Graduate Admissions

Graduate Admissions Information

Royce Hall, viewed from just south of the Janss StepsThe UCLA Linguistics Department welcomes applications from students interested in pursuing the Ph.D. degree. The department currently has approximately 45 graduate students. The admissions process is highly competitive; those offered admission are provided with full financial support, with commitments up to five years. Support packages include tuition, fees, and salary or stipend, and normally involve a mixture of fellowship, research assistantship, and teaching assistantship.
Admission to the Graduate Program 

The admissions application is prepared and submitted online, through the website of UCLA’s Division of Graduate Education. General information about applying to UCLA for graduate study (such as the University’s requirements for admission) is also available at this link. Applicants must meet the University minimum requirements for admission (see also the Frequently Asked Questions for additional technical information).

Although the department offers both the M.A. and Ph.D. degrees, it normally admits only those students who plan to ultimately pursue a Ph.D. Students are admitted to begin residence in the Fall quarter only.

We assume a background roughly equivalent to a B.A. in Linguistics. This does not mean that the department will not accept applicants with little Linguistics background. Students lacking sufficient background may, however, need to complete preparatory or supplemental courses in their first year.

The typical class size of entering graduate students per year is about seven to ten. We make admissions offers to about 13-15 applicants per year, from an applicant pool of approximately 180.

Admissions decisions are made by an Admissions Committee composed of department faculty. It will be helpful if applicants include on their Statement of Purpose the names of particular faculty they hope to work with, since the Admissions Committee may solicit the opinions of those faculty in making their decision. You may find our list of active ladder faculty on our Faculty Profiles page.

We recommend you review our Graduate Program Overview page, which includes information about our Graduate Student Support packages.

The deadline for submission of applications for the Fall quarter is December 10 of the previous year. The UCLA Application for Graduate Admission for the 2025-26 academic year (for Fall 2025 consideration) will be available in September 2024, with a deadline of December 10, 2024.

The online application consists of the following:
  • A statement of purpose, explaining their background for graduate study in linguistics and their immediate and long-range goals in the field. Statements of purpose should primarily focus on intellectual interests and research plans, though autobiographical material can be useful where it is clearly relevant. You can find guiding questions for the statement on the UCLA Division of Graduate Education’s website here, under “Statement of Purpose”; 1,500 word limit for our application.
  • Three letters of recommendation, ideally from scholars who can attest to the applicant’s potential in linguistics and general intellectual qualifications. Letters from employers can also be useful where they supplement the letters from teachers
    • If a recommender wants to submit their letter through Interfolio, enter the email address(es) provided by Interfolio for recommenders in the application. Instruct Interfolio to answer all questions on the recommendation forms with the option Dossier Service Completion.
  • Transcripts from each academic institution attended. You must upload one copy of current, unofficial transcripts. An unofficial transcript will be issued by the university or college registrar’s office but may be accessed through a student portal. An unofficial transcript may also be a physical, official copy that has been opened and scanned. Do not provide screenshots, degree progress reports, grade audits, or similar printouts as it will not count as an unofficial transcript. If possible, you should rotate the document or page(s) prior to uploading so that the text is upright for reading. Please see the “Admissions Materials” section below for additional information.
  • A research paper in linguistics (or a related field). This part of the dossier is very important, and is often given more weight in admissions decisions about admissibility than anything else, since it (potentially) provides evidence of the ability to pursue original research in the field.  Please note that a literature review is less useful than an original research paper. If no paper in linguistics or a related field is available, it is better to include a paper in some non-related field, rather than no paper at all.
  • The University’s English Language Requirement applies to all applicants. Citizenship, U.S. residence and/or work experience are not substitutes for meeting the requirement. Exemptions to submitting TOEFL or IELTS scores can only be made for applicants who meet the criteria as listed on the English Requirements page on the UCLA Division of Graduate Education’s website. Please see the “Admissions Materials” section below for additional information.
  • UCLA’s fellowship application, found in online admissions application. It is useful to inspect the list of UCLA fellowships carefully, to see what you might be qualified for. Applicants are also encouraged to apply for as many extramural fellowships and scholarships as they are eligible. As part of the fellowship application, they require you to submit a Personal Statement: You can find guiding questions for the statement on the UCLA Division of Graduate Education’s website here, under “Personal Statement.” To a limited extent, the Admissions Committee uses the criterion of what students can be supported with available resources.
  • Although not required, it also would be useful to include with your application an informal list of the courses you have taken in your desired field. Add any information you think would clarify the kind of work you did, especially if the title of a given course does not reflect the actual course content.
  • Please note that the GRE is NOT required for admission to our program. Please do not submit GRE score reports to us, as they will not be considered.

We are not the only linguists at UCLA.  There are graduate programs in English, Indo-European Studies, and specific foreign languages, each with separate admission processes. Please contact these departments directly for information about applying to their graduate programs.

