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American law school tuition: $66,990 a year full-time plus $2,182 in fees, or $2,481 per credit part-time, all from the school's own 2025 509. That 509 prints no single cost of attendance total, so this page builds the budget from its tuition, fee and living lines rather than quoting a figure the school does not publish.
Tuition is $66,990 FT + $2,182 fees (2025-26, 509); PT $2,481/credit and no single total cost of attendance figure, which American does not publish in its 509 per year, from American's own 2025 509 (https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdf).
Against that, the same report gives a median grant of $40,000 (2024-25 aid year, 509; 25th, 50th and 75th all print $40,000) reaching 59% of students.
Sticker is the wrong number to plan with and the right number to start from, because it is the only one that is certain before you hold an offer.
Cost figurePer yearOver three yearsSourceTuition$66,990 FT + $2,182 fees (2025-26, 509); PT $2,481/creditmultiply by threehttps://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfTotal cost of attendancenot published as a single figuremultiply by threehttps://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfMedian grant$40,000 (2024-25 aid year, 509; 25th, 50th and 75th all print $40,000)if renewed each yearhttps://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfShare receiving a grant59%not a guarantee of renewalhttps://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfFederal borrowing cap$50,000 a year$200,000 aggregateFederal Register, RISE final rule
American posts no single total cost of attendance figure in its 509 or on its own cost page per year, being tuition plus the published living-expense allowance rather than anything we assembled (https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdf).
Three years at that number is the arithmetic worth doing before you apply rather than after you are admitted. Do it at sticker and again at the median grant; the two answers will be far apart.
One thing changed in 2026 and belongs in the same calculation. Federal borrowing for professional programs is capped at $50,000 a year and $200,000 aggregate with Grad PLUS eliminated, effective July 1 2026 under the Reimagining and Improving Student Education final rule (Federal Register, RISE final rule (https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/05/01/2026-08556/reimagining-and-improving-student-education-federal-student-loan-program-final-regulations)), which attributes the caps to the Working Families Tax Cuts Act.
The outcome side is 17.3% (69/399, Class of 2025 ABA Emp Summary) of the class into firms over 100 lawyers and 86.2% (344/399, all employed categories at 10 mo) employed at ten months, with top markets of DC (134), MD (51), NY (30), from the school's own ABA reporting (https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdf).
We are not going to hand you a verdict, because the answer depends on your award, your target practice and your tolerance for debt, and none of those are published.
The honest framing: a strong placement rate at a heavy discount is a straightforward yes, the same rate at full sticker under the new borrowing caps is a real decision, and no page can make it for you.
No ABA 509 report publishes grant size by LSAT or GPA band, at any school. The median grant therefore describes the whole entering class rather than predicting your letter.
Money follows the numbers, and the further above a median you sit the more of it follows. That direction is reliable; the magnitude is not published anywhere.
Renewal conditions are the other unpublished variable. Some awards carry a GPA condition and 509 reports do not disclose them, so ask in writing before comparing two offers.
Bar study. The months between graduation and admission carry living costs and a prep course, and no cost-of-attendance figure includes them.
Your own circumstances. The living-expense line is a school-set allowance rather than a budget, and it will be wrong for you in one direction or the other.
Interest. Every figure here is principal, and three years of accrual on a six-figure balance is not a rounding error.
Figure2025 reporting yearSourceApplicants5,952https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfOffers1,981https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfAcceptance rate33.3%https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfLSAT 25th / median / 75th157 / 162 / 163https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfGPA 25th / median / 75th3.32 / 3.63 / 3.75https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfMedian grant$40,000 (2024-25 aid year, 509; 25th, 50th and 75th all print $40,000)https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfShare receiving a grant59%https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdfTotal cost per yearnot published as a single figurehttps://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdf
Our master admissions file carries detailed committee texture for 31 schools: what the essay has to do, how hard the school protects yield, how it uses interviews, and how it behaves on scholarship. American is not one of the 31.
So this page makes no claim about how American's committee reads a file. Everything here comes from what American itself publishes: its ABA Standard 509 report and its own admissions pages.
A page that filled that gap with plausible-sounding advice would be indistinguishable from one that knew something, which is exactly why we would rather leave the hole visible. If you want committee-level read on this school, the honest source is the admissions office.
