How to Get Into St. John's Law School: LSAT, GPA & Admissions (2026)

The short answer to how to get into St. John's Law School is to clear the medians in St. John's Law's 2025 ABA Standard 509 disclosure: a 164 LSAT and a 3.81 GPA. The middle 50 percent of the entering class scored 156 to 166 on the LSAT and held a 3.44 to 3.91 GPA. Clear both and you are competitive.

By Ali Unar, Georgetown Law, Founder of Lovare Institut. Ali Unar is a Georgetown Law student and the founder of Lovare Institut, an admissions and LSAT-prep practice built on primary-source law school data. Verified August 2026. Every figure on this page comes from St. John's Law School's 2025 ABA Standard 509 Information Report for the fall 2025 entering class, the ABA Employment Summary for the Class of 2024, and St. John's University's own published pages.

The single most distinctive fact about St. John's Law School is how much of the sticker it discounts. According to St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509 disclosure, 84% of students receive grants and the median grant is $60,000 against a $76,742 tuition-and-fees sticker, which means a median-grant recipient at St. John's Law School nets about $16,742 in tuition and fees before living costs. That is one of the deepest median discounts you will find at a private law school, and it comes with no conditional string: St. John's Law School does not use scholarships that can be cut for grades. The second distinctive fact is that St. John's Law School is more selective than its regional reputation implies, and it is reverse-splitter friendly, which together mean a high GPA can carry a lower LSAT into a genuinely competitive class. The thesis of this page is that St. John's Law School is a value-and-selectivity story: real merit money that you keep, attached to a class that is harder to enter than many applicants assume.

St. John's Law School at a glance: LSAT, GPA, acceptance rate and cost

St. John's Law School, the law school of St. John's University, posts a 164 LSAT median, a 3.81 GPA median, and a 23.05% acceptance rate in St. John's Law's 2025 ABA Standard 509 disclosure. Full-time tuition and fees run $76,742 a year. The table below gathers the headline numbers for St. John's Law School in one place.

MetricSt. John's Law School (fall 2025 entering class)LSAT (25th / 50th / 75th)156 / 164 / 166GPA (25th / 50th / 75th)3.44 / 3.81 / 3.91Acceptance rate23.05%Applications4,417Offers of admission1,018Matriculants241First-year class241 (238 full-time and 3 part-time)Full-time tuition and fees$76,742 a yearLiving expenses$32,728Share receiving grants84%Median grant$60,000Conditional scholarshipsNo (awards are not tied to a first-year grade threshold)First-time bar passage87.74% (exam year 2024, largest jurisdiction New York)Employed at ten months93.2% (247 of 265 graduates, Class of 2024)

Source: St. John's Law School's 2025 ABA Standard 509 Information Report for the fall 2025 entering class, with employment from the ABA Employment Summary for the Class of 2024 and bar passage from St. John's Law School's ABA bar-passage report. Tuition and living expenses are printed separately in the 509, which does not publish a single combined cost-of-attendance total, so this page does not sum them into an invented all-in figure.

What LSAT and GPA do you really need to get into St. John's Law School?

St. John's Law School reports an LSAT spread of 156 to 166 and a GPA spread of 3.44 to 3.91 in its 2025 ABA 509. A 164 LSAT and a 3.81 GPA sit at both medians. Below the 156 LSAT or the 3.44 GPA, you need a clear compensating strength on the other number.

St. John's Law School reports an LSAT 25th, 50th, and 75th percentile of 156, 164, and 166, and a GPA 25th, 50th, and 75th of 3.44, 3.81, and 3.91 for the fall 2025 entering class, according to St. John's Law's 2025 ABA Standard 509 disclosure. The median is the fiftieth percentile: half of the enrolled class scored above 164 on the LSAT and above 3.81 in GPA, and half scored below. A 164 and a 3.81 make you a solidly competitive applicant at St. John's Law School rather than a reach, and they sit at the center of the admitted class.

The striking feature of the St. John's Law School bands is the LSAT spread. From the 25th percentile of 156 to the median of 164 is an eight-point drop, while from the median to the 75th of 166 is only two points. That asymmetry means St. John's Law School admits a meaningful number of students well below its median LSAT, but very few above it. A 156, the LSAT bottom quartile, is a real admit range at St. John's Law School, but it needs a strong GPA, at or above the 3.81 median, to carry the file. The GPA band is comparatively tight, running 0.47 from the 3.44 bottom quartile to the 3.91 top quartile, with most of that width on the low side.

