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Average GPA for STEM Majors
Page updated 4 October 2026 · Berkeley data 2025-26 · NCES national means 1999-2000, distribution 2009
STEM coursework is graded lower than non-STEM coursework. STEM majors are not. Those are two different claims and most pages on this subject run them together, then attach departmental grading figures from a single liberal arts college. Here is what the published data actually shows.
STEM majors, UC Berkeley 2025-26
3.47
Across 37 STEM majors and 5,468 graduates, against 3.54 for the non-STEM remainder and 3.51 for all 86 majors. A gap of 0.07.
STEM vs non-STEM course grades
2.8 v 3.0
National FIRST-YEAR course GPA for 2003-04 beginning bachelor's degree students. The grading gap is about 0.2, and it sits in first-year courses, not in whole transcripts.
Sources: UC Berkeley Office of Planning and Analysis (downloaded 4 October 2026) and NCES 2013-152, Table 8 (BPS:04/09 and PETS:09).
STEM majors are not more likely to finish with a low GPA
In the most recent national distribution, 37.7% of STEM majors finished with a cumulative GPA of 3.50 or higher, against 36.4% of all 2007-08 bachelor's degree recipients. Social sciences, not engineering, had the largest share finishing below 2.50 (9.7% against 6.7% for engineering). And when NCES last published per-field means, engineering graduates averaged 3.11 and mathematics graduates 3.34, the highest of any field. See the full national table on average GPA by major.
Average GPA by STEM Field (High to Low)
The 37 majors we classify as STEM at UC Berkeley, 2025-26 bachelor's degree recipients. Graduate counts are shown because several of these programmes graduate fewer than twenty students a year.
| STEM Field | Average GPA | Graduates |
|---|---|---|
| CDSS Computer Science | 3.61 | 816 |
| Eng Math & Statistics | 3.60 | 10 |
| Nutrition & Metabolic Biology | 3.59 | 49 |
| Environmental Sciences | 3.56 | 96 |
| Genetics & Plant Biology | 3.56 | 28 |
| Neuroscience | 3.55 | 63 |
| Molecular & Cell Biology | 3.54 | 680 |
| Atmospheric Science | 3.52 | 7 |
| Molecular Environ Biology | 3.52 | 133 |
| Electrical Eng & Comp Sci | 3.49 | 517 |
| Aerospace Engineering | 3.48 | 33 |
| Bioengineering | 3.48 | 106 |
| Chemical Biology | 3.47 | 70 |
| Statistics | 3.47 | 165 |
| Chemistry | 3.46 | 100 |
| Environmental Earth Science | 3.46 | 7 |
| Industrial Eng & Ops Rsch | 3.46 | 57 |
| Marine Science | 3.46 | 9 |
| Microbial Biology | 3.46 | 76 |
| Nuclear Engineering | 3.45 | 30 |
| Nut Sci-Physio & Metabol | 3.45 | 24 |
| Nutritional Sci-Toxicology | 3.44 | 8 |
| Applied Mathematics | 3.43 | 295 |
| Mathematics | 3.43 | 129 |
| Data Science | 3.42 | 941 |
| Physics | 3.38 | 168 |
| Chemical Engineering | 3.37 | 89 |
| Energy Engineering | 3.37 | 11 |
| Materials Science & Eng | 3.37 | 24 |
| Geophysics | 3.35 | 6 |
| Mechanical Engineering | 3.35 | 243 |
| Integrative Biology | 3.34 | 249 |
| Civil Engineering | 3.31 | 113 |
| Astrophysics | 3.29 | 77 |
| Engineering Physics | 3.27 | 17 |
| Environmental Engineering Sci | 3.20 | 16 |
| Geology | 3.13 | 6 |
Source: UC Berkeley Office of Planning and Analysis, Average GPA by Major (CSV), downloaded 4 October 2026. Berkeley is a highly selective public university, so read the ordering and the size of the gaps rather than the absolute level. How sources are chosen: methodology.
How this STEM list was drawn. This STEM grouping is ours, not Berkeley's and not the federal STEM designated-degree list. The rule and the full list are shown so the judgement is visible. The rule applied is the natural sciences, mathematics, computing and engineering. On that rule it selects 37 of Berkeley's 86 majors, every one of which is in the table above. Public health, psychology, cognitive science, geography, architecture and the environmental-policy and economics programmes are excluded as social, health or design fields; the federal STEM designated-degree list would include some of them, and adding all eight of them moves the weighted mean from 3.471 to 3.479, which rounds to 3.47 either way.
Why STEM Courses Grade Lower
The 0.2 course-level gap has four structural causes. None of them requires STEM majors to graduate with lower cumulative GPAs, and in the national data they do not.
Objective Grading
STEM courses rely on exams with right-or-wrong answers. There is less room for partial credit or effort-based assessment. A proof is correct or it is not; an engineering calculation works or it does not.
