Undergraduate accounting enrollment rose again last fall, marking the third straight year of growth for a major that has spent the past decade fighting a narrative of decline. 

New figures from the National Student Clearinghouse’s Final Fall Enrollment Trends 2025 show accounting undergrad enrollment grew 7.3% year over year in fall 2025, far outpacing the 1.2% increase across all majors. 

The momentum has been building steadily, following an 11.3% jump in fall 2024 and a 1.9% rise in fall 2023, suggesting the pipeline issue may be loosening at the entry level, even as the profession continues to wrestle with staffing shortages and retention. 

According to Accounting Today, AICPA CEO of public accounting Susan Coffey framed the trend as a meaningful signal about student priorities. “Three straight years of growth is energizing for the profession,” Coffey said, adding that the fact enrollment increased “versus competitive fields of study signals that students are seeing the purpose, trust, value, and financial security that accounting delivers - and they’re choosing it.”

Overall postsecondary accounting enrollment reached 313,397 students in 2025, up from 293,759 in 2024, spanning four-year institutions, community colleges, hybrid schools, and graduate programs. 

Four-year undergraduate accounting enrollment alone grew 7.4% to 204,283, while total enrollment at public four-year institutions grew only 1.4% and declined at private schools. 

Most notably, accounting is taking up more space inside business schools, with one out of eight undergraduate business students majoring in accounting last fall, up from one in nine in 2023. 

At the graduate level, accounting enrollment ticked up to 25,580 students, representing the first year-over-year increase since 2019.