Admissions Materials

Virtually all admissions materials (statement of purpose, research paper/writing sample, transcript etc.) are to be uploaded to the online application. Please contact Graduate Student Affairs Officer if you have any questions.

Transcripts

Transcripts from U.S. institutions

Current, unofficial transcripts are acceptable for the purposes of the application. Acceptable unofficial transcripts from U.S. institutions must:

  • Have the word “transcript” on the document
  • Have the name of the institution attended or are attending
  • Include the student’s name, program of study, and major of study
  • Include a term by term breakdown of each course taken with its corresponding units and grade*
  • Be clearly legible

*This requirement is waived only for those applicants who attended institutions that do not use a traditional grade or grade point system. For those institutions, there must be a note on the unofficial transcript that states that the institution does not assign grades or grade points.

Transcripts and academic records from institutions outside the U.S.

Please carefully review the UCLA Division of Graduate Education’s website for degree and academic record(s) requirements. Scans of transcripts and academic records are acceptable for the purposes of the application. If available, please also upload a copy of the degree certificate/diploma along with the transcript. Third-party evaluated transcripts, such as evaluations provided by WES, will not count as a transcript. Unless academic records and diplomas are routinely issued in English by the institution, the records in their original language must be submitted with an authorized, complete, and exact English translation.

All academic records must show the dates of enrollment; the subjects or courses taken, together with the units of credit or time allotted to each subject and, if rank is determined, rank in the total class or group. The records must also include a complete description of the institution’s grading scale or other standard of evaluation. Maximum and minimum marks and the steps between them must be indicated.

Official transcripts and academic records

Applicants who are admitted and choose to attend the program must submit their official final transcript(s) showing degree conferral. Applicants who completed post-secondary education outside of the U.S. and who are admitted and choose to attend the program must also provide one original or certified copy of their certificate/diploma showing degree conferral in English and one original certified copy of their certificate/diploma showing degree conferral in their original language. Further instructions regarding the delivery of official final transcript(s) and records will be sent to applicants who are admitted and choose to attend the program.

English Language Requirement

As noted above, the University’s English Language Requirement applies to all applicants. Citizenship, U.S. residence and/or work experience are not substitutes for meeting the requirement. Exemptions to submitting TOEFL or IELTS scores can only be made for applicants who meet the exemption criteria as listed on the English Requirements page on the UCLA Division of Graduate Education’s website. If you do not meet the exemption criteria, valid (unexpired) TOEFL or IELTS scores are required. Please note that TOEFL and IELTS scores are considered valid for only two years. The scores must be valid at the time of application submission.

  • TOEFL: The minimum score to be considered for admission is 87 on the TOEFL. UCLA does not currently accept MyBest TOEFL scores. The institution code for UCLA is 4837. The linking of TOEFL scores between ETS and the UCLA application only begins after an applicant submits the UCLA application. It may take 5 or more business days after you submit the UCLA application for the TOEFL status on your application to automatically update.
  • IELTS: The minimum overall band score to be considered for admission is 7.0 on the IELTS. Applicants submitting IELTS scores must arrange their scores to be sent to the UCLA Department of Linguistics (address below) and the UCLA Division of Graduate Education. Updating the IELTS status on an application is a manual process that may take several weeks. If you also arranged for IELTS to mail their scores to the Department as described above, then it may take 1 to 2 weeks following receipt of mailed scores for the Department to manually mark scores as received on your application.

Address for IELTS score delivery
ATTN: Graduate Student Affairs Officer
335 Portola Plaza
3125 Campbell Hall
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1543 (USA)

Frequently Asked Questions
  1. How many years is the Linguistics Graduate Program?

The normative time to complete the program is 5 years. The department offers both the M.A. and Ph.D. degrees, and all students are expected to complete program requirements at both levels. You may review our Current Graduate Students page to review the normative timeline and requirements for our program.

2. What if I’m an international applicant, and do not meet the eligibility criteria to be exempt from UCLA’s English Language Requirement?

UCLA does not currently accept exception requests to waive the English Language Requirement outside of the exemption criteria listed on UCLA’s Graduate Division website. You will need to take and submit test scores for the TOEFL/IELTS with your graduate program application.

3. Where can I find more information on the graduate application fee waiver?

Please review the University’s fee deferral and waiver requirements and the “Fee Waivers” section in the Admissions FAQs for eligibility requirements and required documentation. All required documentation outlined in the policy must be uploaded to the fee waiver/deferral section of the online application for a request to be considered. If you qualify for multiple deferral or waiver types, only one request type should be selected to prevent any technical issues with the fee deferral/waiver review.

4. If I do not meet the criteria for a fee deferral or waiver, can I submit an exception to the department?

Unfortunately, the university does not accept exceptions to the criteria for fee waivers. These are set at the university level, and individual graduate programs/departments cannot waive this for you.