YALE SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT · MBA GUIDE
Yale SOM’s full-time MBA runs for two years in New Haven, Connecticut, with a first-year core that crosses subjects and a required summer internship. Start here to understand the program and prepare each part of your application.
Fall 2027 entry
GET TO KNOW THE PROGRAM
Yale’s first-year core doesn’t treat business functions as isolated subjects. After a set of orientation courses, many of its courses are named for a group a manager has to understand, such as the customer, the competitor, the investor, and the workforce, and they use multidisciplinary cases.
ORIENTATION TO MANAGEMENT
Courses in managing groups and teams, accounting, probability and statistics, economics, negotiation, and global virtual teams, plus the new required AI Foundations for Managers.
ORGANIZATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
Courses such as Customer, Competitor, Investor, Workforce, State & Society, and Operations Engine, ending with a capstone called The Executive.
SUMMER AND YEAR 2
A summer internship is required. In your second year, you can take electives across the university, including at least one approved leadership elective.
You choose a route: an International Experience (a half-semester course and a ten-day trip), Global Network Week, a Global Network course, Global Social Entrepreneurship, or a semester exchange. The Global Network for Advanced Management is Yale’s group of partner business schools. Exchange partners include the London School of Economics, London Business School, HEC Paris, IESE, the National University of Singapore, and Tsinghua.
Testing out: Exams before the fall term can exempt you from core economics, accounting, or statistics, if you reach the grade Yale’s catalogue sets. They don’t exempt you from the rest of the core.
Your cohort and team: You’re placed in a diverse cohort and a smaller learning team. A 2020 student account described five cohorts and teams of seven to nine. Yale’s current pages don’t give today’s sizes.
Exchanges: A semester exchange comes in the fall or spring of your second year. You can also propose an exchange with another school in the Global Network.
Travel support: For 2026–27, Yale’s global studies support covers an International Experience’s costs except international airfare. You can use it instead for up to two Global Network Weeks or up to ten exchange days. Online Global Network courses carry no subsidy.
Outside class: More than 50 student clubs, plus student-run conferences, speakers, recruiting boot camps, and mock interviews.
The options: Yale lists 11 joint-degree combinations with other Yale schools. Most save a year, and each has its own rules.
Applying: You’re admitted separately by both schools, and you add a brief statement of your interest in the joint degree.
MBA and public health: The intensive MBA/MPH takes 22 months and starts with public-health courses in the summer. You apply to both schools at the same time. A three-year route lets you apply to the second school during your first year.
MBA and engineering: The MBA/MS takes two years, with the MBA core first. The engineering school’s application requires the GRE and prerequisites in your discipline.
MBA and asset management: This two-year joint path has its own application, due January 7, 2027, with materials due January 11, 2027. Those aren’t the MBA deadlines.
English tests: Not required. Yale needs you to be fluent in English and judges it from your video answers and interview.
Degrees and transcripts: Accredited three-year degrees from outside the U.S. are accepted. Transcripts not in English need the original plus a notarized English translation.
Your visa paperwork: After you accept your offer, Yale’s Office of International Students and Scholars sends a New Student Survey and asks for proof of funding for your I-20, the form you need for an F-1 student visa. Complete requests normally take 7 to 10 business days.
Working while you study: Yale limits on-campus jobs to 19 hours a week during term. In your second year, off-campus work through curricular practical training is possible, up to 20 hours a week in total, with the required authorization.
Partners and children: They need their own visa documents and added proof of funding. A spouse on an F-2 visa can’t work in the U.S.
Loans: International students can apply to Quorum Federal Credit Union without a U.S. co-signer. Other private lenders on Yale’s list need a creditworthy U.S. co-signer, and Yale can’t co-sign.
The class: International students made up 41% of the Class of 2027.
UNDERSTAND WHAT YALE SOM LOOKS FOR
In Yale’s introduction to this year’s application, Bruce DelMonico writes that “there really isn’t a single profile.” The committee looks at your academic readiness, your experience, your personal background, and what you’d contribute, as one picture.
ACADEMIC READINESS
Yale sets no minimum GMAT or GRE score. The Class of 2027’s median GMAT Focus score was 675, and its median undergraduate GPA was 3.69.
Letrado’s adviceAim for the class’s middle range. When your practice scores stop climbing, move those hours to your essay, your résumé, and your recommenders.
EXPERIENCE AND GOALS
Yale asks about your career interests to understand your motivation. It doesn’t expect a plan you can never change. Full-time work is strongly encouraged but not required.
Letrado’s adviceSay which job you’re aiming for after the MBA and what the degree gives you that your current job can’t. A near, specific goal convinces more than a grand title ten years out.