Curved Exams
Many STEM courses use curves that normalize grades, structurally capping the share of A grades. When the class average on an exam is 55%, even strong students may receive B grades.
Weed-Out Courses
Programmes deliberately front-load difficult courses (organic chemistry, calculus II, introduction to circuits) designed to filter students. These have high failure rates, and they are where the course-level grading gap is concentrated.
Cumulative Knowledge
STEM courses build on each other. Struggling in calculus I affects physics and every downstream engineering course. Early difficulty compounds, unlike humanities where courses stand more independently.
How a STEM GPA Is Read in Context
- * Medical schools compute a separate science GPA (BCPM: biology, chemistry, physics, math). 2025-2026 matriculants averaged around 3.75 science and 3.81 overall (AAMC Table A-16 means). See good GPA for med school.
- * Technical grad programs often weight major GPA over cumulative GPA. Many engineering programs treat a 3.2 in engineering as competitive against higher cumulative GPAs in non-technical fields.
- * Employers that screen by GPA most commonly use a 3.0 cutoff (NACE). Technical recruiters frequently apply a lower effective bar for STEM candidates and weigh projects and internships heavily.
- * Law schools do not adjust for major, which disadvantages STEM applicants whose GPAs are earned against tougher curves.
Common Questions
What is the average GPA for STEM majors?
At UC Berkeley, the 37 majors we classify as STEM in the 2025-26 graduating class averaged 3.47 across 5,468 graduates, against 3.51 for all 86 majors and 3.54 for the non-STEM remainder. That is a gap of about 0.07 between STEM and non-STEM, not the half-grade-point gap the widely circulated tables imply. Individual STEM majors ran from 3.13 (Geology, 6 graduates) to 3.61 (CDSS Computer Science, 816 graduates). These are one institution's published figures and our own STEM grouping, which is listed in full on this page; no US agency publishes a current national mean GPA by major.
What is the average GPA of an engineering student?
At UC Berkeley in 2025-26, the 13 majors with Engineering in the degree title averaged 3.43 across 1,266 graduates, running from 3.20 (Environmental Engineering Sci, 16 graduates) to 3.60 (Eng Math & Statistics, 10 graduates). The largest programme by headcount is Electrical Eng & Comp Sci at 3.49 (517 graduates), followed by Mechanical Engineering at 3.35 (243). Nationally, the last mean NCES published for engineering graduates was 3.11 cumulative, for the 1999-2000 bachelor's degree recipients (NCES 2003-165, Table 5 (B&B:2000/01)), and 35.5% of 2007-08 engineering and engineering technology graduates finished at 3.50 or higher against 36.4% of all recipients.
Is a 3.0 GPA good for a STEM major?
It is below the average in current published institutional data. Every one of the 37 STEM majors at UC Berkeley averaged above 3.1 in 2025-26, and the lowest, Geology, still averaged 3.13 across 6 graduates. Tables putting STEM field averages below 3.0 are quoting departmental grading figures from one small liberal arts college, not a national measurement: when NCES last published national per-field means, engineering graduates averaged 3.11 and mathematics graduates 3.34. A 3.0 in a STEM field is a workable GPA that clears most employer screens, but do not assume it reads as above average.
Why do STEM courses grade lower than other courses?
They do, and the gap is real but smaller and narrower than usually claimed. In their first year, 2003-04 beginning bachelor's degree students earned 2.8 in STEM courses against 3.0 in non-STEM courses (NCES 2013-152, Table 8 (BPS:04/09 and PETS:09)), a gap of about 0.2 in first-year coursework rather than across a whole transcript. Rojstaczer and Healy put the science-versus-humanities departmental gap at roughly 0.4. The structural reasons are objective right-or-wrong grading, curves that cap the share of A grades, deliberately difficult early courses, and cumulative sequences where early difficulty compounds. What does not follow is lower cumulative GPAs for the students who stay: STEM majors take non-STEM courses too, and they select into the major.
How do medical schools treat a science GPA?
Medical schools calculate a separate science GPA, the BCPM (biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics), alongside the cumulative GPA, precisely because they know science grades are earned differently. For the 2025-2026 entering class, matriculants averaged around 3.75 science GPA and 3.81 overall (AAMC Table A-16 reports these as means). A strong BCPM signals readiness for the science-heavy medical curriculum, so it often carries more weight than the cumulative figure for applicants from lighter majors.
Do employers apply lower GPA cutoffs for STEM majors?
Some do. Among employers that screen by GPA, 3.0 is the most common cutoff (NACE Job Outlook surveys). Technical recruiters at engineering and science firms often understand that a 3.2 in engineering reflects different rigor than a 3.5 in a non-technical field, and some elite recruiters apply a lower effective bar for STEM candidates. Major GPA and demonstrated technical projects frequently matter more than the cumulative number for STEM hiring.