Test-Optional Colleges 2026: Who Requires the SAT Now

Between 2022 and 2024, more than 1,800 four-year colleges adopted test-optional policies. Many of those policies were always temporary, set to expire after a stated review period. The 2026-27 cycle is the one where a handful of high-profile institutions ended that review and chose to require testing again.

Three buckets now exist. Test-required schools want an SAT or ACT score from every applicant. Test-optional schools let the student choose whether to submit. Test-blind, also called test-free, refuses to consider scores even if a student sends them. The FairTest list of test-optional colleges is the most current public summary, but for any single school the only authoritative source is its own admissions page.

These institutions have publicly announced that the class entering in fall 2027 must submit an SAT or ACT score, with limited exceptions. The list is not exhaustive and policies can still shift before the November early-decision deadlines, so verify each school on its official admissions site.

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology reinstated its testing requirement in 2022 and continues to require scores from every applicant.
• Yale and Dartmouth announced returns to required testing for the 2024-25 cycle and remain test-required for 2026-27. Yale accepts AP and IB scores in place of SAT or ACT under its flexible-testing policy.
• Brown, Harvard, and the University of Pennsylvania moved back to required testing for the 2025-26 cycle. Brown and Harvard maintain that policy for 2026-27.
• Caltech reinstated testing for the 2025-26 cycle after several years of being test-blind.
• Stanford reinstated testing for the 2025-26 cycle as well.
• Georgetown has required testing throughout, and Cornell has moved several of its undergraduate colleges to test-required status for 2026-27.
• Public flagships including the University of Florida, Georgia Tech, the University of Tennessee, and the University of Texas at Austin require SAT or ACT scores.
• Purdue restored its testing requirement for the 2025-26 cycle.

Most selective private liberal arts colleges, many large public university systems, and the majority of mid-sized private universities are still test-optional for the 2026-27 cycle. A few notable cases:

• Princeton, Columbia, and Northwestern are test-optional for 2026-27. Each has announced that the policy is under review on a year-by-year basis.
• Duke, Vanderbilt, and the University of Chicago remain test-optional.
• The University of Michigan, the University of Virginia, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill are test-optional for in-state and out-of-state applicants.
• The 16 schools of the University of California system are test-blind, meaning scores cannot be submitted or considered for admission or scholarships. The 23 California State University campuses are also test-blind.
• Bowdoin, Wesleyan, Hampshire, Pitzer, and Sarah Lawrence have been test-optional or test-blind for years and have not signaled a return to required testing.

When test-optional became the default during the pandemic, application volume to selective schools rose sharply. Yield rates fell, and admissions offices reported that reading applications without a standardized measure made it harder to compare students from schools they had never seen before.

Several recent institutional studies, including ones published by MIT and Dartmouth, found that test scores added information beyond GPA in predicting first-year academic performance, especially for students from under-resourced high schools who had not submitted scores under optional policies. Those findings drove the highest-profile reinstatements.

At the same time, public state systems in California and most liberal arts colleges have published their own data showing that holistic review without scores produces comparable outcomes. Both camps cite real research; the right answer depends on the institution.

For test-required schools, the decision is made. Submit the strongest official score the student has by the application deadline. For test-optional schools, the decision turns on one number: how the student's score compares with the school's published middle 50 percent range.

If the score sits at or above the school's 50th percentile (the median), submit it. If it sits below the 25th percentile, almost always do not submit. The gray zone between the 25th and 50th percentiles is where the call gets harder.

• Pull each test-optional school's most recent admitted-student profile and find its SAT and ACT middle 50 percent range. The College Scorecard publishes these for every Title IV institution, and our school search surfaces them alongside admission rate and net price.
• Compare the student's best official score with the 50th percentile, not the 75th. A score at the median is a clear submit; a score 30 points below the 25th percentile is a clear hold.
• In the gray zone, weigh the rest of the application. A strong GPA, a competitive curriculum, and a high-context counselor letter can carry the file without a borderline score; a lighter transcript benefits more from any objective data point.
• Treat each school separately. The same 1380 SAT can be a submit at one school and a hold at another. Decisions made school by school usually beat one blanket rule.

Admissions readers at test-optional schools typically read the file in two passes. The first pass looks at curriculum, grade trend, recommendations, and essay. If a score is on file, it joins this initial picture and either confirms what the academic record suggests or raises a flag if there is a wide mismatch.

A submitted score above the school's median nudges a borderline file toward admit. A submitted score below the 25th percentile rarely tips a file toward admit and sometimes does the opposite. Withholding a score under that threshold is the safer call.

Merit scholarships are the place where test-optional policy matters most. Many schools that are test-optional for admission still use scores for institutional merit aid, which can shift a student's net price by several thousand dollars per year. Always check each school's scholarship page, not only its admissions page.

A rising senior applying in fall 2026 has time for one or two more official test sittings before the November early-decision deadlines. The June and August SAT and the July and September ACT are the realistic windows.

Pair that calendar with the school list. If even one school on the list requires testing, the student needs a score. If the list is entirely test-optional and test-blind, the decision becomes about scholarships and personal preference rather than admission eligibility.

• Build a one-column spreadsheet of every school on the list with its current policy: required, optional, or blind. Refresh this in late August in case any school updates its rules.
• Plan a target test date and a backup. Skipping the August test in favor of a single September attempt is the most common reason a strong applicant ends the cycle without a usable score.
• Run each school's net-price calculator both with and without a likely score, where the school awards merit aid based on scores. The dollar difference often answers whether one more test attempt is worth the time.

Test policy is no longer one rule for every school. It is a per-school question that interacts with the student's score, the rest of the application, and how each institution awards aid. Build the school list first, classify every school on testing policy second, and decide whether to submit on a school-by-school basis.

Students who treat the score as a tool rather than a verdict usually make stronger choices. A score that sits above one school's median and below another's belongs in only one of those applications.