A 1580 is in the 99th percentile: it beats about 99 of every 100 SAT takers. Among the 400 most-applied-to colleges that report SAT ranges, it's at or above the 75th percentile at 400 of them.
Top 1%: in or above the middle 50% at almost every college.
A 1580 is in the 99th percentile. It's in or above the middle 50% range at nearly every college that reports SAT scores, including the most selective.
At that level the score has done its job. The most selective colleges see many applicants in the 1550s and up, so your courses, essays, recommendations and activities decide what happens next.
For scale: a 1530 is the 99th percentile and a 1600 is the 99th. Check your own estimate with the SAT score calculator, or any score's rank with the SAT percentile calculator.
The middle 50% is the range between the 25th and 75th percentile SAT scores of a college's first-year students. Above the 75th percentile, your score is a strength; inside the range, it's typical; below the 25th, it's a reach that the rest of the application has to make up for.
| College | Middle 50% | Admit |
|---|---|---|
| Harvard University | 1480–1580 | 4% |
| Yale University | 1480–1580 | 5% |
| University of Chicago | 1510–1580 | 6% |
| Massachusetts Institute of Technology | 1510–1580 | 4% |
| New York University | 1450–1570 | 13% |
| Columbia University | 1470–1570 | 4% |
| University of Pennsylvania | 1480–1570 | 6% |
| Stanford University | 1470–1570 | 4% |
Ranges are each college's most recently reported middle 50% for students who submitted scores, from our college database. University of California and Cal State campuses are left out because they don't consider SAT scores. Look up any college with the college SAT lookup.
The SAT reports Reading and Writing and Math separately, 200–800 each. Colleges see both, so the same 1580 can read differently for an engineering program than for an English major.
| Profile | Reading and Writing | Math |
|---|---|---|
| Even split | 790 | 790 |
Almost never worth it. Moving from 1580 to a 1600 changes how a college reads your application very little, and the prep time is better spent on essays and activities.
Retake if:
Keep your 1580 if:
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Percentiles come from the same SAT percentile table as our percentile calculator. SAT® is a trademark registered by the College Board, which is not affiliated with, and does not endorse, this page.