{"id":4421,"date":"2011-01-04T09:10:53","date_gmt":"2011-01-04T14:10:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/?p=4421"},"modified":"2022-01-29T11:53:52","modified_gmt":"2022-01-29T16:53:52","slug":"mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/","title":{"rendered":"Mission Admission: The &#8220;Right&#8221; Number of Schools"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday. <\/em><\/p>\n<p>These days, as candidates consider their strategy for the coming MBA admissions cycle, many have a logical question in mind: <em>How many schools should I apply to?<\/em> The answer, of course, varies  dramatically from applicant to applicant, but the golden rule is that you should only apply to an MBA program if you have enough time to make your application the best it can be. So, if you have time to \u201cperfect\u201d only three applications, then you should focus on applying to just three schools&#8212;and <em>not<\/em> consider submitting five &#8220;average&#8221;  applications.<\/p>\n<p>In terms of a target number\u2014assuming that time is not a factor and you can commit yourself to all of your applications\u2014five or six is  generally optimal. With five or six applications, candidates can apply  to a mix of reach, competitive and safe schools and can therefore truly  cover their bases. Of course, each applicant has his\/her own risk  profile and timing to consider, but for most candidates, too few schools can increase the risk of not being admitted, and too many can be overkill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday. These days, as candidates consider their strategy for the coming MBA admissions cycle, many have a logical question in mind: How many schools should I apply to? The answer, of course, varies dramatically from applicant to applicant, but the &hellip; <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/\">Read&nbsp;More&nbsp;&nbsp;<i class=\"fal fa-sm fa-angle-right\"><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mission-admission"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Mission Admission: The &quot;Right&quot; Number of Schools | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mission Admission: The &quot;Right&quot; Number of Schools | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday. 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These days, as candidates consider their strategy for the coming MBA admissions cycle, many have a logical question in mind: How many schools should I apply to? The answer, of course, varies dramatically from applicant to applicant, but the &hellip; Read&nbsp;More&nbsp;&nbsp;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/","og_site_name":"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","article_published_time":"2011-01-04T14:10:53+00:00","article_modified_time":"2022-01-29T16:53:52+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":675,"url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-fallback-image.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Jeremy Shinewald","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Jeremy Shinewald","Est. reading time":"1 minute"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":["Article","BlogPosting"],"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/"},"author":{"name":"Jeremy Shinewald","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/74216774a1761e746e2426c9c8171f5f"},"headline":"Mission Admission: The &#8220;Right&#8221; Number of Schools","datePublished":"2011-01-04T14:10:53+00:00","dateModified":"2022-01-29T16:53:52+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/"},"wordCount":203,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization"},"articleSection":["Mission Admission"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/","name":"Mission Admission: The \"Right\" Number of Schools | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2011-01-04T14:10:53+00:00","dateModified":"2022-01-29T16:53:52+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-the-right-number-of-schools\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Mission Admission: The &#8220;Right&#8221; Number of Schools"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/","name":"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","description":"World&#039;s Leading MBA Admissions Consulting Firm","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"mbaMission","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-organization-logo.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-organization-logo.png","width":696,"height":696,"caption":"mbaMission"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/74216774a1761e746e2426c9c8171f5f","name":"Jeremy Shinewald","description":"In addition to being Founder and President of mbaMission, Jeremy Shinewald is a Darden MBA, published author, and the recipient of Poets&amp;Quants\u2019 Lifetime Achievement Award in MBA Admissions Consulting. 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