The current average total GMAT score is 554.67 out of 805. That’s the global mean across more than half a million GMAT Focus Edition exams taken between 2020 and 2025. But if you’re applying to a top-50 U.S. MBA program, you’ll usually need a score well above the global average—often in the mid-600s or higher.
This guide gives you both: the GMAT averages and score ranges for the top 50 U.S. business schools, plus the percentile context to help you set a realistic target. School rankings reflect the most recent USNWR Best Business Schools release (April 2026). Wherever schools still report on the old 200-800 scale, we’ve included a GMAT Focus Edition translation so you can compare apples to apples.
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Average GMAT Scores in 2026
According to GMAC (the organization that makes the GMAT), the current average total GMAT score is 554.67. That number reflects a sample of 531,520 GMAT Focus Edition exams taken between 2020 and 2025.
Here’s the breakdown by section:
| Section | Mean Score |
|---|---|
| Quantitative Reasoning | 78.06 |
| Verbal Reasoning | 79.34 |
| Data Insights | 75.03 |
| Total Score | 554.67 |
Sample size: 531,520 exams. Data period: 2020-2025. Source: GMAC.
A few things to know about that average:
- It’s a Focus Edition number. The current GMAT (officially the GMAT Focus Edition) uses a 205-805 scale. The classic GMAT, which used a 200-800 scale, was retired in February 2024. If you’ve seen older averages around 575 or 600, those were on the old scale and don’t compare directly.
- The total score is not a simple sum. Your three section scores (each 60-90) feed into a scaled total between 205 and 805. The three sections are weighted equally.
- The mean is global. U.S. test-takers tend to score slightly lower than the global average; test-takers from China and India tend to score slightly higher. GMAC has not yet published country-specific means for the Focus Edition.
Pro tip: Before you set a target, take a free GMAT practice test to see where you stand today. Your baseline matters more than the global average when you’re planning prep.
What’s a Good GMAT Score?
A “good” GMAT score depends entirely on the schools you’re applying to. For the global test-taker pool, anything above 555 puts you above average. For competitive MBA programs, the bar is higher.
Here’s a practical breakdown:
| Target | Score (Focus) | Classic Equivalent | Percentile |
|---|---|---|---|
| Above average for all test-takers | 555+ | 575+ | 48%+ |
| Competitive for many MBA programs | 645+ | 700+ | 87%+ |
| Strong for top-25 programs | 665+ | 720+ | 92%+ |
| Top-tier (M7) competitive | 685+ | 740+ | 96%+ |
| Scholarship-tier / elite | 705+ | 760+ | 98%+ |
645 is the new 700. GMAC has been explicit about this: on the Focus Edition, a 645 sits at the same percentile that a 700 occupied on the classic GMAT. Both are roughly the 87th percentile. So if you’ve heard older advice to “aim for a 700,” translate that to a 645 on the current exam.
For most applicants, a “good” target looks like this:
- If your dream school is in the M7 (Stanford, Wharton, Booth, Harvard, Kellogg, MIT Sloan, Columbia), aim for 685+. Class of 2027 averages at these programs run 670-690 on the Focus scale.
- If you’re targeting top 15-25 programs, aim for 645-675. Most schools in this range report Focus averages between 645 and 685, with a few outliers below.
- If you’re targeting top 26-50 programs, 575-665 is competitive. Averages run from the mid 500s to the mid 600s.
Remember that schools take a holistic view: GPA, work experience, essays, recommendations, and your interview all matter. A below-average GMAT doesn’t end your chances, and an above-average score doesn’t guarantee admission.
Pro tip: Schools care about your section balance, not just the total. A 645 with a strong Quant score reads differently than a 645 with a strong Verbal score. Use Magoosh’s GMAT Score Chart to see how section scores combine into a total.
Average GMAT Scores at the Top 50 MBA Programs
You’ll need a competitive score to stand out at a top business school. At the top 14 U.S. business schools, the average GMAT is at least 665 on the Focus scale. At schools ranked 30-50, averages span from the mid 500s to the mid 600s.
A few notes before the table:
- Rankings reflect USNWR’s 2026 release (April 2026), the most recent Best Business Schools list. Several schools moved several positions since the prior year’s ranking, including Stanford returning to solo #1 and Kenan-Flagler jumping to #21.
