Suppose you were recently waitlisted to the Emory University Class of 2029. You’re likely wondering if Emory has a history of turning to its waitlist and, if so, if the institution typically reaches deep down its waitlist to fill seats in its incoming classes. Well, we’ve got answers to all your questions about the Emory waitlist!

Emory Waitlist Acceptance Rates and Statistics

Below are the last five years of Emory waitlist acceptance rates and statistics — from the Class of 2027 through the Class of 2023 as reported to The Common Data Set:

Emory University Class Year	Number of Students Waitlisted to Emory	Number of Students Who Chose to Join Emory Waitlist	Number of Students Accepted Off Emory Waitlist	Emory Waitlist Acceptance Rate
Emory Class of 2029	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD
Emory Class of 2028	Not Yet Published	Not Yet Published	Not Yet Published	Not Yet Published
Emory Class of 2027	5,875	3,372	123	3.65%
Emory Class of 2026	6,448	3,388	107	3.16%
Emory Class of 2025	6,539	3,883	21	0.54%
Emory Class of 2024	5,215	2,898	477	16.46%
Emory Class of 2023	4,679	3,731	168	4.5%

Your Chances of Admission to Emory After Being Waitlisted

Unlike other highly selective institutions, Emory does not maintain a treasure trove of waitlist data on its Office of Planning and Administration’s website. Often, schools will feature their releases to The Common Data Set over the last ten or more years, but Emory publishes only the four most recent data sets.

That said, Emory has turned to its waitlist over each of the last five years in which data has been released. During this time frame, Emory has admitted as few as 21 students off its waitlist (for the Class of 2025) and as many as 477 (for the Class of 2024 as so many students opted to take gap years due to the onset of the pandemic). On average, Emory admitted 179 students out of limbo over this span, with an average waitlist acceptance rate of 5.66%.

Emory University’s Waitlist Mistake

But if you learn you’re among the waitlisted candidates lucky enough to earn a seat in the Emory incoming class, you might want to wait to celebrate for at least a few hours. Wondering why?

Twelve years ago, Emory mistakenly sent an email notification inviting students to an admitted students event to encourage these students to select Emory as the college they would be attending. But the email didn’t just go out to all admitted students — it also went out to a select set of students on the Emory waitlist. One such student was then-high school senior Savannah Jones.

According to a piece on the Emory waitlist mistake in The Emory Wheel, “Jones immediately called her mom to express how excited she was that she had been admitted to her top choice school. However, upon checking OPUS, she noticed her status on the waitlist had not changed…’ All systems have glitches, but that is damaging emotionally especially for someone who is dead set on Emory and didn’t get in in the first place,’ Jones said.” 

And Savannah was right. Colleges need to be more circumspect when sending out mass emails. They should never send an invitation to an admitted student weekend if all students on that list haven’t yet received an invite to the incoming class.

Your Chances of Admission to Emory After Being Waitlisted with Ivy Coach’s Help

If Emory has waitlisted you to its Class of 2029, we at Ivy Coach can help optimize your case for admission — to give you the best shot of earning entry out of limbo. It’s a two-step process that goes as follows:

1. Complete Ivy Coach’s PostMortem application review. We need to review each piece of your Common Application and Emory supplement to know precisely how you positioned yourself. After all, we can’t position you out of left field once waitlisted. If you were a student interested in art history when you applied, you can’t suddenly position yourself as a biology student. We need to help present you as the most exciting art historian you can be.
2. Submit a compelling Letter of Continued Interest to Emory — one filled with no brags and no updates but instead laden with specific after specific about how you’re going to contribute your hook to the institution. On its website, Emory’s admissions office writes, “Demonstrated interest” is not a factor in our application review process.” The admissions office even penned a blog post that they don’t measure Demonstrated Interest. It’s nonsense! Emory invented Demonstrated Interest — quantifying a student’s likelihood of attending. The notion that Emory doesn’t care about Demonstrated Interest is thus comical. Send that letter and fill it with specifics that only apply to Emory to demonstrate your interest in attending!

Getting Started with Ivy Coach on Emory Waitlist

If you’re interested in optimizing your case for admission off the Emory waitlist, fill out Ivy Coach’s consultation form. We’ll then be in touch to delineate our services for students who first come to us after receiving waitlist decisions.