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Haas School of Business – University of California, Berkeley

Image for Haas School of Business – University of California, Berkeley
Class Size 244
Women 41%
MEAN GMAT 733
MEAN GPA 3.64

Haas School of Business is one of 14 schools and colleges at the University of California, Berkeley and is located on the eastern side of Berkeley’s campus. In addition to its full-time MBA program, Haas offers an Executive MBA program and an Evening and Weekend MBA program. Haas’s MBA curriculum is centered on Berkeley Innovative Leadership Development, an approach to business education that emphasizes experiential learning and problem-solving in order to help students become innovative leaders. Haas also helps students shape their education by offering students the chance to design courses in conjunction with a faculty member.

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FAQ

What is the tuition for Haas’s MBA program?

The tuition for Haas’s MBA program is $69,814 for California residents and $82,059 for non-residents.  Haas estimates that with additional expenses such as living expenses and textbooks, students will pay up to $111,786 as residents or $124,041 as non-residents.

How hard is it to get into Haas’s MBA program?

The acceptance rate for Haas is 13.2% It is important to consider the acceptance rate in the context of the student profile of those who are admitted. For example the average GMAT score is 733.

What is the average GMAT score for admission to Haas’s MBA program?

The average GMAT score for the incoming class at Haas is 733. The GMAT middle 80% range is 680 to 770.

Does the Haas MBA program accept the GRE?

Yes. The Haas MBA program has accepted the GRE for a few years now.

What is the average GRE score for admission to Haas’s MBA program?

The average GRE score for the incoming class at Haas is 161 Verbal, 163 Quant.

What is the minimum number of years of work experience required for admission to Haas’s MBA program?

Haas does not state a minimum requirement for years of work experience. However, it is important for candidates to be aware that they are being considered against other candidates with an average of 5.8 years of experience.

What is the average number of years of work experience for admission to Haas’s MBA program? (or, What is the average age of a Haas MBA student?)

The average number of years of work experience among students in Haas’s MBA program is 5.8.

What is the average starting salary for graduates of the Haas MBA program?

The average starting salary for Haas MBA graduates is $162,831. The salary will vary by industry, with consulting and finance jobs generally commanding the higher salaries.

How long is Haas’s full-time MBA program?

Haas offers a traditional 2 year MBA program.

What are the application deadlines for Haas’s MBA program?

The Round 1 MBA application deadline is September 14, 2023. The Round 2 application deadline is January 4, 2024. The Round 3 deadline is March 28, 2024.

What percent of Haas MBA students are women?

The percentage of the class at Haas that are women is 41%.

What type of interview does Haas use for MBA admissions?

Haas offers interviews by invitation. The interviews are resume-based. This means the interviewer has not had access to the application materials.

Videos

Student Story | Matt Wood

With the full support of his wife, Marie, Matt is pursuing his MBA in the EMBA program at Berkeley-Haas. See what he plans to do with his degree and why Matt—and Marie—feel it's been worth it.

Student Story | Sally Allain

As a scientist making business decisions, Sally saw the value of adding an MBA to her toolkit. She commutes from San Diego to study in the Berkeley EMBA; find out why it's been worthwhile and how she balances school with work and family.

Admissions

The Class Profile

244 students enrolled at Berkeley Haas for the MBA Class of 2025. First-year Haas MBA students scored an average GMAT score of 733 with the middle 80% of scores ranging from 680 to 770. Those who took the GRE averaged 161 Verbal and 163 Quant. The average undergraduate GPA for the group was 3.64.

In regards to their undergraduate studies, engineering claims 23% and economics claims 18% of the Class of 2025. Another 13% had majored in business commerce, and 11% majored in social sciences.  The group had an average of 5.8 years of work experience. Twenty-four percent had a background in consulting and 16% worked in financial services before joining Haas. High tech/electronics covers 20%, and consumer products six percent. 

Forty-seven percent of first-year MBA candidates are international. The group represents 39 countries. Women comprise 41% of the Class of 2025.  Finally, 48% of U.S. citizens and permanent residents identify as members of a U.S. minority group, which comprises students of African American, Hispanic American, Native Hawaiian/Pacific Island­er, Asian American and East Indian/Pakistani heritage. Thirteen percent of U.S. citizens and permanent residents identify as underrepresented minorities.

Application Procedures

Applicants can elect to apply to Haas during one of three admissions rounds, which usually occur in September, January and April. Haas requires applicants to submit their completed online application along with a résumé, essays, GMAT and TOEFL or IELTS scores from students who received degrees from countries whose official language is not English, transcripts from all collegiate and post-collegiate academic institutions attended, and two professional letters of recommendation. Interviews are conducted on an invitation-only basis and are required for admission to the MBA program.