Our sheet records American's top markets as DC (134), MD (51), NY (30), from its own ABA employment reporting (https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdf). Read the concentration rather than the list.
Alongside that, 17.3% (69/399, Class of 2025 ABA Emp Summary) of the class went to firms over 100 lawyers and 1.0% (4/399; state/local 13.8%) took federal clerkships, from the same reporting.
In the Washington market specifically, those two numbers pull in different directions. Federal agencies, the Hill and the public interest sector employ heavily and appear in neither the large-firm column nor the clerkship column, so a modest large-firm rate here does not mean what it would mean in New York.
That is the honest way to read a DC school's outcomes: the large-firm figure describes one route out of several, and the geography column tells you which city's version of all of them you are buying into.
Put your own numbers beside the bands first. American publishes 157 to 163 on the LSAT and 3.32 to 3.75 on GPA, from its 2025 509 (https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdf), and everything else follows from where you land in those.
Then price it against the 509 again, noting that American posts no single total cost of attendance figure in its 509 against a median grant of $40,000 (2024-25 aid year, 509; 25th, 50th and 75th all print $40,000) reaching 59% of students. Three years of the gap is the number that will still matter in a decade.
Then decide what you would do with the degree, because a school's value is mostly a statement about a market rather than about a ranking, and the market is the part you cannot change from inside.
If any of those three is unresolved, that is the work to do next, and it is more useful than reading another page about this school.
Open https://www.american.edu/wcl/school/admissions/jd/apply/first-year/requirements.cfm ; https://www.american.edu/wcl/school/admissions/jd/apply/first-year/early-decision.cfm ; https://www.american.edu/wcl/school/admissions/jd/apply/first-year/faq.cfm and confirm every deadline, prompt and requirement against the live application, because everything on this page carries a date for a reason.
Place yourself against the published bands rather than the acceptance rate: 157 to 163 on the LSAT and 3.32 to 3.75 on GPA, from the 2025 509 (https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdf). Your position there decides what the rest of the application has to do.
Decide what this school is to you before drafting anything: a reach where the file must argue, a match where it must not get in the way, or a safety where the real question is how much money you can extract. Those are three different applications.
Every American figure on this page was read from American's own 2025 ABA Standard 509 Required Disclosure Report at https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/2025-standard-509-information-report-12-16-25-2.pdf ; Emp Summary: https://www.american.edu/wcl/academics/academicservices/registrar/aba-required-disclosure/upload/aba-employment-summary-2025.pdf, and recorded in our data sheet with that URL against each individual field rather than as a single citation at the bottom.
Application mechanics come from American's own admissions pages at https://www.american.edu/wcl/school/admissions/jd/apply/first-year/requirements.cfm ; https://www.american.edu/wcl/school/admissions/jd/apply/first-year/early-decision.cfm ; https://www.american.edu/wcl/school/admissions/jd/apply/first-year/faq.cfm. Where our sheet holds a field as unverified, this page says so instead of presenting it as settled.
The 509 refiles every December, so every number here has a known expiry date. We would rather you knew that date than trusted the page indefinitely.
Every LSAC figure on this page was taken from LSAC's own pages and last checked on July 26, 2026. Prices, dates and policies move without notice, so the source link sits next to each number rather than in a bibliography at the bottom.
Where LSAC has not published something, this page says so in those words rather than filling the hole with a plausible number. That is the difference between a gap and a guess, and only one of them is safe to plan around.
Tuition is $66,990 FT + $2,182 fees (2025-26, 509); PT $2,481/credit, and no single total cost of attendance figure, which American does not publish in its 509 per year, from the school's own 2025 509 report.
American publishes no single total cost of attendance figure in its 509 per year as published, being tuition plus the school's own living-expense allowance.
That depends on your award and your target practice. The outcome side is 17.3% (69/399, Class of 2025 ABA Emp Summary) into firms over 100 lawyers and 86.2% (344/399, all employed categories at 10 mo) employed at ten months.
Not automatically. Some awards carry conditions and 509 reports do not disclose them, so ask in writing before comparing offers.
Under the Federal Register's RISE final rule, borrowing for professional programs is capped at $50,000 a year and $200,000 aggregate with Grad PLUS eliminated from July 1 2026, so any gap above that closes privately or not at all.
Written by Ali, Georgetown Law, founder of Lovare Institut.
August 5, 2026
August 5, 2026