Undergraduate enrollment inched up this fall, while master’s dips 3.7%

Fall undergraduate enrollment inched up 0.6% in 2026, according to preliminary data from National Student Clearinghouse Research Center released Thursday. But that growth is significantly slowed from last fall, when it rose 2.4% from 2024 to 2025.

Community colleges drove the modest overall increase. They saw a year-over-year 1.2% bump in students, building on a 3.5% annual increase they experienced last fall.

Enrollment levels at both private and public four-year colleges remained roughly flat "across credential programs, admission selectivity categories, institution locales, and more,” Matthew Holsapple, the clearinghouse's senior research director, said at a press conference Wednesday. “The important change this fall isn't widespread decline; it's the loss of that broad-based growth we saw last year.”

By the numbers

0.6%

The annual increase in fall undergraduate enrollment, according to early data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. That's down from 2.4% in 2025.

-12.4%

The year-over-year enrollment drop in undergraduate computer science majors at four-year institutions, which tracks with a relatively high unemployment among the field's recent graduates in the field.

-3.7%

The enrollment decline in master’s programs, which have become a critical revenue source for many institutions.

Meanwhile, graduate enrollment shrunk 1.6% overall as master’s enrollment within that category fell 3.7%. Master’s levels began to slide last fall, when enrollment dipped 0.4% compared to 2024.

"What was a relatively small decline last year has really become more, much more pronounced,” Holsapple said at the press conference.

The overall numbers mask considerable variance, including by fields of study.

Computer science programs experienced the biggest losses among subject areas in the clearinghouse’s data, with four-degree undergraduate enrollment plummeting 12.4% year over year this fall.

Amid tech layoffs and the take-off of automated coding, unemployment rates for recent computer science and computer engineering graduates reached 7% and 7.8%, respectively, in 2024, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. That's among the very highest rates of recent college grads unemployment by degree field and roughly 3 percentage points above the overall unemployment rate that year.

“Computer science led years of strong growth before reversing direction last fall, where we started to see numbers really drop,” Holsapple said. “This year, it's even more pronounced.”

Visual and performing arts, as well as liberal sciences, both saw enrollment drop by over 4% at the undergraduate level. In contrast, engineering and health professional degree enrollment each spiked by over 6%.

Thursday's preliminary data is based on responses from 46% of institutions that report to the clearinghouse and includes 7.9 million student enrollments. The clearinghouse's final fall 2026 data is set to be released in January.