Application Requirements

The following materials are required to apply for the Berkeley Haas MBA:

  • Online application
  • $200 application fee
  • Current resume (submitted online)
  • Admissions essays
  • Two professional letters of recommendation
  • University transcripts
  • GMAT or GRE score report
  • English language proficiency
  • Interview

Essay Topic Analysis

Need help with your essays? Get our experts' advice.

Interview Reports

Haas Q&As

Berkeley / Haas LiveWire and DecisionWire

MBA LiveWire

March 26, 2024 3:46pm ET
Accepted to Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 2
Received via phone on March 19, 2024
GPA: 2.8
GRE: 309
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Post MBA Career Name: Entrepreneurship
Application Location: Mexico
Note:

Received grant to pay for part of tuition !

March 26, 2024 3:38pm ET
Accepted to Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 2
Received via phone on March 20, 2024
GPA: 3.66
GMAT: 720
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Post MBA Career Name: Entrepreneurship
Application Location: New Jersey
March 26, 2024 10:42am ET
Rejected at Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 2
Received via email on March 21, 2024
GPA: 3.4
GRE: 327
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Post MBA Career Name: Technology
Application Location: Nyc
Note:

Invitation 3/2. Interviewed 3/12. Rejected after interview.

March 26, 2024 10:17am ET
Waitlisted at Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 2
Received via portal on March 21, 2024
GPA: 3.5
GMAT: 760
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Post MBA Career Name: Finance
Application Location: Texas
March 25, 2024 12:18pm ET
Accepted to Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 2
Received via phone on March 20, 2024
GRE: 324
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Note:

Full ride scholarship -- stoked!

March 25, 2024 10:09am ET
Accepted to Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 2
Received via phone on March 20, 2024
GPA: 3.8
GRE: 328
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Post MBA Career Name: Technology
Application Location: U.S.
Note:

MBA/MEng

March 23, 2024 4:41am ET
Accepted to Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 2
Received via phone on March 20, 2024
GPA: 3.7
GMAT: 730
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Post MBA Career Name: Consulting
Application Location: Asia
Note:

with $$ - so honored!! I love the Haas community. Show alignment with their values and the leadership principles :)

March 22, 2024 5:01pm ET
Waitlisted at Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 2
Received via email March 22, 2024
GPA: 3.6
GRE: 329
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year

MBA DecisionWire

?
March 28, 2024 1:11pm ET
Enrolled: Undecided
Admitted: Columbia , Dartmouth / Tuck
Applied: U. Chicago Booth, Columbia, Dartmouth / Tuck, Duke / Fuqua, NYU Stern, UPenn / Wharton
Entering Year: 2024
Post MBA Career: Private Equity, Entrepreneurship
GRE: 325
GPA: 3.6
Location: NYC
Notes:

I'm currently based in NYC and would like to go back into investing post-MBA (currently in PE). The choice between CBS and Tuck seems to be a clear CBS for me but welcome any opinions on this. Both such different experiences but unique in their own right.

?
March 28, 2024 12:38pm ET
Enrolled: Undecided
Admitted: U. Chicago Booth $
$40000
,
Columbia , Harvard Business School , Yale SOM $
$40000
Applied: U. Chicago Booth, None, Yale SOM, UPenn / Wharton, Northwestern / Kellogg, MIT Sloan, Harvard Business School, Columbia
Entering Year: 2024
Post MBA Career: MF, Auto, Aerospace
GMAT: 750
GPA: 3.55
Location: Midwest
Notes:

Most likely heading to HBS, waiting to see if Booth or CBS give a full ride as that is what it would take.

I did the whole process without any paid consultants, spending $250 total on gmat prep. Doing it again I would have considered paying for mock interviews as I know that’s what went wrong at Kellogg and Wharton.

