Every Flavor of Early Apps Explained

There are a lot of terms like ED, EA, and REA when it comes to applying for college. Before you finalize your college list, you should familiarize yourself with these terms to plan ahead and spend your time more effectively during your application season. Here is a very brief overview of what each term means, along with some general pros and cons for each. Please note that this article is only to define these terms and intentionally does not address the deeper topic of the strategy for picking an ED school.

Early Decision (ED)

Applying Early Decision to a school means committing to attend that school if you get in. Because of this, you can only apply for ED in one place. Colleges are very serious about this and have been known to blacklist students who break their ED commitment. However, you can still apply Early Action (see below) to others if you apply ED. That said, if you’re admitted through ED, you’re obligated to withdraw your other applications. Usually, ED results come out in mid-December. 

Pros: Find out early, better chance of admittance

Cons: Less time to prepare, commit to one school

Early Decision II (ED2)

Early Decision II is a recent trend that is essentially the same as Early Decision, where you commit to attending a school if you’re admitted, but its deadline is later (usually the Regular Decision deadline). You lose the advantage of finding out before RD deadlines, but you find out your admittance status sooner than with RD (usually February). You can apply ED, and, if deferred or rejected, apply ED2 to a different school.

Pros: Better chance of admittance, more time to prepare

Cons: Committed to one school (and have to withdraw all other application

Early Action (EA)

Early Action is like Early Decision but without the commitment. You apply early, find out early (though typically later than ED), but don’t necessarily have to attend that school. With the changing college admissions landscape, fewer and fewer schools now offer Early Action, but some that do include University of Chicago, MIT, Caltech, and University of Virginia. Usually EA results come out in January or February.

Pros: Find out early, can apply to several schools/not committed to one

Cons: Less time to prepare, doesn’t boost chances much

Restrictive/Single-Choice Early Action

REA or SCEA fall somewhere between EA and ED in that you can only apply early to that one school (like ED) but are not committed to enrolling there if you get in (like EA). Some schools with this system still allow you to apply ED to public universities. While ED and EA are somewhat universally defined terms, REA and SCEA can vary from school to school, so it is important to verify the exact details on the admissions website. Schools using a REA or SCEA system include Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Notre Dame, and Georgetown.

Pros: Find out early, not committed to one school

Cons: Less time to prepare, can only apply early to one (plus public schools