Do AP Scores Really Matter?

May 28

After months of studying, exhaustive and exhausting practice, and near–or over!–$100 per test, you probably want to know how much AP scores really matter.

The answer is more complicated than you’d probably like. We’ll discuss the importance of testing, how colleges evaluate AP classes and scores, and which tests you need to focus on.

What’s a “Good” Score?

The APs are scored on a scale of 1 to 5. Your score is supposed to indicate how qualified you are to receive college credit in each area of study. A passing score is a 3 or above, and each of these numbers corresponds to a potential college course grade:

Grade Equivalency /Recommendation

A or A+ (Extremely Well Qualified)

B, B+, or A- (Well Qualified)

C, C+, or B- (Qualified)

AP Exam Score

Note: A score of 2 or below is not considered passing.

How Do Colleges Use AP Scores?

Obviously, it's nice to score a 4 or a 5 on a particular AP exam. But AP exams are not a required part of your college application. Colleges primarily use AP exam scores to determine whether you should receive college credit and/or skip introductory courses.

Let’s say, for example, that you take AP Biology and receive a passing score of 3. UCLA will accept that score for college credit. Harvard, on the other hand, requires a minimum score of 5 to grant you college credit for that exam. (You can check out AP credit policies per test or per institution here).

Whatever scores you receive, you do not have to submit those official scores to college until July after your senior year. In other words, colleges won’t even see your official score reports before they make their final decision about your application! They will only evaluate those score reports once you’ve been accepted and you’ve submitted your statement of intent to register. Then they will ask for your official scores so they can determine whether you will receive advanced standing (you get to skip that required introductory course), college credit (you receive credit towards graduation), or both.

So Do You Have to Self-Report All AP Scores–Even Bad Ones?

Still, most colleges will request that you submit your unofficial scores (that is, that you self-report them on your application). The question is: do you have to?

The short answer is nope, absolutely not. If you take an AP exam and you do not perform well on that examination, you do not need to report that score on your college application.

But what does it mean to perform well? Obviously a 5 is a great score, and you should report any and all 5s. Obviously a 1 or 2 is not passing, so you probably shouldn’t report those. What about a 3? Or a 4?

This is where your choices may feel tricky. In general, we recommend that you report all passing scores. A 3, 4, or 5 all show that you are at least qualified to pass an equivalent college-level course.

Some students have doubts, though. Let’s say you’re a bright kid who hopes to study mathematics in college. You’re a junior, and you’ve taken AP English Language, AP Psychology, AP US History, and AP Physics 1, and you received 5s on all those tests. But…you took AP Calculus AB, and even though you got an A+ in the class, you received a 3 on the test.

Now, for some schools, especially the more selective ones, your 3 might bring up some questions. You got an A+ in the class, but maybe your teacher is an easy grader. Maybe you aren’t as strong in math as you need to be for a math major.

In these types of cases, some students prefer not to report their scores. However, not reporting your score is also somewhat suspicious. Admissions officers may wonder whether you passed the examination at all. So you still may be facing questions about how easy your class was or how qualified you are for your major.

In other words, how much your scores matter depends. Some AP scores will be more important than others; the AP STEM scores will be more important for students who are STEM majors, and AP Psychology will be more important for psychology majors.

For some schools, especially the more competitive ones, you'll want to do well on as many APs as you can. For the most competitive schools–those with acceptance rates at 20% or less–doing well on all or most of your AP exams may give you a much-needed edge over other applicants.

To Test or Not to Test

The national deadline to register for AP exams is now much earlier than it used to be: November 15, even before winter break. Some students worry that they are already overwhelmed by a particular AP class, or that one of their classes is less important to their major or areas of interest, and they tell us they prefer not to register for the AP exam. They can spend their time focusing on another subject instead.

However, because tests are not a required part of your application, and because you can always choose not to self-report a low score on your college applications, you should always register for an AP exam (as long as you and your family can comfortably afford to do so!).

After all, you can’t do surprisingly well on a test you never take. And if you do manage to get a passing score, you can save yourself thousands of dollars.

Think about it this way. The average AP test costs $96. You already know that a passing score will help you gain credit at a college. Let’s say you get into USC, where each unit costs you about $2000. An average class at USC is three or four credits, or a total of $6,000 to $8,000.

That $96 just saved you a small fortune. Definitely worth it.