?
March 28, 2024 10:15am ET
Enrolled: Undecided
Admitted: U. Chicago Booth $
$40000
,
Columbia , UPenn / Wharton
Applied: Columbia, U. Chicago Booth, Yale SOM, UPenn / Wharton, NYU Stern, Duke / Fuqua, Dartmouth / Tuck
Entering Year: 2024
Post MBA Career: Technology, Entrepreneurship, Non Profit/SI
GRE: 320
GPA: 3.9
Location: New York
Notes:

I am trying to go into the startup impact fintech space and am struggling on the decision (esp $ side of things since I likely won’t be making much after). CBS is obvs ideal for startups and located in the hub for fintech and startups. Wharton is known for fintech and has the brand if I need to pivot careers. Chi seems to have decent impact centers

?
March 28, 2024 9:40am ET
Enrolled: Undecided
Admitted: NYU Stern , UVA / Darden
Applied: UVA / Darden, NYU Stern, Northwestern / Kellogg, Michigan / Ross, Columbia, U. Chicago Booth
Entering Year: 2024
Post MBA Career: Consulting, Investment Banking
GRE: 327
GPA: 3.6
Notes:

Targeting IB, but also know my career goals could change during school and want consulting and LDP as plan B's. No scholarship for either school and both work geographically. I know NYU with finance goals makes it an obvious choice given its location and finance network, but I also like the experience UVA provides and its cheaper tuition and COL.

Academics

Faculty

Haas employs 74 tenure-track faculty members. These scholars and practitioners help lead Haas’s more than 10 research institutes and centers, and participate in seven multidisciplinary programs, which cover topics ranging from business innovation to nonprofit and public leadership. The Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation, for example, enables faculty to publish articles, create teaching materials and lead research projects on “open innovation,” a more dispersed industry innovation model. 

Curriculum

Professors at Haas make use of a variety of teaching methods, including case studies, seminars, simulations, group projects and guest speakers. Haas places an emphasis on hands-on learning, with certain courses providing students the opportunity to gain consulting experience by working in Silicon Valley firms. 

Haas operates on a two-semester schedule, with MBA classes running from late August through early December and from mid-January through May; commencement takes place shortly thereafter. For first-year students, each semester is further divided into two quarters. Within the academic year, all students have short breaks for Thanksgiving and other holidays, as well as a one-month break between the fall and spring semesters. 

During the first year, Haas students are required to take 12 core courses which account for roughly half of the 51 semester units needed to graduate. The core covers foundational business principles in accounting, finance, economics, marketing, operations, strategy, leadership, decision-making and management. Each of the required courses places an emphasis on team learning, with students working in small groups on projects and assignments. A core course may be waived if a student passes a waiver examination, and these are available for seven of the 12 core courses. These examinations are akin to the course’s final examination and are given the week before the start of each semester. All students must also fulfill an experiential learning, or “applied innovation” requirement by completing at least one of over a dozen programs. These include working in small teams on projects for both nonprofit and for-profit organizations, as well as developing socially responsible strategies for large corporations.

MBA students may begin taking elective courses in the spring semester of their first year. Haas provides a broad range of elective courses from which to choose, and students may even design their own courses together with members of the faculty. The school emphasizes hands-on learning and offers over 20 courses to satisfy the Applied Innovation requirement, ranging from international consulting projects to people development to strategies surrounding sustainable business practices. Haas also provides students with 13 Areas of Emphasis, which are high-level recommendations of courses, extracurricular activities and summer internships that students can follow to prepare for entry into related careers.

Other MBA Degree Options

In addition to the 21-month full-time MBA program, Haas offers a four-year JD/MBA program with either UC Berkeley’s School of Law or UC Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco. Also available are an MBA/MPH program with the UC Berkeley School of Public Health and an MBA/MA program in Global Studies with various UC Berkeley Schools. Part-time options include an evening and weekend MBA program. 

Areas of Emphasis at Haas

  • Finance
  • Marketing
  • Strategy & Consulting
  • Corporate Social Responsibility
  • Energy and Clean Technology
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Equity Fluent Leadership
  • Global Management
  • Health Management
  • Social Sector Leadership
  • Real Estate
  • Sustainable & Impact Finance
  • Technology

Degree Options at Haas

Full-time MBA
http://mba.haas.berkeley.edu/

Concurrent Degrees
JD/MBA
http://haas.berkeley.edu/MBA/academics/concurrent-degrees.html

MBA/MPH
https://mba.haas.berkeley.edu/careers/healthcare

MBA/MA
http://haas.berkeley.edu/MBA/academics/concurrent-degrees.html#internationalandareastudies

MBA for Executives
http://mbaforexecs.haas.berkeley.edu/

Evening & Weekend MBA
http://ewmba.haas.berkeley.edu/

Applied Innovation  Courses

  • Haas@Work
  • Social Sector Solutions
  • International Business Development
  • Cleantech to Market
  • Strategic and Sustainable Business Solutions
  • Design Sprint for Corporate Innovation
  • Design, Evaluate and Scale Development Technologies
  • People Development
  • Real Estate Investment Analysis
  • Hedge Fund Strategies
  • The Haas Socially Responsible Investment Fund
  • Design and Development of Web-Based Products and Services
  • Lean Launchpad
  • Social Lean Launchpad
  • The Startup Lab
  • Applied Data Analytics

Campus Life

Clubs, Conferences & Competitions

Haas offers its students many opportunities for extracurricular involvement, including over 50 student organizations to choose from, with a wide array of professional, athletic and cultural groups on hand. Many MBA students become involved in Challenge for Charity events such as competitions, shows and auctions geared at raising money for the Special Olympics and other charitable organizations. In addition, a large portion of MBA students volunteer their time to the Boost@Haas program, where they act as mentors for underprivileged high school students. 

