The 20 most exclusive colleges and universities in the US

• Some of the most prestigious institutions of higher learning in the US are also the country's most exclusive.
• Using data from the Department of Education, we found the 20 colleges with the lowest admissions rates.
• Many of the most selective schools also appear at the top of many college and university rankings.
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Some of the most prestigious institutions of higher learning in the US are also the country's most exclusive.

Using data from the Department of Education's College Scorecard database, we found the colleges and universities in the US with the lowest admissions rates for the 2017-2018 academic year, the most recently available data. We looked specifically at schools that were predominantly four-year bachelor's degree-granting institutions, as reported to the Department.

Several of the most selective colleges and universities also appear at the top of many college and university rankings, such as the list published annually by U.S. News and World Report. (Stanford University, the second most selective school on our list, ranked seventh in the most recent U.S. News and World Report on the best universities in the country, for example.)

Read more: The 25 top colleges in the US, and how much you might be earning 6 years after graduating

Here are the 20 US colleges with the lowest admissions rates, along with their sticker-price tuition and undergraduate enrollment in the 2017-18 academic year: