The number of students taking Advanced Placement exams has grown tremendously—participation increased in 66 of the last 70 years since AP exams were created—even as most families are unaware of the seismic shift happening in educational standards and expectations. Particularly at the top colleges, AP exam scores are becoming more important than a student’s grades. Notably, Caltech and Stanford now require students to report an AP exam score in their applications for any AP class listed on their transcripts.
Most families still view AP exams as tests for only the most elite students. But, in 2025, 37 percent of public high school graduates had taken at least one AP exam. Across public and private schools, more than three million students took an AP exam—roughly a 166 percent increase from 20 years ago, while the percentage of high school students over all has only slightly increased over that time.
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