Read together, those bands make St. John's Law School reverse-splitter friendly. Lovare's read of the 509 spreads shows a GPA 25th-to-median spread of 0.37 and an LSAT 25th-to-median spread of eight points, so the LSAT band is far wider than the GPA band. A reverse-splitter-friendly school forgives a lower LSAT when the GPA is high; a splitter-friendly school forgives a lower GPA when the LSAT is high. St. John's Law School leans clearly reverse-splitter, which is unusual and worth planning around: a high GPA paired with an LSAT in the high 150s has a genuine path at St. John's Law School, while a high LSAT with a sub-3.44 GPA is a tougher sell. If your transcript is strong and your LSAT lags, St. John's Law School is one of the better-fitting targets in the New York market.

Is St. John's Law School harder to get into than its reputation?

Yes. Among the 36 ABA law schools whose median LSAT sits within two points of St. John's Law School's 164, that is 162 to 166, St. John's Law School ranks 10th most selective of 36 by acceptance rate, per Lovare's analysis of the 2025 ABA 509 disclosures. Its admit math runs ahead of its regional reputation.

Reputation often files St. John's Law School as a solid regional New York school, and its 164 LSAT median already sits above that framing. Its admit math confirms it. Lovare built a peer band of the 36 ABA law schools whose median LSAT falls within two points of St. John's Law School's 164, a median of 162 to 166, then ranked them by acceptance rate from the 2025 ABA 509 disclosures. By that ranking, St. John's Law School comes in 10th most selective of 36, which places it in the upper third of its own scoring band.

According to St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509 disclosure, St. John's Law School received 4,417 applications, made 1,018 offers, and enrolled 241 students, for a 23.05% acceptance rate. Admitting fewer than one in four applicants is a genuinely selective profile, and it is more competitive than most applicants expect from a school they think of as a safety. The honest verdict is that St. John's Law School is harder to get into than its reputation suggests, so treat it as a target that rewards a strong file rather than a guaranteed backup.

A reassuring counterpoint sits alongside the selectivity. St. John's Law School reports a first-year academic attrition rate of 0.0% in its 2025 ABA 509 disclosure, meaning essentially no first-year students left for academic reasons in the reported year. Combined with the absence of conditional scholarships, that low attrition tells you St. John's Law School admits a class it expects to keep and does not use the first-year curve to thin its ranks or claw back aid, which is a meaningful point of stability when you compare offers.

How much does St. John's Law School cost, and how much scholarship money will you get?

St. John's Law School charges $76,742 a year in full-time tuition and fees, per St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509, plus $32,728 in living expenses. Eighty-four percent of students receive grants, with a median award of $60,000. A median-grant recipient nets about $16,742 in tuition and fees before living costs.

The sticker at St. John's Law School looks like a full-freight private school, but the net price does not. St. John's Law's 2025 ABA Standard 509 disclosure lists full-time tuition and fees at $76,742 a year, plus $32,728 in living expenses. The 509 prints tuition and living separately and does not publish a single combined cost-of-attendance total, so any all-in annual number quoted elsewhere is someone's arithmetic rather than a figure St. John's Law School reports, and this page will not invent one.

The aid is where St. John's Law School separates itself. According to the same 509, 84% of St. John's Law School students receive grant aid, with awards at the 25th, 50th, and 75th percentiles of $25,000, $60,000, and $72,630. The median award of $60,000 is exceptionally deep: against the $76,742 sticker, a St. John's Law School student receiving that median grant nets about $16,742 in tuition and fees before living costs. At the 75th percentile, a $72,630 award brings the net tuition close to a token figure. Those grants blend merit and need-based aid, so not every dollar is a merit discount, but the depth of the median tells you St. John's Law School competes hard on price.

One honest boundary belongs here. St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509 disclosure reports 0 full-tuition awards and 0 awards above full tuition, so even the generous 75th-percentile grant of $72,630 stops just short of a complete free ride against the $76,742 sticker. The good news is that whatever St. John's Law School grants you, you keep: St. John's Law School does not use conditional scholarships, so your award is not tied to a first-year class-rank or GPA threshold and cannot be cut if your grades slip. The number St. John's Law School quotes at admission is the number you carry through all three years, which makes its net-price advantage more reliable than a headline discount at a school that reserves the right to reduce it.

What are your real chances off the St. John's Law School waitlist?

St. John's Law School does not disclose waitlist offers or admits, and no ABA report does. The honest proxy is implied yield: 241 matriculants against 1,018 offers is a 23.7% yield in St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509. That is a moderate yield, so St. John's Law School fills much of its class from first-round offers while leaving some waitlist room.

Here is the reasoning in full. St. John's Law School enrolled 241 matriculants from 1,018 offers in its 2025 ABA Standard 509 disclosure, an implied yield of 23.7%. No ABA disclosure, St. John's Law School's included, publishes how many applicants are admitted off the waitlist or how many accept, so implied yield is the honest proxy for waitlist movement. When a little under a quarter of admitted students enroll, a school extends a fair number of offers to fill its seats and typically keeps a waitlist active to manage the gap.

