January–April 2024

• Decide which medical schools you’ll apply to. The specific schools determine details of certain aspects of the process, such as exams you’ll need to take, ideal MCAT scores, and more.
• Collect letters of recommendation, or letters of evaluation. You don’t have to submit these with your primary application, but it’s a good idea to do it anyway. Schools will not evaluate a medical student’s secondary application without them. Putting in a request for individual and/or committee letters well in advance will help your letter writers provide thoughtful recommendations.
• Study for the MCAT. The best MCAT study schedule depends on your individual needs, but we find that most students need 3-6 months before their test day to prepare. For the best chance at success, invest in MCAT tutoring — our tutoring students increase their scores by an estimated 12 points or more.
• Take your MCAT and Casper exam as early as possible. We recommend taking the MCAT by the end of April of your application cycle year if at all possible. The best Casper test dates for your application cycle are by the end of May.
• Register with a pre-health committee if your school has one.
• Register for the AAMC PREview exam if the schools you plan on applying to require it.
• Each medical school has different requirements, so consult MSAR to confirm the specific application materials you’ll need for your chosen schools.
• Begin brainstorming, outlining, and writing your personal statement. If writing isn’t your thing (or you get overwhelmed), use a personal statement editing service to increase your chances of standing out.
• Outline and write out all of your extracurricular activities and work. You’ll need to highlight up to 3 of these on your final application, so consider which of these Work & Activities had the most impact. (Note: Beginning with the 2024/25 application cycle, there’s a brand new Work & Activities experience type called Social Justice/Advocacy. Read AAMC’s process to create this new experience type.)
• If you plan on applying to a Texas medical school or an MD-PhD program, you will also want to start brainstorming, outlining, and writing your essay for those applications.

May 2024

• Open your AMCAS application as early as possible and begin filling out your background information in sections 1-3. AMCAS applications open May 2, 2024. The earliest you can submit a full application is May 30*, 2024.
• Order your official transcripts from all colleges and universities you’ve previously attended to complete the coursework section of your application (section 4 of the AMCAS).
• Send reminders to recommendation letter writers if they have not already provided the letters. You’ll add these letters of recommendation to section 6 of the AMCAS.
• Complete your medical school personal statement and extracurricular activities section by May 15.
• Decide exactly what schools you will be applying to and fill these out in section 7 of your application.

June 2024

• Take your MCAT no later than June 27, 2024. Submit your MCAT score in section 9 of your application.
• Take your Casper exam no later than the end of June 2024. Submit your Casper exam results in section 9 of the AMCAS.
• Begin secondary essays and other requirements for secondary applications. You should start this immediately after you turn in your initial application, starting with your preferred school’s requirements first.
• Submit your AMCAS in early June. It’s important to use the several months before the AMCAS application opens, to improve the quality of your application. Once your application is submitted, it will take anywhere between 1 to 6 weeks to undergo AMCAS verification before being sent directly to schools.

July 2024

• Submit your secondary applications. Secondary or supplemental applications include up to 5 essays and an application fee (for most schools). If this fee is too much for you, you may request a waiver.
• Begin preparation for your medical school interviews. This includes reviewing common questions and answers, learning the traditional and MMI formats (depending on which schools you’ll interview with), and getting help from former admissions committee members.
• Monitor your application status. Remember, the later you submit your application via AMCAS, the longer the verification process will take. The admissions process normally begins in mid-July.

August 2024

• If applying early decision to a single medical school, submit your Early Decision Program application by August 1, 2024.

September 2024–April 2025

• Complete individual medical school interviews. Interview invitations can happen anywhere between September-March. Once you are selected for an interview, you’ll move on to the next step in the medical school application process. These may be virtual or in-person. To help you prepare, we’ve put together a few handy guides and resources:

Medical School Interviews: What To Do Before, During & After

Common Medical School Interview Questions [Plus Answers]

Medical School Interview Question: Why Do You Want to Go to This School?

Medical School Interview Prep, Coaching & Mock Interview 

• Await decisions from each school you interview with. Admissions decisions vary based on each school. They may be made at any point between September–March in your cycle year. Some schools may not immediately accept or reject your application but rather put you on a waitlist, meaning you’ll have to wait longer for their decision.
• Continue the admissions process as you receive acceptance letters from the schools highest on your list. Some schools do rolling admissions, which means they will send acceptance letters a few weeks after your interview. Other schools will wait to make a final decision until March, assuring that all possible candidates were interviewed.
• If you don’t get accepted to the school you chose in the Early Decision Program, quickly submit applications to your other preferred schools. The EDP allows you to be accepted more quickly to the single school you choose, but you can’t apply to any other programs until you’ve been released from the EDP commitment.

January 2025 is technically the last month to submit primary applications. We do not recommend waiting this long, as it is likely to hurt your chances of being accepted by any med school. Most med school application deadlines are actually in November, so waiting this long also greatly limits which schools you may apply to.

October 2025-May 2026

• Negotiate financial aid offers, attend second look day, and officially select a program to enroll in.
• Here are more helpful steps for what to do once you get accepted into medical school.

FAQs

How soon should you submit your med school application?

Aim to submit your med school application as early as possible, preferably in early June of your cycle year. The longer you wait to submit, the lower your chances of being accepted get.

What is the deadline for AMCAS?

Deadlines for submitting your application via AMCAS depending on the schools you’re applying to. Check the AMCAS database for application deadlines for your preferred schools.

IMPORTANT: If you put your application off until just before the deadline, remember that you must request your transcripts no later than 2 weeks before your school’s application deadline. Otherwise, your application will not be processed by the deadline and you won’t be included in that school’s applicants for the cycle year.

How late can I take the MCAT for this application cycle?

You will need to take the MCAT no later than 35 days before your school’s AMCAS application deadline. Verify your MCAT score release date against your school’s application deadline. In general, this probably means the latest you can take the MCAT will typically be sometime between September and November (during the fall semester of your senior year of undergrad).

But waiting this long to take the MCAT is not a wise choice. We recommend taking the MCAT no later than June 27, 2024, but preferably before the end of April.

Which Schools Don’t Require the MCAT?

A few of the least competitive medical schools (typically outside of the U.S.) don’t require the MCAT in your AMCAS application. You may also be exempted from the MCAT if you apply to certain BS/MD programs at U.S. medical schools (although this exemption is getting less and less common each year).

Your MCAT score is typically a critical application data point that admissions committees use in student selection to medical school. Scores help admissions officers interpret grades and other academic data from undergraduate institutions with different curricular focuses and grading standards.