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Capped Majors at UC Campuses - 2021

<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hat_shop.jpg">Hat Shop - Franco Folini</a>, <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0">CC BY-SA 2.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons. Edited by O's List.
Hat Shop - Franco Folini, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Edited by O's List.

The University of California campuses of Los Angeles, Berkeley, San Diego, Irvine, Davis and Santa Barbara are among the most sought-after colleges by students. Last year, applications topped 100,000 at some of these campuses. With so much interest, there is bound to be some majors which are more sought after as compared to others. These high demand majors can be very selective, and in some cases have a cap on enrollment. While other high demand majors may not have a capped enrolment, they can be very competitive for applicants. Some campuses allow students to choose an alternate major in which case the University of California recommends that students choose an alternate major if their first-choice major is a competitive or capped high demand major.

Knowing the impacted majors at the various UC campuses can help students calibrate their applications, expectations and make informed choices about alternate majors and applying to out of state public and private colleges. This a handy list to have as students work on their UC applications.

We have compiled an exhaustive list of the capped, selective, or high demand majors for freshmen admissions by campus.

UC Berkeley

  • College of Engineering:
    • Aerospace Engineering: This is a new major for 2022 and we don’t know if its going to be an impacted or a high demand major. However, since all engineering majors at Berkeley are sought after, it should be safe to assume that Aerospace Engineering will also see a lot of demand.
    • Bioengineering
    • Civil & Environmental Engineering
    • Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences
    • Engineering Science: Engineering science is an interdisciplinary major consisting of engineering, math and physics.
    • Industrial Engineering & Operations Research
    • Materials Science & Engineering
    • Mechanical Engineering
    • Nuclear Engineering
    • Undeclared: UCB requires engineering undeclared students to complete one semester before they can officially declare a major. Engineering undeclared is a small program and can be very competitive as the students have the flexibility to choose any engineering major after the completion of a semester. The price for flexibility is extreme competition!
    College of Chemistry:
    • Chemistry, B.S.
    • Chemistry, B.A.
    • Chemical Engineering
    • Chemical Biology

UCLA

  • College of Applied Science and Engineering:
    • Biomedical Engineering
    • Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
    • Civil and Environmental Engineering
    • Computer Science
    • Electrical and Computer Engineering
    • Materials Science and Engineering
    • Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
  • College of Nursing:
    • Nursing B.S.
  • College of Letters and Sciences:
    • Business Economics
    • Economics

UC San Diego

  • Division of Biological Sciences
    • Bioinformatics
    • Ecology, Behavior and Evolution
    • General Biology
    • Human Biology
    • Microbiology
    • Molecular and Cell Biology
    • Neurobiology
  • Halicioglu Data Science Institute
    • Data Science (Check out our blog on data science.)
  • Division of Physical Sciences:
    • Physics
  • Herbert Werthiem School of Public Health:
    • Public Health
  • Jacobs School of Engineering – all majors in these departments:
    • Bioengineering
    • Chemical Engineering and NanoEngineering
    • Computer Science and Engineering
    • Electrical and Computer Engineering
    • Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
    • Structural Engineering

UC Irvine

  • Paul Merage School of Business:
    • Business Administration, B.A.
    • Business Information Management, B.S.:
  • Claire Trever School of the Arts:
    • Dance
    • Music
  • Sue and Bill Gross School of Nursing:
    • Nursing Science, B.S.
  • The Henry Samueli School of Engineering:
    • Biomedical Engineering
    • Chemical and BioMolecular Engineering
    • Civil and Environmental Engineering
    • Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
    • Materials Science and Engineering
    • Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
  • Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Science:
    • Computer Science
    • Informatics: B.S in Informatics, Game Design, Software Engineering
    • Data Statistics

UC Davis

  • College of Engineering:
    • Aerospace Science and Engineering
    • Biochemical Engineering
    • Biological Systems Engineering
    • Biomedical Engineering
    • Chemical Engineering
    • Civil Engineering
    • Computer Engineering
    • Computer Science and Engineering
    • Electrical Engineering
    • Environmental Engineering
    • Material Science and Engineering
    • Mechanical Engineering
  • College of Letters and Science:
    • Computer Science

UC Santa Barbara

  • College of Engineering:
    • Chemical Engineering
    • Computer Engineering
    • Computer Science
    • Electrical Engineering
    • Mechanical Engineering
  • College of Creative Studies:
    Applications require faculty review and the majors are competitive. The majors offered at CCS are Art, Biology, Biochemistry, Chemistry, Computer Science, Math, Music Composition, Physics, Writing and Literature.

UC Riverside

  • Bourns College of Engineering:
    • Bioengineering
    • Computer Science with Business Applications
    • Chemical Engineering Nanotechnology Biochemical
    • Computer Engineering
    • Computer Science
    • Data Science
    • Electrical Engineering
    • Environmental Engineering
    • Materials Science and Engineering
    • Mechanical Engineering
  • College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences
    • Biochemistry
    • Biology
    • Cell, Molecular, and Developmental Biology
    • Entomology
    • Microbiology
    • Neuroscience
    • Plant Biology
    • Data Science (new)
    • Mathematics
    • Mathematics for Teachers of Secondary School
    • Statistics
    • Chemistry
    • Earth Sciences
    • Environmental Sciences
    • Geology
    • Geophysics
    • Physics

UC Santa Cruz

  • Baskin School of Engineering:
    • Computer Science B.A.
    • Computer Science B.S.

UC Merced

    School of Engineering:
    • Bioengineering
    • Computer Science and Engineering
    • Environmental Engineering
    • Materials Science and Engineering
    • Mechanical Engineering
    • Undeclared Engineering
  • School of Natural Sciences:
    • Applied Mathematical Sciences
    • Biological Sciences
    • Chemical Sciences
    • Earth Systems Science
    • Physics
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