- Most top programs now publish both scales. A year ago, only a handful of schools (Yale, Haas, Questrom) reported Focus Edition scores natively. As of 2026, most of the top 25 dual-report Focus + Classic on their class profile pages. The transition is well underway.
- For schools that publish only one scale, we’ve translated to the other using GMAC’s official concordance table. These derived values are marked with a dagger (†).
- An asterisk (*) marks schools that report a median rather than an average.
- A double dagger (‡) marks schools that don’t publish a detailed class profile on their own site; figures for those schools come from Princeton Review, Clear Admit, and other third-party aggregators.
- Most numbers below are from the Class of 2027 (matriculated Fall 2025). The five schools new to the USNWR 2026 top 50 (Iowa State, Miami, Maryland Smith, American Kogod, Arkansas Walton) publish only Class of 2026 figures via third-party sources.
- Where a school doesn’t publish a class profile, we’ve linked to mba.com’s program finder.
A few caveats on the table above:
- Georgetown McDonough publishes a blended profile across Full-time, Part-time, and Online MBA programs (Class of 2025) rather than a Class of 2027 full-time-only number.
- WashU Olin publishes a profile blended across Classes of 2025-2027 (and recently moved domains from olin.wustl.edu to olin.washu.edu).
- UT Dallas (Jindal) has not published a Class of 2027 profile; the most recent is Class of 2023.
- BYU Marriott is still showing Class of 2025 data on its current class profile page.
- Foster uses “current version” (Focus) and “previous version” (Classic) instead of Focus/Classic terminology.
- Cornell Johnson publishes its Focus number as “GMAT 11th Edition,” which is Cornell’s own framing.
- The five new top-50 entrants (Iowa State, Miami, Maryland Smith, American Kogod, Arkansas Walton) are all GMAT-optional programs with small classes (32-130 students) that don’t publish their own class profiles. The figures above come from Princeton Review and other aggregators, and reflect Class of 2026 data. Treat these numbers as directional rather than precise.
GMAT Score Ranges at the Top 50 MBA Programs
Many schools also publish the GMAT score range for the students they’ve accepted. Some report the full range; some report the Middle 80%; a few report Middle 50%. We’ve noted which is which in the table below.
Why ranges matter more than averages: averages can make it look like you need to hit a single magic number, but ranges show that students with a wide variety of scores get in. A score above the average makes you stand out. A score below the average doesn’t disqualify you, especially if the rest of your application is strong.
| USNWR Ranking | School | GMAT Focus Range | GMAT Classic Range |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Stanford University | Full: 615-785 | Full: 540-780 |
| 3 | University of Chicago (Booth) | Middle 80%: 615-725 | Middle 80%: ~670-770 † |
| 4 | Harvard University | Middle 80%: 645-735 | Middle 80%: 690-770 |
| 4 | Northwestern University (Kellogg) | Middle 80%: 630-770 | (not separately published) |
| 6 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Sloan) | Middle 80%: 645-735 | Middle 80%: 710-760 |
| 7 | Columbia University | (not separately published) | Middle 80%: 700-760; Full: 610-780 |
| 7 | New York University (Stern) | Middle 80%: 645-725 | Middle 80%: 690-760 |
| 9 | Dartmouth College (Tuck) | Full: 595-775 | Full: 690-770 |
| 10 | University of California, Berkeley (Haas) | Middle 80%: 637-725 | Middle 80%: 660-767 |
| 11 | University of Virginia (Darden) | Middle 80%: 665-715 | Middle 80%: 680-750 |
| 11 | Yale University | Middle 80%: 638-715 | Middle 80%: 691-760 |
| 13 | University of Michigan–Ann Arbor (Ross) | Middle 80%: 635-725 | Middle 80%: 700-770 |
| 14 | Duke University (Fuqua) | (not separately published) | Middle 80%: 680-770 |
| 15 | Cornell University (Johnson) | Middle range: 615-675 | Middle 80%: 660-740 |
| 16 | Carnegie Mellon University (Tepper) | Middle 80%: 595-715 | (not separately published) |