A 23.7% yield is moderate, which puts St. John's Law School in the middle of the range for waitlist behavior. It is not so high that the class fills entirely from first-round deposits, and not so low that the school leans heavily on its list. For a waitlisted applicant to St. John's Law School, that means real but limited hope: some cycles will see movement, others little. If you land on the St. John's Law School waitlist, send a concise letter of continued interest naming St. John's Law School as a top choice, add any new LSAT score or improved grades, and keep another acceptance in hand. Given how reverse-splitter friendly St. John's Law School is, a late GPA-heavy update can genuinely help your case.

Where do St. John's Law School graduates actually work?

In the ABA Employment Summary for the Class of 2024, St. John's Law School placed 229 of 265 graduates in New York, an 86.4% top-market share, and 89.8% across its top three markets. Large firms of 101 or more lawyers took 23.4% of the class, and 2.6% won federal clerkships. St. John's Law School is a concentrated New York school.

Market concentration is the first thing to understand about a St. John's Law School degree. In the ABA Employment Summary for the Class of 2024, St. John's Law School placed 229 graduates in New York, 6 in New Jersey, and 3 in Delaware. That is an 86.4% top-market share and an 89.8% top-three share, one of the more concentrated placement profiles at its level: nearly nine in ten graduates work in New York alone. If your target is New York, that concentration is a strength. If your goal is a different regional market, the same concentration is a warning that St. John's Law School's alumni network and employer relationships are heavily New York centered.

On firm outcomes, St. John's Law School posts a solid large-firm share for its band. The ABA Employment Summary for the Class of 2024 shows 23.4% of St. John's Law School graduates taking jobs at large firms of 101 or more lawyers. Roughly one in four graduates entering large-firm practice is a strong result for a private school outside the national top tier, and it is one of the clearer reasons to choose St. John's Law School if a big-firm New York career is your aim. The large-firm jobs St. John's Law School feeds into are overwhelmingly New York jobs, consistent with the market concentration.

Federal clerkships and the overall rate complete the picture. The ABA Employment Summary for the Class of 2024 shows 2.6% of St. John's Law School graduates entering federal clerkships, a respectable share for a school at this level. Overall, St. John's Law School reported 247 of 265 graduates employed at ten months, or 93.2%, in the same summary, a healthy employment rate. Read the outcomes together and St. John's Law School reliably places its graduates into New York practice, with a strong large-firm channel and a modest but real clerkship footprint.

When are St. John's Law School's application deadlines?

The sources behind this page do not include St. John's Law School's application deadlines or the terms of any Early Decision program, so both should be confirmed directly on St. John's Law School's admissions site. What this page can date is the data: the admissions, cost, and outcome figures here were verified in August 2026 against St. John's Law School's primary disclosures.

Application cycles reward early, complete files, so even without a published deadline in front of you, the practical advice for St. John's Law School is to apply as early in the cycle as your strongest LSAT allows. Law school admissions at schools like St. John's Law School are typically rolling, which means seats and scholarship money are more plentiful earlier and thinner later. Given how generous the St. John's Law School median grant is, applying early is also the best way to be considered while the deepest awards are still available. Because this page's sources do not specify St. John's Law School's exact deadlines or whether it offers a binding Early Decision round, confirm the current dates and any binding terms on St. John's Law School's own admissions pages before you build your timeline around them.

Frequently asked questions about getting into St. John's Law School

Is a 164 LSAT good enough for St. John's Law School?

A 164 is exactly the LSAT median at St. John's Law School, per St. John's Law's 2025 ABA Standard 509 disclosure, where the middle 50 percent scored 156 to 166. A 164 puts you at the fiftieth percentile, competitive rather than a lock. Pair it with a GPA at or above the 3.81 median and you are a strong candidate at St. John's Law School.

What GPA do you need for St. John's Law School?

St. John's Law School reports a GPA median of 3.81, with a 25th to 75th range of 3.44 to 3.91, in its 2025 ABA 509. Aim for 3.81 or higher. Because St. John's Law School is reverse-splitter friendly, a high GPA is especially valuable and can help carry an LSAT in the high 150s into a competitive file at St. John's Law School.

What is St. John's Law School's acceptance rate?

St. John's Law School admitted 23.05% of applicants for the fall 2025 class, extending 1,018 offers against 4,417 applications, according to St. John's Law's 2025 ABA Standard 509 disclosure. Admitting fewer than one in four applicants makes St. John's Law School genuinely selective, more so than many applicants expect, so treat it as a target that rewards a strong file.

How many people apply to St. John's Law School each year?

St. John's Law School received 4,417 applications for the fall 2025 entering class, made 1,018 offers, and enrolled 241 students, split into 238 full-time and 3 part-time, per St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509. That large pool against a relatively small offer count is what produces St. John's Law School's 23.05% acceptance rate.

How much does St. John's Law School cost per year?

