University of Illinois Chicago College of Dentistry: Average DAT, GPA, and How to Get In

Numbers below come from the school's own published materials as of July 2026 (each is linked to its source). Admissions stats shift every cycle — treat these as a snapshot and confirm on the school's official admissions page before you apply.

UIC College of Dentistry is a public DMD program in Chicago, Illinois. (Officially it's a Doctor of Dental Medicine, not a DDS, even though the two credentials are functionally the same.) Here's exactly what UIC has told applicants about its own program, straight from the school's own PDFs and pages, with nothing rounded or guessed — and where a figure comes from an older class year, we say so.

UIC dental school stats at a glance

UIC's average DAT score

For the Class of 2029 (matriculated August 2025), UIC's own "DMD Enrollment Demographics, Entering Classes of 2025-2029" report lists "DAT Academic Average 21; DAT Perceptual Ability 20; DAT Total Science 21." Those are on the standard old DAT 1–30 scale — UIC's report doesn't use the newer 200–600 scale at all. Per that same table, this isn't a one-cycle blip: the four prior classes (2025-2028) averaged an Academic Average of 20-21, a PAT of 20, and a Total Science of 20-21, so UIC's incoming DAT profile has held steady in that narrow band for at least five straight entering classes.

Per UIC's own admissions-requirements page, no minimum GPA or DAT score is required to apply, though the page notes DAT and GPA are "competitive application components" and cites the national average Academic Average of 19-20 as a rough competitive benchmark. If you're trying to figure out where a 20 or 21 AA on the old scale lands relative to today's applicant pool, our DAT score percentiles guide walks through the ADA's official concordance and percentile tables, and our DAT score converter will translate an old-scale number to its new-scale equivalent in one click.

UIC's average GPA

UIC's Class of 2029 entered with a Science GPA of 3.74/4.0, a Non-Science GPA of 3.91/4.0, and a Cumulative GPA of 3.80/4.0, per the same enrollment-demographics PDF. That cumulative figure has been climbing steadily across the five classes shown in the report — from 3.50 for the Class of 2025 up to 3.80 for the Class of 2029 — which suggests the applicant pool competing for a UIC seat has gotten stronger each cycle, even though UIC states no minimum GPA is required to apply.

Class size and the residency gap

UIC enrolled 72 students total in the Class of 2029 (72 Illinois residents, 0 nonresidents), per the enrollment-demographics PDF. The applicant-pool numbers behind that class are worth sitting with: 499 resident applicants produced 108 offers and 72 enrolled, while 1,381 nonresident applicants produced only 3 offers and 0 enrolled, per that same official report. UIC strongly favors Illinois residents in practice, whatever its stated policy — if you're applying from out of state, that residency split is the single most important data point on this page.

Application deadline and interview process

Per UIC's how-to-apply page, the AADSAS/UIC supplemental application deadline for the current cycle — applying to matriculate in Fall 2027 — is December 1, 2026 (applications open June 1). UIC runs rolling admissions with preference given to earlier applicants, and interviews for this cycle run September 2026 through March 2027, held virtually, with final decisions by April. A separate $85 UIC supplemental application, paid by credit card only, is required after your AADSAS submission is complete.

For the 2026-2027 cycle, UIC's own how-to-apply page describes interviews as virtual and "closed file," meaning each candidate meets with 1-2 faculty members one time, plus a separate student-panel component. UIC's page also states plainly that recording interviews is prohibited and can lead to disqualification — a rule worth knowing before interview day.

Tuition and prerequisites

Per UIC's official combined tuition PDF, academic year 2025-26 resident tuition is $19,379/semester ($38,758/year tuition-only, with an estimated $56,678 total D1-year cost including fees, clinic assessment, and books). Nonresident tuition is $34,874/semester ($69,748/year tuition-only, roughly $87,668 total D1-year cost). Those figures exclude an estimated $20,000/year in living expenses and are subject to change pending Board of Trustees approval, per UIC's own note on that document; D2-D4 years run three semesters instead of two and cost more in total than the D1 year shown here.

One prerequisite detail worth flagging before you plan your coursework: per UIC's admissions-requirements page, chemistry prerequisites require 14 semester hours (including at least 4 semester hours of Organic Chemistry), and AP credit is explicitly not accepted toward any prerequisite course requirement.

Bottom line

UIC's own numbers — a steady 20-21 AA range, a cumulative GPA that's climbed to 3.80, and a 72-seat class that's overwhelmingly Illinois residents — describe a program with no stated minimum cutoffs but a clear practical bar shaped by geography. UIC does not publish an overall acceptance rate, so we're not going to manufacture one; use the residency-split figures above as the honest, sourced context instead, and confirm anything specific to your cycle on UIC's admissions-requirements page.