The number of applicants has risen more than 40 percent over the last two years, despite new limits on student loans and uncertainty over how artificial intelligence will affect legal work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For decades, the American law school has served as a popular hedge against a cooling economy. When the \u201cHelp Wanted\u201d signs disappear, the \u201cJ.D.\u201d applications surge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That\u2019s what is happening now. The number of U.S. law school applicants for the 2026 cycle is up an estimated 17 percent<\/a> from last year, according to data from the American Bar Association compiled by the Law School Admission Council. That figure is a staggering 44 percent increase from just two years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But for this new wave of aspiring lawyers, the safety of the ivory tower comes with a steep entry fee and a shifting floor. Between new federal loan caps and the looming shadow of generative artificial intelligence, the legal profession\u2019s newest recruits are walking into a high-stakes gamble that looks very different from the one their predecessors lost after the 2008 financial crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Enrollment rose to 52,404 by 2010, a 7 percent jump from three years earlier. Many of those students didn\u2019t enter the legal careers they may have envisioned; about half of 2011 law school graduates were not working in full-time jobs that required a law degree<\/a> within a year of graduation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The job prospects for lawyers have since greatly improved, with more than 80 percent of students who graduated in 2023 and 2024 working in jobs that require their legal credentials within a year, according to the American Bar Association.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But the flocks of people applying to law school face new risks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n New limits on student loans that go into effect this year could make financing a degree more expensive. And artificial intelligence threatens to bring major changes to the industry, affecting which jobs are available and how much they pay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s too early to know how things will change,\u201d said Kellye Testy, the executive director of the Association of American Law Schools, which has more than 170 members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSome worry that A.I. will decrease demand for lawyers,\u201d she said, adding that eventually the technology could have a more direct role in legal work. \u201cThat could matter in three years,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Growing costs<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1985, going to law school at a private university cost on average about $8,000 a year, according to the Law School Admission Council. Now the average cost is about $60,000 a year at private universities \u2014 and a still hefty $32,000 a year at public ones. At some law schools, tuition and annual living expenses exceed $110,000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Financing that big bill is about to get more expensive. Stricter limits on student loans, which were passed as part of President Trump\u2019s tax and spending law last year, go into effect in July. They impose a yearly limit of $50,000 for students seeking professional degrees, with a $200,000 lifetime cap<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alternative financing options like private loans can have higher interest rates and more restrictions than federal direct loans, said Susan Bogart, director of financial aid for Penn State Dickinson Law, where the cost of attendance will be about $90,000, according to its website.<\/p>\n\n\n\n During a surge of applications, law schools may also pull back on the discounts they offered to entice promising students when applicants were scarce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It can be difficult to estimate how well the investment in a law degree will pay off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Law students often anticipate landing high-paying legal jobs in private law firms or corporations, where the entry-level salary can be around $225,000, according to the National Association for Law Placement. But the median starting salary for public service lawyers, for example, is around $65,000 \u2014 which can make monthly student loan payments more of a stretch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A.I. uncertainty<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2023, Stanford researchers, in collaboration with a legal technology company, announced that ChatGPT had passed the bar exam, scoring in the 90th percentile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That claim, which other researchers later challenged, set off a wave of speculation about how A.I. would affect lawyers. Economists at Goldman Sachs estimated that year that the technology could automate 44 percent of legal work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But it\u2019s still unclear how new A.I. tools for lawyers, including Thomson Reuters\u2019s CoCounsel and the A.I. legal assistant Harvey<\/a>, will affect the availability of legal jobs or how much they pay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The tools can make routine legal tasks, including document review and case research, faster. (Lawyers who have tried to use A.I. for more than that have sometimes been embarrassed by A.I.-generated briefs<\/a> that cite made-up court cases.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n