FAFSA Completion Is Up

Free Application for Federal Student Aid completion is up this year, with 26 percent of high school seniors having filled out the FAFSA by Nov. 21, according to the National College Attainment Network’s annual FAFSA tracker. That’s an 11.7 percent increase over the number of students who had completed the form as of the same date in 2022, the last time the form successfully launched on Oct. 1. (This year, it opened a few days early.)

That rate is slightly higher among students attending high-income high schools (27.8 percent) and lower for low-income high schools (22.1 percent). High schools in cities also have lower completion rates (21.8 percent) than in suburbs, rural areas and small towns.

Indiana is the state with the highest FAFSA completion rate, at 38.1 percent, while in Alaska, just 10.7 percent of high school seniors have filled out the form.

In a blog post about FAFSA data, NCAN wrote that students have reported filling out the simplified FAFSA in as little as 15 minutes. That, combined with the early opening date this year, may lead to record FAFSA completion for the Class of 2026, the organization said.