St. John's Law School lists full-time tuition and fees of $76,742 a year, plus $32,728 in living expenses, in its 2025 ABA 509. St. John's Law School does not publish a single cost-of-attendance total in the 509, so tuition and living are best read separately. After the median grant, a St. John's Law School student nets about $16,742 in tuition and fees before living costs.

Does St. John's Law School give scholarships?

Yes, generously. St. John's Law School reports that 84% of students receive grant aid, with awards of $25,000, $60,000, and $72,630 at the 25th, 50th, and 75th percentiles, per St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509. The $60,000 median is one of the deepest at any private law school, though St. John's Law School reports no full-tuition awards, so even top grants stop just short of a free ride.

Are St. John's Law School scholarships guaranteed for all three years?

Effectively yes. St. John's Law School does not use conditional scholarships, per its 2025 ABA 509, so an award is not tied to a first-year class-rank or GPA threshold and cannot be cut if your grades slip. The grant St. John's Law School quotes at admission is the grant you keep, which makes its deep median discount more reliable than a conditional award elsewhere.

What is St. John's Law School's bar passage rate?

St. John's Law School posted an 87.74% first-time bar passage rate for exam year 2024, with New York as its largest jurisdiction, according to St. John's Law School's ABA bar-passage report. Its ultimate pass rate, measured for the 2022 cohort, was 94.81%. Both figures are strong, and the gap shows that most St. John's Law School graduates who miss on the first attempt ultimately pass.

What is St. John's Law School's first-year attrition rate?

St. John's Law School reports a first-year academic attrition rate of 0.0% in its 2025 ABA 509 disclosure, meaning essentially no first-year students left for academic reasons in the reported year. Combined with the absence of conditional scholarships, that tells you St. John's Law School admits a class it expects to keep rather than thinning it through the first-year curve.

Where do St. John's Law School graduates work?

Overwhelmingly in New York. The ABA Employment Summary for the Class of 2024 shows St. John's Law School placed 229 graduates in New York, 6 in New Jersey, and 3 in Delaware, an 86.4% top-market share and 89.8% across the top three. St. John's Law School has one of the more concentrated New York placement profiles of any school at its scoring level.

Do St. John's Law School graduates get large-firm jobs?

At a solid rate for the band. In the ABA Employment Summary for the Class of 2024, 23.4% of St. John's Law School graduates took jobs at large firms of 101 or more lawyers. Roughly one in four graduates entering large-firm practice is a strong result for a private school at this level, and it is a leading reason to choose St. John's Law School for a New York firm career.

Can a splitter get into St. John's Law School?

A reverse-splitter has a real path. Lovare reads St. John's Law School as reverse-splitter friendly, with an LSAT 25th-to-median spread of eight points against a GPA spread of 0.37 in the 2025 ABA 509. That means St. John's Law School forgives a lower LSAT when the GPA is high, so a strong-GPA applicant with an LSAT in the high 150s is more viable than the reverse at St. John's Law School.

How selective is St. John's Law School compared with schools at the same LSAT?

More selective than most of them. Among the 36 ABA law schools within two points of St. John's Law School's 164 median, that is 162 to 166, St. John's Law School ranks 10th most selective of 36 by acceptance rate in Lovare's analysis of the 2025 ABA 509 disclosures. So St. John's Law School sits in the upper third of its band and rewards a genuinely strong file.

Is St. John's Law School worth it?

The value case is strong. St. John's Law School pairs a $76,742 sticker with an 84% grant reach and a $60,000 median award that nets about $16,742, per St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509. Add a 23.4% large-firm rate and an 87.74% first-time bar pass, and St. John's Law School offers a low net price and a strong New York outcome, especially for applicants aiming at the local market.

What LSAT and GPA give the best shot at a St. John's Law School scholarship?

Numbers above the medians, with the GPA doing extra work. Because St. John's Law School is reverse-splitter friendly and awards deep grants, a GPA above 3.81 paired with an LSAT above 164, pushing toward the 166 and 3.91 upper quartiles in St. John's Law's 2025 ABA 509, positions you for the largest awards, near the $72,630 upper-quartile grant that St. John's Law School reports.

Sources

Every figure on this page is drawn from primary disclosures, listed here so readers can verify each one directly.

St. John's Law School 2025 ABA Standard 509 Information Report (fall 2025 entering class): https://backend.abarequireddisclosures.org/api/AnnualQuestionnaire/GenerateIndividualDisclosure509Report?schoolId=106&year=2025

St. John's Law School ABA bar-passage report: https://backend.abarequireddisclosures.org/api/BarPassageOutcomes/GenerateIndividualBarPassageReport?schoolId=106&year=2025

ABA Employment Summary, Class of 2024: https://backend.abarequireddisclosures.org/api/EmploymentOutcomes/GenerateIndividualEQSummaryReport?schoolId=106&year=2024

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