Is University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign or Boston University harder to get into?

The biggest practical tradeoff is that UIUC’s selectivity can swing a lot by major, while Boston University is usually judged more as a highly selective private university overall. In broad terms, BU is often perceived as harder to get into across the university, but UIUC can be just as hard, or harder, for certain programs. At UIUC, majors like computer science, engineering, and business are especially competitive, so the answer can change depending on what you plan to study.

If you are asking for an overall, school-wide comparison, BU is the one most students would describe as harder to get into. Its applicant pool is very large, it draws heavily from students aiming at selective private universities, and admissions does not vary by major as dramatically as UIUC. That makes BU feel more consistently selective across the board.

UIUC is a little different because admission is much more program-specific. For less impacted majors, it may be somewhat more accessible than BU. But for top-demand programs, especially in Grainger Engineering or CS, UIUC can be extremely difficult and should not be treated as the easier option.

So the simplest answer is BU is usually harder to get into overall, while UIUC may be harder for specific high-demand majors.