Which is generally harder to get into for undergraduate engineering: MIT or Georgia Tech?

The biggest practical difference is that MIT admits from a far smaller, globally self-selecting applicant pool, while Georgia Tech is a large public institute whose admissions context is strongly shaped by Georgia residency. For undergraduate engineering, MIT is substantially harder to enter overall. Its applicant pool includes exceptional students from around the world, and admission requires distinction well beyond strong grades and advanced math and science coursework.

Georgia Tech is also highly selective, particularly for engineering and particularly for applicants from outside Georgia. Strong preparation in calculus, physics, computing, and rigorous coursework matters a great deal, and out-of-state admission can be very competitive. But Georgia Tech enrolls a much larger undergraduate population and reserves significant access for Georgia residents, so its overall admissions landscape is meaningfully less restrictive than MIT’s.

For a student applying to engineering, the sensible comparison is not that one school is "easy" and the other is hard. Both should be treated as reaches for many qualified applicants, especially in popular areas such as computer science, mechanical engineering, aerospace, and biomedical engineering. MIT belongs in the extreme-reach category even for applicants with near-perfect academics; Georgia Tech can range from a reach to a more plausible option depending heavily on residency, course rigor, grades, and preparation.