AP Credit and Placement Policies for Colleges and Universities

Students who take AP exams could potentially earn college credit or get a higher placement into college courses. These credit and placement policies vary from college to college, so it’s important that you do your research for schools you’re interested in.

AP Policies at Top 10 Ranked Colleges

We summarized the AP credit and placement policies for the top 10 ranked US colleges and top 5 ranked public US colleges in the tables below. If you want more detailed information on the policies, you can click on the links to navigate to the college website.

1. Stanford University

   • Requires a 4 or 5
   • Maximum units granted are 10 in a given subject area
   • No more than 45 units in total can be granted

2. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

   • Requires a 5
   • For some subjects, you have to take MIT’s Advanced Standing Exam to get credit.

3. Harvard University

   • Requires a 5
   • Credit for graduation is only applicable when a student earns 32 credits through AP exams

4. Princeton University

   • Requires a 4 or 5
   • Only two units of AP in each foreign language is granted
   • Only one unit of AP in history is granted

5. California Institute of Technology (Caltech)

   • AP exams are usually used for placement

6. University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)

   • Requires scores between 3 and 5
   • AP credit does not satisfy General Education requirement

7. Yale University

   • Requires a 4 or 5
   • Only for the following realm of subjects: English, Languages, Art History, Music, and Physics

8. University of Chicago

   • Requires a 4 or 5
   • Some subjects offer advancement placement instead of offering credits

9. Johns Hopkins University

   • Requires a 4 or 5.
   • A score of 3 is accepted on AP Calculus BC. |

10. University of Pennsylvania

    • Requires a 4 or 5
    • A mix of advanced placement and credits options

AP Policies at Top 5 Ranked Public Colleges

1. University of California, Berkeley

   • Requires a 3, 4, or 5
   • Requirements are school-specific. |

2. University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)

   • Requires a 3, 4, or 5
   • AP credit does not satisfy General Education requirement
   • Does not award credit for AP Research or Seminar exams

3. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

   • Mostly requires 4 or 5, but some departments accept 3
   • Subscores from Calculus and Music Theory are not used

4. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

   • No more than two courses can be used for the major core
   • Only one course can be used for the minor core

5. University of Virginia

   • Requires 3, 4, or 5
   • Higher scores grant both credit and exemption from courses

AP Credit Policy Search Tool

If the college that you’re interested in attending wasn’t part of the list, you can also get all the information regarding AP policies by using College Board’s tool. The search tool allows you to look up schools and get the information you need regarding AP policies.

What’s neat is that you can build a list of colleges and universities you’re interested in applying to— this way you’ll be able to keep all your information in one place!

College Board’s online AP policy search tool.

Image Courtesy of College Board