State Guide · 2 ABA Schools · 509 data 2025
Iowa law school requirements
Iowa has 2 ABA-approved law schools, with LSAT medians from 156 to 164. Together they took 2,035 completed applications, made 986 offers and filled 300 first-year seats in 2025. Every number on this page comes from those schools' own ABA Standard 509 reports.
ABA schools
2
1 public, 1 private
LSAT median range
156 to 164
across the state
First-year seats
300
from 2,035 applications
Tuition range
$50,920 to $52,191
full time, non-resident
The 2 ABA-approved Iowa law schools
| School | Type | LSAT | GPA | Accept | 1L | Tuition |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| University of IowaIowa City | Public | 164 | 3.78 | 44.4% | 159 | $52,191 |
| Drake UniversityDes Moines | Private | 156 | 3.67 | 54.8% | 141 | $50,920 |
What the state data shows
University of Iowa reports the highest LSAT median in the state at 164, with a 3.78 GPA median and a 44.4% acceptance rate on 1,247 applications. The spread of 8 LSAT points between the top and bottom of the state means a single score can be a stretch at one Iowa school and comfortably above median at another. The national median of school medians is 159, so Iowa's strongest reported median sits 5 points above it.
1 of the 2 schools charge residents less than non-residents, so residency status is worth checking before you apply. The lowest published resident tuition belongs to University of Iowa at $30,944 a year, where the median full-time grant is $30,043. Across the state, published non-resident tuition runs from $50,920 to $52,191, a gap of $1,271 a year before fees, living costs or scholarship.
2 of the 2 schools reporting bar outcomes beat the weighted average pass rate in the jurisdictions where their graduates sat. University of Iowa reports the state's highest first-time pass rate at 90.96% from 166 first-time takers, against a 82.10% jurisdiction average. Bar admission is granted state by state, so the jurisdiction you intend to practise in matters as much as the school.
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Data: ABA Standard 509 Information Report (2025), published for consumer disclosure, retrieved from the ABA Required Disclosures portal on 2026-09-01, with bar passage figures from the same portal's Bar Passage Outcomes report for the class of 2024. Restated in our own structure; no ABA document or file is reproduced here.