Some law schools have additional application components. For example, as of 2023:

• Yale requires an additional 250-word essay and extensive background information about your professional and extracurricular experience
• Penn has two additional, optional one-page essays
• Duke has an additional optional essay
• Michigan has several options for additional one- to two-page essays, of which you can choose up to two
• Northwestern has an additional optional, one- or two-paragraph essay
• Cornell has an additional optional essay
• Georgetown has an additional, optional 250-word essay or one-minute video component

Applying to law school is time-intensive. From starting to think about law school to submitting your applications, you can expect the application process will take over 100 hours over the course of at least four months; some applicants spend more like 400 hours. (Ideally, you would spread this work out over a longer period of time). Many applicants will spend at least half of the time they invest in their application on test prep for the LSAT or the GRE.

1. Reaching out to former professors to provide an update on your work and plans to attend law school, especially if you have already graduated college and haven’t yet secured letters of recommendation. Keeping in touch with former professors is a great way to keep “warm references” that you can draw upon in the future.
2. Asking friends for help with proofreading your resume and personal statement to ensure that they are free from typos and other errors. Lawyers and law school admissions committees tend to value attention to detail, so small mistakes in your application materials can be costly. Just be sure to disclose any help you receive, if asked to do so. (Yale, for example, asks a question about this topic.)
3. Applying early in the application cycle, ideally in September or October of the year before you plan to start law school. Most law schools have rolling admissions, meaning that there are fewer seats available as the cycle progresses. 2 All else being equal, planning ahead to be ready to apply toward the beginning of the cycle may help i

• Aiming for impressive extracurricular activities during college. Like aiming for higher grades, this typically requires a very significant time commitment, but it is ambiguous how much benefit people receive from these kinds of activities. Anecdotally, they seem to be much less necessary in the law school admissions process than they are in undergraduate admissions, where most top candidates have near-perfect high school GPAs and test scores, and schools seem to use extracurricular activities as a way of distinguishing otherwise-similar candidates. Having one or two meaningful extracurricular commitments is probably sufficient for most candidates, especially if a recommender can speak to the candidate’s interest and performance in that activity.
• Demonstrating an interest in a specific area of law, for example through extracurricular activities or post-college work experience. These kinds of experiences can help show law school admissions committees that you have thought carefully about why you want to go to law school and what kind of work you want to do with your degree. But having this kind of background isn’t a requirement for admission; many people enter top law sch

After you submit your transcript to the Law School Admissions Council (LSAC), LSAC will summarize your transcript and compute a standardized undergraduate grade point average (GPA) . This standardized figure may differ somewhat from the GPA that your school calculates. Law schools will receive your transcript alongside the standardized GPA.
The undergraduate GPA is one of two quantitative data points that law schools receive about candidates that is standardized across all applicants, and it plays an important role in admissions decisions.

Once you have a standardized GPA calculated by LSAC and a score from a practice test for either the LSAT or the GRE, take a moment to compare your numbers with the median numbers of incoming students at the law schools you are considering (see table here and admissions “predictor” calculators here and here ).

Resume

Most general-purpose advice about resume-writing also applies in the law school application context. Your resume should fit on one page using a reasonable font size and margin width. Use a neat and consistent format throughout. Use a variety of powerful, specific verbs to describe what you did in past jobs and extracurricular activities. This podcast episode has lots of advice about how to format your resume and how to highlight the most relevant parts of your experience.

Personal statement and other essays

LSAC provides the following advice about personal statements:
An essay on actual experiences and past accomplishments has more value to the committee than speculation about future accomplishments. Any noteworthy personal experience or accomplishment may be an appropriate subject, but be sure to do more than just state it. Describe your experience briefly but concretely, and explain why it had value to you.

Many law schools provide detailed advice about what they look for in personal statements. For example:

• Yale : “The personal statement should help us learn about the personal, professional, and/or academic qualities an applicant would bring to the Law School community. Applicants often submit the personal statement they have prepared for other law school applications.”
• Stanford : “Enclose a statement of about two pages sharing important or unusual information about yourself that is not otherwise apparent in your application.”
• Harvard lists five pieces of advice, including: “Keep an open mind about your topic. Sometimes it makes sense to talk about your journey to applying to law school and why you want to attend. Other times, you would rather share a personal story or other aspect of your past. As long as we are learning about you and your experiences, we truly have no preference about what approach you take. Our main concern is that you write about somethin

Letters of recommendation

For most law schools, you will need to submit 2-3 letters of recommendation.
LSAC summarizes what law schools are looking for in letters of recommendation the following way:
The most effective letters of recommendation are written by professors or work supervisors who know you well enough to describe your academic, personal, or professional achievements and potential with candor, detail, and objectivity. Letters that compare you to your academic peers are often the most useful.
For most applicants, it is important to have at least two letters of recommendation from college professors, rather than employers or colleagues. (Yale takes this preference for academic letters particularly seriously .)

