Undergraduate Degree Earners
Academic Year 2023-24
April 10, 2025
In the 2023-24 academic year, more than 3.2 million learners earned an undergraduate credential. Of these, 58.8 percent (1.9 million) earned a bachelor’s degree as their highest undergraduate award, 25.1 percent (821,400) earned an associate degree, and 16.1 percent (525,200) earned an undergraduate certificate.
The total number of undergraduate degree earners rose for the first time in three years (+0.6% or +20,500 from a year earlier). Numbers increased this year for both first-time completers (+0.5%) and those with previous undergraduate credentials (+0.9%).
Over a quarter of all undergraduate awards went to students who had already earned a credential. The share of credential earners with a prior award has grown by a full percentage point in the past 4 years (from 25.3% to 26.3%).
The number of learners earning certificates continued its record-breaking growth, reaching a new 10-year high for the third consecutive year. Both first-time certificate earners (+12.6%, +41,500) and those with a prior award returning to earn a certificate (+8.0%, +11,500) saw significant increases.
In contrast, both bachelor’s degree and associate degree earners declined for the third consecutive year. Fewer students earned an associate degree this year than in any of the last ten years, and bachelor’s degree earners declined to their lowest level since 2015-16. As a result of ongoing certificate growth and associate and bachelor’s decline, the proportion of first-time completers who earn a certificate has risen from about 1 in 9 (11.3%) in 2014-15 to about 1 in 7 (15.4%) in 2023-24.
The 2023-24 academic year marks the first time that certificate completers aged 24 and younger outnumbered those 25 and older. Certificate completers 18-20 years old grew by 19,400 (17.8%) and those under 18 (likely dual enrolled high school students) grew by 7,100 (27.2%) in 2023-24.
While most undergraduate credential earners earn just one award, 10.4 percent of completers in 2023-24 earned multiple awards within the academic year. This was most common among certificate earners: more than one third of all completers earning a certificate (34.5% in 2023-24) received that certificate within the same year alongside a bachelor’s, associate, and/or another certificate.
The Undergraduate Degree Earners Report provides a demographic and education credential profile for all students who graduate with an undergraduate-level credential, encompassing undergraduate certificates and associate and bachelor’s degrees. In this report, we profile students who earned undergraduate credentials during the most recent academic year (2023-24), focusing on first-time completers versus those with a prior award. We also examine change over time in student demographics (gender, age, race/ethnicity), major field, and credentials attained (certificates, and associate, bachelor’s and master’s degrees) since the 2014-15 academic year. The report presents trend data nationally, as well as by state and region. All data prior to the 2023-24 academic year reflect any newer and additional data that participating institutions have reported to the Student Clearinghouse since last year’s publication.
The report is presented as an interactive data dashboard. New this year is a special analysis of learners who complete multiple credentials within the same academic year. Additional information can be found in a downloadable data appendix.
Download the Data Appendix (xlsx) and Methodological Notes (pdf).
Navigate using the tabs at the top of the dashboard to see details for demographics, prior awards, major fields, states and regions, and a special analysis.
This report was created with the support of Lumina Foundation.