East Tennessee State University acceptance rate and your odds of getting in

With an acceptance rate near 86%, East Tennessee State University is an accessible public university in Tennessee. Because it admits most qualified applicants, admission turns on the strength of your whole profile rather than any one number.

Use this page to see what East Tennessee State University weighs, where it ranks among Tennessee schools, and how a profile like yours is likely to land. Admitted students post a 75th-percentile SAT around 1140, a useful checkpoint for where your scores sit, though it is a reference range and not a cutoff.

What are my chances at East Tennessee State University with a 3.1 GPA and a 1090 SAT?

About 98% (Safety), by CollegeCalcAI's deterministic model, for an applicant with a 3.1 unweighted GPA and a 1090 SAT, the middle of East Tennessee State University's admitted range, applying Regular Decision without a hook. A 3.4 GPA with a 1200 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/east-tennessee-state-university.

Here is how to get into East Tennessee State University, built from what its admitted class actually looks like and what the school says it weighs.

For the fall 2023 entering class, East Tennessee State University received 9,903 applications and admitted 8,622, an acceptance rate of 87.1%. 2,141 enrolled. Only about 25% 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. East Tennessee State University enrolls about 10,004 undergraduates in total, 60% of them women, with a student-to-faculty ratio of 15 to 1.

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

The middle 50% of admitted students at East Tennessee State University scored between 980 and 1200 on the SAT (average 1144). On the ACT the middle 50% runs from 19 to 26. A score above 1200 puts you in the top quarter of admits and turns the test into an asset; a score below 980 puts you in the bottom quarter, where the rest of the application has to carry more weight. East Tennessee 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.

In its review, East Tennessee State University leans most on 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 East Tennessee State University's reported Common Data Set, so the full chart below reflects what the school itself says it values, not a generic guess.

East Tennessee State University's published cost of attendance, before any aid, is roughly $27,042 per year. Tuition and fees are $10,472 for TN residents and $14,522 for out-of-state students, a $4,050 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 $15,983 a year, and it ranges from $12,433 for families earning under $30,000 to $21,193 for families earning over $110,000. 35% 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 East Tennessee State University student who received federal aid earns $44,859 a year, up from $38,704 at six years. 53% of first-time, full-time students graduate within six years, and 76% return for a second year. Among graduates who borrowed, median federal debt at graduation is $19,442; 34% 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 33 Tennessee schools we track, East Tennessee State University ranks #25 most selective by acceptance rate. Schools like Vanderbilt University (6%) and Fisk University (37%) sit nearby, which makes Tennessee 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.

Build around East Tennessee State University with peers at a comparable selectivity, such as Ball State University, Kent State University, and Lamar University. 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.