Bowling Green State University acceptance rate and your odds of getting in

Bowling Green State University, a public university in Ohio, reports a 81% acceptance rate and sits in the accessible band. In practice that means it admits most qualified applicants, so a strong application is judged against an applicant pool that is already self-selected.

Use this page to see what Bowling Green State University weighs, where it ranks among Ohio schools, and how a profile like yours is likely to land. Admitted students post a 75th-percentile SAT around 1170, a useful checkpoint for where your scores sit, though it is a reference range and not a cutoff.

What are my chances at Bowling Green State University with a 3.1 GPA and a 1110 SAT?

About 97% (Safety), by CollegeCalcAI's deterministic model, for an applicant with a 3.1 unweighted GPA and a 1110 SAT, the middle of Bowling Green State University's admitted range, applying Regular Decision without a hook. A 3.4 GPA with a 1210 SAT comes out near 98%. Courses, activities, essays and the application round move the number; the free calculator includes them.

Estimates, not guarantees. Get yours with your real courses and activities. Assistants and developers can fetch this table from the free API: /api/v1/colleges/bowling-green-state-university.

There is no formula that guarantees a spot at Bowling Green State University, but the applicants who get in tend to do the same four things. Here is what the numbers say each one looks like.

Bowling Green State University admitted 15,016 of the 18,629 students who applied for fall 2023, which works out to 80.6%. 3,114 enrolled. Only about 21% of admitted students enrolled, so the school admits several students for every seat it expects to fill, which is why its acceptance rate reads higher than its selectivity feels. Bowling Green State University enrolls about 12,812 undergraduates in total, 57% of them women, with a student-to-faculty ratio of 17 to 1.

Source: U.S. Department of Education, IPEDS 2023 admissions and enrollment.

The middle 50% of admitted students at Bowling Green State University scored between 1000 and 1210 on the SAT (average 1117). On the ACT the middle 50% runs from 19 to 26. A score above 1210 puts you in the top quarter of admits and turns the test into an asset; a score below 1000 puts you in the bottom quarter, where the rest of the application has to carry more weight. Bowling Green State University is test-optional: scores are considered if you submit them but not required. Send a score at or above the middle of the admitted range; otherwise apply without one and let your transcript lead.

Source: College Scorecard (U.S. Department of Education), release 2026-06-10.

The factors that carry the most weight at Bowling Green State University are rigor of secondary school record, academic GPA, and standardized test scores. Solid grades in a challenging schedule do most of the work here, with the rest of the application providing context. These ratings come from Bowling Green State University's reported Common Data Set, so the full chart below reflects what the school itself says it values, not a generic guess.

Bowling Green State University's published cost of attendance, before any aid, is roughly $33,007 per year. Tuition and fees are $14,460 for OH residents and $22,448 for out-of-state students, a $7,988 gap that makes residency the single biggest lever on cost. What families actually pay is different: the average net price after grants and scholarships is $24,022 a year, and it ranges from $18,396 for families earning under $30,000 to $27,414 for families earning over $110,000. 23% of undergraduates receive a federal Pell Grant.

Source: College Scorecard (U.S. Department of Education), release 2026-06-10. Net price is what students receiving aid paid after grants, by family income.

Ten years after enrolling, the median Bowling Green State University student who received federal aid earns $47,896 a year, up from $41,281 at six years. 64% of first-time, full-time students graduate within six years, and 82% return for a second year. Among graduates who borrowed, median federal debt at graduation is $25,000; 48% of undergraduates take federal loans.

Source: College Scorecard (U.S. Department of Education), release 2026-06-10. Earnings cover students who received federal aid.

Among the 45 Ohio schools we track, Bowling Green State University ranks #30 most selective by acceptance rate. Schools like Denison University (17%) and Kenyon College (31%) sit nearby, which makes Ohio a useful frame for calibrating a balanced list. As a public university, residency matters: in-state applicants generally see meaningfully better odds than the headline rate suggests.

Applicants targeting Bowling Green State University often weigh Indiana State University, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, and Lander University, which sit at a similar level. Running the same profile against each one in the free calculator is the fastest way to see where you are a reach, a match, or a likely.

Acceptance rate, application counts, admitted test ranges, cost, and outcomes reflect publicly reported federal data (U.S. Department of Education: IPEDS 2023 and the College Scorecard) and each school's Common Data Set; figures are rounded and lag the current cycle by one to two years, so confirm deadlines and policies on the school's own site. The typical-admit GPA and SAT are CollegeCalcAI's modeled estimates. Estimates from CollegeCalcAI are a planning tool computed by a fixed, transparent model, not a guarantee of any admission decision.