On Friday, Dec. 11, Stanford accepted 745 high school students for early admission to the Class of 2020, amounting to an acceptance rate of 9.5 percent. 7,822 students applied to Stanford’s restrictive early action program, Stanford’s largest ever early applicant pool. 701 applicants were deferred to the regular admissions program.

This year’s early acceptance rate was lower than last year’s, which was 10.2 percent. For the Class of 2019, Stanford accepted 743 and deferred 562 students out of a pool of 7,297 early applicants.

“Today we invited 745 remarkable young people to join the Stanford family,” wrote Colleen Lim M.A. ’80, associate dean and director of undergraduate admission, in an email to The Daily. “It is such an honor and joy for our staff to play a role in transforming the lives of these admitted students, and we can’t wait to see the impact they will make on the Stanford community.”

The 745 early admits come from 48 states and 34 countries, according to Richard Shaw, dean of admission and financial aid. Over 80 percent of the students have a high school grade point average of 4.0 or above.

“These students represent the best and brightest young people from around the world, selected from an extraordinary array of candidates from every conceivable background,” Shaw told the Stanford News Service.

“We had a record pool this year, and we regret that we could not  accommodate more of the many well qualified candidates who applied to Stanford,” Lim wrote.

The majority of spaces in the freshman class will be filled during the regular admission program in the spring. According to the Office of Undergraduate Admission, more than 35,000 students are expected to apply.

Contact Sarah Wishingrad at swishing ‘at’ stanford.edu.