| 16 | Vanderbilt University (Owen) | Middle 80%: 625-705 | Middle 80%: 680-755 † |
| 18 | University of California–Los Angeles (Anderson) | (not separately published) | Middle 80%: 670-750 |
| 18 | University of Texas–Austin (McCombs) | Middle 80%: 615-695 | (not separately published) |
| 20 | University of Washington (Foster) | Middle 80%: 615-695 | Middle 80%: 689-740 |
| 21 | University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill (Kenan-Flagler) | Middle 80%: 605-715 | (not separately published) |
| 23 | The University of Texas at Dallas (Jindal) | (not separately published) | Middle 80%: 650-700 (Class of 2023, most recent published) |
| 25 | University of Georgia (Terry) | Middle 80%: 615-665 | (not separately published) |
| 29 | Rice University (Jones) | (not separately published for FT MBA) | Middle 50%: 675-720 |
| 31 | Georgetown University (McDonough) | Middle 80%: 569-687 | Middle 80%: 660-740 |
| 38 | Iowa State University (Ivy) ‡ | ~530-565 † | Middle 50%: 575-610 |
| 39 | University of Miami (Herbert) ‡ | ~555-625 † | Middle 50%: 600-680 |
| 43 | Michigan State University (Broad) | Middle 80%: 565-635 | ~615-690 † |
| 43 | University of Maryland (Smith) ‡ | ~575-655 † | Middle 50%: 620-710 |
| 46 | Boston University (Questrom) | Middle 80%: 595-673 | (not separately published) |
| 48 | University of Arkansas (Walton) ‡ | ~535-605 † | Middle 50%: 580-660 |
| 48 | University of Wisconsin–Madison | ~575-645 † | Middle 80%: 630-700 |
Schools omitted from this table only publish averages, not ranges (Fisher, Olin, Carroll, Kogod). A few schools that used to publish ranges no longer do.
GMAT Percentile Rankings
Percentile rankings show how your score compares to everyone who’s taken the GMAT in the past five years. Some schools publish percentile benchmarks instead of (or alongside) score numbers, so it pays to know how the two map.
Here’s the current GMAC percentile distribution, based on 531,520 GMAT Focus Edition exams from 2020-2025:
| Focus Score | Classic Equivalent | Percentile |
|---|---|---|
| 805 | 800 | 100% |
| 755 | 790 | 100% |
| 705 | 760 | 98% |
| 685 | 745 | 96% |
| 675 | 735 | 95% |
| 665 | 725 | 92% |
| 655 | 715 | 91% |
| 645 | 700 | 87% |
| 635 | 690 | 82% |
| 605 | 650 | 70% |
| 555 (≈ Mean) | 580 | 48% |
| 505 | 530 | 27% |
| 455 | 480 | 15% |
| 405 | 430 | 7% |
| 355 | 380 | 3% |
| 305 | 330 | 1% |
Two patterns to notice:
- Each 50-point step in the 600s buys a lot of percentile. Going from 605 (70%) to 655 (91%) is only 50 points, but it jumps you over 20 percentile points. That’s where most of the M7-tier work happens.
- The top end compresses fast. Above 705, you’re already at the 98th percentile. The marginal value of every extra 10 points keeps shrinking; admissions committees focus more on the rest of your application once you clear ~705.
For a deeper breakdown by section, see our guide to GMAT percentiles.
Pro tip: Verbal has the tightest score distribution of the three sections, meaning small score differences translate to big percentile jumps. A V85 puts you in the 94th percentile, while a V80 is only the 56th—five points of section score, 38 percentile points apart.
Final Takeaway
The single number that matters most isn’t the global GMAT average; it’s the average at the schools you’re applying to. Use the tables above as a benchmark, but remember:
- Your GMAT is one piece of your application. A strong score gives you a real advantage, but it won’t carry a weak essay or thin work experience.
- Aim above your target school’s average if you can. That cushion gives the rest of your application more room to work.
- Section balance matters. Most top programs care that both your Quant and Verbal scores are competitive, not just the total.
Once you have a target in mind, the next step is figuring out what your score could be with prep. Try the GMAT score calculator to model how section gains roll up into a total. And when you’re ready to commit to a study plan, Magoosh GMAT prep is built around the same data philosophy as this guide: aim for the right score, prep efficiently, and don’t waste time on what won’t move the needle.