To submit your letters to some schools, you will need to use LSAC’s Credential Assembly Service . The FAQ and help pages on LSAC’s website explain the process in detail, but it is not the most intuitive tool. Be sure to leave yourself enough time to explain the process to your recommenders and work out any technical glitches. It is your responsibility to ensure your recommenders submit their letters; continue to follow up with them (politely) until you have confirmed that all of your letters are submitted.

Most, if not all, law school interviews are conducted remotely. In general, it is a good idea to plan to dress formally (e.g. in a business suit) and take the interview from a quiet place where you will have a neutral background behind you. As with other important virtual meetings, be sure to test your audio and video setup before the interview begins, using the same application the host will be using for the interview.
To prepare for interviews, consider reviewing this advice and list of questions from prior interviews with many of the top-ranked law schools. Organizing a practice virtual interview with a friend who can prompt you with some of these questions and give you feedback can also be helpful.

Most law schools begin accepting applications in September of the year prior to enrollment and have an application deadline between February and April. Most schools make decisions on a rolling basis, so there is some advantage to applying early in the cycle when schools have filled fewer of their seats. Another advantage of applying early is that you are more likely to receive a decision sooner, giving you more time to make plans for the following year.
As a rough guide:

• Aim to apply in September or October if you hope to receive your first decisions before the end of the calendar year.
• Aim to apply before the end of November for the best chance of admission.
• If you need more time to improve your test scores or application essays, it is okay to apply in December or early January. Do not apply before your materials are in excellent shape.
• But try to avoid applying in late January or beyond, unless doing so would allow you to significantly strengthen your application. By this time, most schools will have filled many of their available seats, so your odds of admission to a selective school may be lower. Applying later may also signal less interest in the school, which

You will need to include 2-3 letters of recommendation with your application. As a courtesy to your recommenders, and to ensure that they have time to write you the strongest letter possible, you should aim to ask for the letter at least six weeks in advance of whatever target deadline you provide to your recommenders. You should also build in one or two weeks between the target deadline you provide to your recommenders and the actual date you intend to submit your applications, to account for any technical difficulties or other unexpected problems.
In total, plan to ask for letters of recommendation at least two months before you intend to submit your applications.

You will probably submit most (or all) of your applications via LSAC.org . Follow the instructions on this page to create an account and request copies of your transcripts and letters of recommendation. You should allow at least two weeks for LSAC to process these requests.
Then, follow the instructions to upload your personal statement, resume, and other materials to each school’s application. Be sure to proofread everything one more time before you submit.

Waiting for decisions

Timing

Law schools make decisions on a rolling basis, with most decisions arriving between December and April. Candidates who apply earlier in the cycle tend to receive decisions first.
Candidates who apply in September or October may start to receive decisions in December. But because the admissions process is rolling, it is possible to receive a final decision much later—perhaps as late as the summer if you are admitted off of the waitlist.

Most schools will give all applicants a decision of some kind—acceptance, rejection, or an offer of a position on the waitlist—by April 1. Some schools may request a seat deposit soon after this date to confirm your interest in joining their incoming classes. If you receive multiple offers, read the terms of each offer carefully: the seat deposit may be non-refundable, and the school may expect you to withdraw all other applications (except those for which you are on a waitlist) before placing the deposit.
If you have received an offer of admission from at least one school, it usually makes sense to place a seat deposit by the deadline, even if you are still waiting on waitlist decisions. Under LSAC’s policies , you are free to accept a new offer of admission (including an offer off of a waitlist) even after you have paid a deposit. But if you do not place a deposit by the deadline at the school that admitted you, you may forfeit your opportunity to join that school’s

Offers of admission to people initially placed on waitlists may come at any time between early May and late August, with only a short timeline to make a decision: perhaps only a day or two, and usually without information about financial aid available. While most top schools have a small waitlist, Harvard usually admits 100 people off of the waitlist, so being on its waitlist may provide a better chance than other top schools.

To maximize your chances of receiving an offer off of a waitlist, you will need to write a compelling “letter of continued interest” (often abbreviated “LOCI”) in late April or the first few days of May, emphasizing your interest in the school and confirming that you will accept at any time. It can help to emphasize a geographic tie to the location of the school you are targeting (e.g. family or partner in the area, a place to stay if you need to move last minute). It is considered very bad form to stay on a waitlist and not accept if given an offer.

One potentially valuable thing you can do to save yourself time and emotional energy during that period is to commit not to visit websites where you might be tempted to check for “news” about the admissions decision process (e.g. status updates from other applicants).
There is almost no upside to checking for this kind of news. Updates about the decision process are not action-relevant for most applicants. With very few exceptions, there is nothing you can do to improve your chances of admission after submitting your application.

• June: Take the LSAT or GRE, if you don’t yet have a score that you are happy with.
• _July:_Ask for a letter of recommendation from your supervisor, and from any other recommenders you haven’t contacted yet.
• August: Draft your personal statement and optional diversity statement; update your resume.
• September: Retake the LSAT or GRE, if needed; revise your essays and resume.
• _October:_Submit your applications.
• _November-April:_Interview; receive admissions decisions; commit to a law school.
• May-August: Wrap up your full-time job; take a vacation; move to your new city; attend law school orientation.
• September: Start law school.