University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign supplemental essays
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign asks for two supplemental essays in 2026-27, plus more depending on your college or program. Common App. Personal statement required (250-650 words).
Early Action closes November 1, 2026 and Regular Decision closes January 5, 2027. The prompts carry this limit: About 150 words. Every University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign prompt is printed on this page in full, with its word limit and who has to answer it, checked against the college’s own admissions page.
Deadlines
| Round | Date |
|---|---|
| Early Action | November 1, 2026 |
| Regular Decision | January 5, 2027 |
Checked against admissions.illinois.edu/essays. Confirm on the college’s own page before you submit.
The essays, 2026-27
Required · About 150 words
Explain, in detail, an experience you’ve had in the past 3 to 4 years related to your first-choice major. This can be an experience from an extracurricular activity, in a class you’ve taken, or through something else.
First of two bullets under the heading "First-Choice Major Essays". BOTH first-choice bullets are required; this is not a choose-one. Answered in the Writing section of the Illinois questions on the Common App. Contains curly apostrophes (U+2019) in "you've", reproduced verbatim.
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Required · About 150 words
Describe your personal and/or career goals after graduating from Illinois and how your selected first-choice major will help you achieve them.
Second of two bullets under "First-Choice Major Essays". Required alongside the first.
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Required if applying Undeclared (replaces the two first-choice major essays) · About 150 words
What are your future career or academic goals? You may include courses you took in high school and how these impacted your goals.
Under the sub-heading "If you're applying Undeclared...", introduced by "Complete these prompts instead of the standard first-choice major essay prompts." Undeclared applicants answer this and the next one INSTEAD OF the two first-choice major essays, not in addition to them.
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Required if applying Undeclared (replaces the two first-choice major essays) · About 150 words
What are your academic interests? Please include 2-3 majors you’re considering at Illinois and why.
Second Undeclared-track prompt. Contains a curly apostrophe (U+2019) in "you're", reproduced verbatim.
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Required if you list a second-choice major (optional otherwise, because listing a second-choice major is optional) · About 150 words
Please explain your interest in your second-choice major or your overall academic or career goals.
Under the heading "Second-Choice Major Essay", introduced by "When you apply with a second-choice major, you'll answer this additional prompt." This is what makes the Illinois supplement 2 essays or 3 essays depending on the applicant.
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Your University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign checklist
Two supplements, all required. The first deadline, Early Action, is November 1, 2026.
- Common App personal statementRequired250-650 words
- Supplement 1RequiredAbout 150 words
- Supplement 2RequiredAbout 150 words
- 3 program-specific promptsOnly if you apply to the college or program it names. All printed in full above.
It saves these rows to your essay manager, where each one carries a status you set yourself and the prompt stays attached to it. Add your other schools and they land on the same page, in deadline order. Nothing written yet? The topic quiz is free as well.
Free: this page, the checklist, the essay manager and the topic quiz. Paid: a written review of a finished draft, $49 an essay.
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Getting into University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign admits 42.4% of applicants. The middle 50% of enrolled students scored 1310-1520 on the SAT and 30-34 on the ACT.
About 1 in 2 applicants are admitted, at a college of 36,258 undergraduates.
| Enrolled students | 25th | Median | 75th |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAT total | 1310 | 1440 | 1520 |
| SAT reading and writing | 650 | 700 | 740 |
| SAT math | 660 | 740 | 780 |
| ACT composite | 30 | 32 | 34 |
What SAT score do you need for University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign?
A 1520 puts you in the top quarter of the students who enrolled, a 1440 at their midpoint, and a 1310 at the bottom quarter, meaning one in four enrolled students scored below it. The same three points on the ACT are 30, 32 and 34. A quarter of an enrolled class scoring under the 25th percentile is not a rounding error, so a score below the range is a reason to strengthen the rest of the application rather than a reason not to apply.
US Department of Education, College Scorecard (2026-09-17). Percentiles describe students who enrolled, not everyone admitted. SAT totals are the reading and math bands added together, which is how every source in this market reports them and is an approximation of about 10 to 20 points, because the two sections are correlated.
- What SAT score do you need for University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign?
- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign sets no minimum. Among students who enrolled, the middle 50% scored 1310-1520 on the SAT: a 1310 sits at the 25th percentile, 1440 at the median and 1520 at the 75th. A score at or above 1520 is a clear strength in the application; below 1310 it is the part of the file the rest has to make up for. These are the figures University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign reports to the US Department of Education, released in the College Scorecard of 2026-09-17.
- What ACT score do you need for University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign?
- The middle 50% of enrolled students scored 30-34 on the ACT, with a composite of 32 at the median. There is no cutoff: a quarter of the enrolled class scored below 30. Reported by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign to the US Department of Education, College Scorecard release of 2026-09-17.
- What GPA do you need for University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign?
- The honest answer is that the federal data behind this page does not contain one. Colleges report their admit rate and their enrolled students' test scores to the Department of Education; they do not report a GPA distribution, so any site quoting an exact average GPA for University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign is either reading that college's own Common Data Set or estimating. What the reported data does say is that University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign admits 42.4% of applicants, and the more selective a college is, the closer to the top of the class its admitted students sit and the more the strength of your course load counts alongside the number itself.
- How hard is it to get into University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign?
- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign admits 42.4% of the people who apply, which is about 1 in 2 applicants. Numbers inside the reported range put you in a real position here, and the application itself decides the rest.
What University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign costs after grant aid, by family income, from the same federal data.
Sort your whole college list into reaches, targets and likelies, or find colleges that fit your GPA and test scores. Both are free and neither needs an account.
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign essay questions, answered
- Does University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have supplemental essays?
- Yes. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign asks for two supplemental essays in 2026-27, plus more depending on your college or program. Every prompt is printed in full on this page. Word limits: About 150 words.
- How many essays do you write for University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 2026-27?
- Two supplements, plus the Common App personal statement. Some applicants write more, depending on the college or program.
Schools with similar admit rates
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign admits 42.4% of applicants. The colleges either side of it in our set by admit rate, most selective first, each with its own prompts and deadlines: University of Tennessee, Knoxville (41.6%), North Carolina State University (41.7%), Dickinson College (42.1%), Furman University (43.0%), University of South Florida (43.2%), Union College (NY) (43.9%).