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Law Schools with the Highest LSAT Scores

 
Your LSAT score is your destiny.
That’s the conventional wisdom in law school. Why? For one, law schools understand that academic prowess equals success. And placing the best students side-by-side raises everyone’s performance. Plus, higher LSATs mean a higher ranking… which, in turn, draws applicants with higher LSATs.
So you shouldn’t be surprised that 10 of the 11 highest-ranked law schools also carry median LSAT scores of 168 or better (on a scale that tops out at 180). In fact, U.S. News’ two highest-ranked schools—Yale Law and Harvard Law— were tied with median scores of 173. However, Yale tops Harvard with its acceptance rate, maintaining an enviable 9.4% against Harvard’s more lenient 15.6%. While Yale Law has held its #1 ranking in U.S. News for nearly a quarter century, Harvard Law actually scored slightly higher among law school deans and tenured professors. It also produced a higher bar passage rate (97% vs. 94.4%).
Just below Yale and Harvard, Columbia and Stanford produced median LSAT scores of 171, with New York University and the University of Chicago trailing slightly behind at 170. Surprisingly, NYU sustained a 170 median despite a hefty 31.4% acceptance rate.
Overall, the University of California at Berkeley was the only top 10 school with a median LSAT score below 168 (its 25th to 75th percentile fell between 163-169). Among the 189 schools on U.S. News’ list, Valparaiso University yielded the lowest median LSAT score at 143. U.S. News also reported that Georgetown and Northwestern fell just under the 168 median threshold.
To see which schools scored 168 or above, check out the table below:

 
Source: U.S. News and World Report