcomes for the class of 2024 measuring law graduate employment on March 15, 2026 (approximately 10 months after spring graduation), are expected to be released in April 2026.
