Coast Guard Academy requirements

Every published requirement

Read from the official source, with nothing inferred. A blank means the institution publishes no figure, not that there is no bar.

Dates for this cycle

The next one is 76 days away. Dates that have passed are kept, because the pattern repeats each cycle and the spacing is the useful part.

Working backwards: ACT publishes a one-to-four-week score release window, so the last sitting whose scores reliably arrive before January 15, 2027 is December 12, 2026. Every sitting’s release window, and the registration deadlines.

Which ACT sittings still work for January 15, 2027

ACT publishes a one-to-four-week score release window rather than a release calendar, so the usable sitting is earlier than the deadline suggests. Judged against the four-week end, which is the one to plan against when the cost of being late is the application.

The last sitting that works is December 12, 2026, and registration for it closes November 6, 2026. Coast Guard Academy does not publish a superscore policy, so plan for a single sitting to stand on its own.

Who takes your best sitting, and who does not

Two opposite retake strategies for the same applicant, and the comparison is published nowhere else. Superscoring means a later test can only help. A single-sitting rule means it has to clear the bar on its own.

3 of these 7 take your best sections across sittings; Air Force ROTC explicitly does not. If you are applying to both kinds — and most applicants are — plan for the stricter rule, because a single strong sitting satisfies everyone and a patchwork of best sections does not.

The programmes that publish an actual floor

Only two do. The academies publish a deadline, a nomination requirement and a process — not a number.

The gap between them is the whole story: Army ROTC at a 19 is the 58th percentile and AFROTC at a 28 is the 91st. Same uniform, nine points apart. The full percentile chart puts any score in that range.

The Physical Fitness Examination, by the numbers

Not the CFA — the Academy states the CFA cannot be substituted for it. Three events out of 300 points, and unlike anything on the academic side of this page it carries a real published minimum.

These are not requirements. They are the mean performances the Academy publishes for the Class of 2027 at their initial Swab Summer examination in July 2023 — admitted cadets, measured, offered for comparison. A 220 is what the middle of an admitted class did, not what you must do.

The rules, which matter more than the numbers:

• Three events worth a maximum of 100 points each, in a fixed sequence — cadence push-ups, two-minute sit-ups, then the 1.5-mile run — with a maximum of five minutes' rest between them.
• Scores must come from a single test session and cannot be pieced together from multiple sessions or practice tests.
• There is no prescribed minimum on any individual event. Only the total is assessed.
• An applicant who cannot reach 150 of 300 will not receive a full appointment, and the Academy states that standard may be raised with the competitiveness of the pool.
• The bar rises after you arrive: new cadets are expected to reach 180 by the end of Swab Summer, and cadets who cannot reach it by the end of the first semester are normally disenrolled.

Read from the Academy’s own Cadet Candidate Physical Fitness Examination Instruction Manual and Scoring Table.

What Coast Guard Academy is worth, and what it costs you

Not in the abstract. Against the 504 published merit grids we hold, which is the only honest yardstick we have.

The largest published annual merit award anywhere in our dataset is $42,000 a year at Simpson, and 30 of 504 colleges publish $30,000 or more anywhere in their grid. None of them covers room, board and medical as well, and none of them pays you. What your own score is worth at all 504.

What a score will not do for Coast Guard Academy

• Replace the rest of the file. No nomination is needed here, but fitness, medical qualification and the interview are each their own gate.
• Pass the fitness test or the medical. Physical Fitness Examination (PFE). The Candidate Fitness Assessment used by the other academies cannot be substituted for it. Medical exam due 15 February for Early Action, 1 April for Regular Admission.
• Stand in for a published requirement that does not exist. Coast Guard Academy publishes no minimum, so nobody can tell you the score you "need" — including us.
• Carry an out-of-date eligibility rule. Age, citizenship and dependency rules are strict and are checked: A US citizen of sound moral character, 17–22 years of age on the last Monday in June, unmarried with no dependents or financial debt, and a high-school graduate or GED recipient before entry.

Questions about Coast Guard Academy

Sources

• USCGA — Cost and Tuition
• USCGA — Admission Requirements
• USCGA — Apply

The other academies and ROTC scholarships

• West Point requirements — no published minimum, nomination required
• Naval Academy requirements — no published minimum, nomination required
• Air Force Academy requirements — no published minimum, nomination required
• Army ROTC requirements — 19 ACT minimum, no nomination
• Air Force ROTC requirements — 28 ACT minimum, no nomination
• Navy ROTC requirements — no published minimum, no nomination