Nearly Half of High School Students Now Use AI in the College Search

The finding

EAB’s national survey of more than 5,000 high school students found that 46 percent used tools such as ChatGPT during the college search, up from 26 percent in spring 2025. EAB: Nearly Half of High School Students Now Use AI in College Search.

A national survey shows AI use rising sharply, but students still place human and first-party sources ahead of chatbots when a decision becomes specific. EAB: Nearly Half of High School Students Now Use AI in College Search.

What the evidence actually shows

The survey also found that only a small minority turned to chatbots first for information about a specific institution. That gap matters: AI is becoming a discovery and synthesis layer, while official college pages, people and established search channels still carry more weight when students verify a deadline, program or price. EAB: Nearly Half of High School Students Now Use AI in College Search. Inside Higher Ed: Survey: How High Schoolers Are Using AI in College Search.

The decision hidden inside the headline

Colleges are no longer writing only for a human visitor arriving through Google. Their pages are also being summarized by systems that may collapse exceptions, reuse stale text or omit the difference between a policy and an FAQ. The institutions with the clearest structured answers may be more accurately represented in AI-generated comparisons, creating a new form of visibility advantage. EAB: Nearly Half of High School Students Now Use AI in College Search. Inside Higher Ed: Survey: How High Schoolers Are Using AI in College Search.

What the record cannot yet prove

The survey records self-reported use, not the accuracy of any answer students received. It does not show that AI caused an enrollment decision or that usage is evenly distributed across regions and income groups. Inside Higher Ed: Survey: How High Schoolers Are Using AI in College Search.

What applicants should do now

Treat an AI answer as a research lead. Open the college’s current admissions and financial-aid pages, record the date, and verify every deadline, testing rule and cost claim before acting. EAB: Nearly Half of High School Students Now Use AI in College Search.

Preserve the exact cycle, program and applicant category in any checklist. When a secondary report and a controlling admissions page differ, the current first-party instruction governs the application. EAB: Nearly Half of High School Students Now Use AI in College Search.