CONTRIBUTION
Your background and what you’d bring to the community are read alongside your record. The essay asks about a commitment, a community, or a challenge.
Letrado’s adviceChoose the story where you did the most yourself, not the one with the most impressive setting.
WHAT YALE DESCRIBES
Video answers, after you submit and pay
The Behavioral Assessment: 130 pairs of statements, no preparation needed
An interview, by invitation, with an interviewer who has seen only your résumé
The video questions are like ordinary interview questions and aren’t published in advance, but a practice tool is available. The Behavioral Assessment is run by ETS, the organization behind the GRE, and adds to the other evidence in your application. It isn’t a test you study for.
Interviews are required before admission. Invitations go out on a rolling basis and can come as late as decision day, or after you’re put on the waitlist. Your interviewer is a second-year student, a recent graduate, or a member of the Admissions Committee, and asks about your experience and your plans for and after the MBA.
CLASS OF 2027, AT ENROLLMENT
Before the MBA, 25% worked in financial services, 19% in consulting, 12% in technology, 11% at nonprofits, and 9% in government.
These describe one enrolled class, not minimums. The median on the earlier GMAT edition was 740, on a different scale. The middle 80% of undergraduate GPAs, from U.S. transcripts on a four-point scale, ran from 3.37 to 3.93.
WHAT YALE REQUIRES
Yale prefers a current or recent supervisor. A senior colleague who knows your work is accepted if you explain your choice, and entrepreneurs or family-business applicants can ask a client, investor, or mentor.
Yale’s rule is plain: “you can have no role in the drafting or submission of your recommendations.” Share your résumé and context, but not your essays. Recommenders may write in their own language and use translation software.
Yale takes part in the Common Letter of Recommendation from GMAC (the organization behind the GMAT), a shared form whose public questions ask how the recommender knows you, how you compare with well-qualified peers, and the most important constructive feedback they’ve given you.
WHAT YALE SAYS
Yale’s application guide says: “don’t use AI when completing your video questions.” It also says the application itself contains a fuller statement on AI, which isn’t on Yale’s public pages.
If you apply through the Consortium, you also certify that you wrote your essays and that your recommenders wrote their letters.
PLAN THE APPLICATION
Yale reviews applications for fall 2027 entry in three rounds and says your chances are comparable in each, so apply when your application is strongest.
Round 1
Sep 15, 2026Round 2
Jan 6, 2027Round 3
Apr 7, 2027Decisions are released by 5 p.m. Eastern Time. Yale’s public pages don’t give a time of day for the application deadlines, so don’t leave submission to the last hours. The videos and the Behavioral Assessment come after you submit and pay.
One essay of up to 500 words, plus fields on your work, career interests, and activities. Your résumé is normally one page. With more than 10 years’ experience, you can use the space you need.
Required, with no waivers and no preference between the GMAT and GRE. The LSAT is accepted if you’re considering law school. Contact admissions first for instructions. Scores must be valid on the day you submit.
Copies from every university where you earned credit, with official records only on enrollment. Report a GPA only if it’s printed on your transcript. Don’t calculate one.
Professional letters, ideally from a current or recent supervisor. You can have no role in drafting or submitting them.
Two 60-second video answers and the 25-minute Behavioral Assessment for everyone. A 30-minute interview, required before admission, is by invitation.
How it works: You take the first-year MBA core straight after college, then work full time for one or more years, then come back to finish the degree. Yale is clear that it isn’t a conventional deferred MBA, where you work first.
Who can apply for 2027: Normally, students graduating from college between August 1, 2026, and July 31, 2027. One or two years of graduate study straight after college can still qualify, if you haven’t done substantial full-time work. If you graduated in 2025–26, you can petition, explaining why in Optional Information.
What’s different: One recommendation comes from a professor or academic adviser and one from a work or internship supervisor. The interview is 30 minutes with one or two members of the Silver Scholars committee.
Dates and joint degrees: The rounds are the same as the MBA’s. Joint degrees are open to Silver Scholars, except the intensive MBA/MPH.
Which tests: The GMAT (the current Focus Edition or the earlier edition) or the GRE, including the online versions. Scores are valid for five years from your test date to your submission date.
More than one score: Yale reviews every score you report and credits your highest. It also considers the GMAT Superscore (your best section scores combined from several sittings) alongside your individual sittings.
Sending scores: Use GRE code 3986, or select “Yale MBA Full-Time” for the GMAT, and arrange official reporting before your score expires.
The fee: $250, or $175 if your total yearly pay is below $50,000 and $125 if it’s below $25,000. Yale checks pay for admitted students who enroll.
Fee waivers: Yale lists groups such as U.S. military members and veterans, current and former Peace Corps volunteers, members and alumni of Teach For America and Teach For All, current Forté MBALaunch participants and MLT MBA Prep Fellows, and QuestBridge alumni. Request one at least 48 hours before your deadline.