Approximately ten conferences are regularly hosted by Haas faculty and students. These comprise both industry- and affiliation-related events, such as the Berkeley Energy Symposium and Women in Leadership Conference. Haas also sponsors the Haas Healthcare Conference, the UC Berkeley Startup Competition and the Global Social Venture Competition. Furthermore, MBA students have the opportunity to create their own competitions.

Campus Spaces

Designed by architect Charles Moore, Haas’s campus is comprised of three buildings—one each for classrooms, student services and faculty—linked together that face a main courtyard. Among the school’s facilities are a career center, a high-tech computer lab, a café and an economics and business library.

While most Haas students choose to live off campus, a fair number of students take advantage of Haas’s on-campus housing options. These include university residence halls as well as several apartment complexes devoted to housing UC Berkeley graduate students. The university also provides a housing service called Cal Rentals, through which students can receive counseling about their housing options. Students who wish to live off campus can refer to Cal Rentals for a listing of off-campus rental opportunities. 

MBA Careers

Career Services

The Haas Career Management Group provides extensive support for MBA students by hosting on-campus interviews, corporate presentations and electronic job postings through CareerNet. The Career Management Group also offers students informal ways to meet employers year-round through career panels, alumni mixers, industry firm nights, job fairs and corporate visits. In addition, individual career advisors are available to aid students in developing their job search skills and tackling the recruiting process. Full-time recruiting for second-year students takes place in the fall and spring semesters, and internship recruiting for first-year students occurs in the spring.

Career Statistics

The mean base annual salary of 2023 Haas graduates was $162,831, with an average signing bonus of $36,777. Of the 294 Haas MBA graduates, 87% reported seeking post-MBA employment. Just under 90% looking for work secured offers within three months and 88.7% accepted. The entrepreneurial spirit was high at Haas as 12.7 percent of the class opted to work for startups, and another 3.4 percent of graduates ventured into starting their own businesses.

Nearly 30% of the Class of 2023 found jobs in the technology industry after graduating. The next most chosen industry was consulting, at nearly 28% of the class, and 14.5% of students accepted positions in financial services. Nearly 8% of students entered the healthcare industry and another 6.6% went into energy.

Roughly three-quarters of graduates settled in the West of the U.S. after graduation. The Northeast claimed just over 9% of graduates. Just over 5% pursued post-MBA roles in the South U.S.

Financing

The tuition for Haas’s MBA program is $69,814 for California residents and $82,059 for non-residents for the 2023-2024 academic year. Haas estimates that with additional expenses such as living expenses and textbooks, students will pay up to $111,786 as residents or $124,041 as non-residents. Haas offers both merit- and need-based scholarships to help students with the program’s cost. While some merit-based scholarships are awarded to applicants at the time of admission, others require the completion of separate applications. Both two-year and one-year scholarships are available, and Haas requires that the recipients of two-year grants maintain at least a 3.0 GPA throughout business school. Students also have an array of loan options at their disposal, including federal loan offerings for U.S. citizens and permanent residents. In addition, Haas publishes a compiled list of preferred lenders with different loan options for students to consider. For international students, a risk-share loan is available that does not require a U.S. co-signer.

Cost of Attendance

Tuition & Fees

  • CA Resident $69,814
  • Non-Resident $82,059

Health Insurance $6,156
Housing & Food $28,284
Books & Supplies $730
Transportation $3,660
Personal Expenses $3,152
Totals:

  • CA Resident $111,786
  • Non-Resident $124,041

Contact

Full-Time MBA Admissions
Haas School of Business University of California, Berkeley
545 Student Services #1900 (Mail Address)
2220 Piedmont Avenue (Delivery Address)
Berkeley, CA 94720-1902
Phone: 510-642-1405
Fax: 510-643-6659
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.haas.berkeley.edu
Blog: http://blogs.haas.berkeley.edu/the-berkeley-mba
Twitter: @BerkeleyHaas