Transcripts: Include study abroad and transfer credit, unless your main transcript lists those courses with their grades.
The Consortium: The Consortium for Graduate Study in Management works to widen access to business education. Applying through it means its core application plus a Yale supplement, with the same review, videos, assessment, and interview. You need to be a member to be considered for a Yale Consortium Fellowship.
Consortium dates: The Consortium lists its deadlines as October 15 and January 5, at 11:59 p.m. EST, without years. Check the cycle on its site. It’s open to U.S. citizens, permanent residents, and recipients of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) who meet its criteria, and the fee is $150 for one school.
QuestBridge MBA Match: For QuestBridge alumni with several years of professional work experience. A match brings a full-tuition scholarship. In the 2026 Match, Yale’s supplement was due September 18, 2026.
If you’re reapplying: You submit a new application and fee, the videos, the Behavioral Assessment, and a reapplicant essay. Within two years, you can reuse your transcripts and recommendations, but you still need valid test scores.
WRITE IN YOUR OWN VOICE
500 words at mostOne required essay, chosen from three prompts. Two 60-second video answers and the Behavioral Assessment follow after you submit.
Each prompt asks what you did: the actions you took, what you contributed, or how you confronted a problem. Shorter fields cover your work, career interests, and activities, and Optional Information is for context the committee needs, not a second essay.
Letrado’s adviceChoose the prompt where your own actions are clearest. If you have to explain at length what happened before you can say what you did, pick another one.
Say why it’s meaningful to you and what actions you’ve taken to support it.
Say what you’ve gained from being part of it, and the most important thing you’ve contributed to it.
Say how you confronted it and how it shaped you as a person.
They’re like ordinary interview questions and aren’t shown in advance. Yale asks you not to use AI or read from a script.
Yale says it isn’t another general essay. Employment gaps of more than three months have their own field in the work section.
MAKE ROOM FOR THE FINANCIAL QUESTION
That’s Yale’s published 2026–27 budget for one student for one academic year. Grant aid isn’t automatic: after you’re admitted, you complete a short supplementary scholarship application, and only students who complete it are considered for grants.
THE SCHOLARSHIP FORM
A short form asks about your funding plans, other opportunities you’re weighing, and relevant circumstances.
HOW AWARDS ARE MADE
Awards consider your merit and your individual circumstances, and usually cover both years.
RECENT GRANTS
Yale awarded more than $7.8 million in grants to the class that entered in 2024.
Yale’s public pages don’t give deadlines for the scholarship form.
Scholarships at Yale SOM (opens in a new tab)PUBLISHED 2026–27 BUDGET · ONE STUDENT, ONE ACADEMIC YEAR
$128,976Tuition is $90,900 and the program fee $500. The rest covers living and personal costs, transportation, books, and health insurance, assuming modest shared housing.
For fall 2027 entry, use the 2027–28 budget when Yale publishes it. The budget is for one student, and Yale doesn’t publish one for partners or children. You’re enrolled in Yale Health automatically unless your own comparable coverage is approved.
Yale SOM cost information (opens in a new tab)Letrado’s adviceWork out your funding plan before you apply: savings, loans, sponsorship, and the other offers you might weigh. Then you can complete Yale’s form quickly once you’re admitted. If funding matters, don’t leave your application to Round 3.
Of the Class of 2025’s 273 job seekers, 79.9% had accepted an offer within three months. The median base salary was $175,000 for graduates working in the U.S., $119,831 for those working outside it, and $90,000 for those in Asia.
Employment report, Class of 2025 (PDF) (opens in a new tab)ADMITTED TO YALE SOM · C.E.
He had eight years in project and infrastructure finance, including renewable-energy deals in East Africa, but several projects were delayed or still in development, and their full scale wasn’t his result. We helped him label each project accurately and plan a realistic path into investment.
Then he focused on his own tasks and decisions, not the project’s full size.
He changed a financial assumption after local operating evidence contradicted the model, rather than defend a cleaner but less useful version.
His plan targeted infrastructure investment or project development before any ambition to lead a fund.
Yale’s interviewers (opens in a new tab) read only your résumé before you meet, which is one more reason to label every project the way C.E. did.
AI illustrationHIS YALE SOM OUTCOME
Admitted to the Yale MBA, with financial support
HIS CHOICE: YALE SOMHarkness Tower, Yale University · Photo: Carol M. Highsmith / Wikimedia Commons, Public domain. Cropped.
INSEAD’s one-year format minimized time away, but Yale’s two years allowed an internship before his next role. Returning to East Africa remained the plan.
ALSO ADMITTED TO
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