TL;DR: Plan II Honors is not an honors overlay: established in 1935, it is a four-year interdisciplinary arts and science honors major at UT Austin leading to the Bachelor of Arts, whose core curriculum is itself the major, with over a third of required courses restricted to Plan II students and a senior thesis at the end (Plan II Honors Program, UT Austin). Admission is competitive and separate from admission to UT Austin. For fall 2027 the application opens August 1 and is due December 1, honors programs do not take part in Early Action, Liberal Arts must be one of the applicant’s two college choices, and decisions come on or before March 1, 2027. The program’s FAQ reports around 2,500 complete applications and roughly 370 offers for an entering class of about 175. For affluent families, Plan II is one of the closest things to a liberal arts college inside a major public research university. To position an application for it, schedule a consultation with Oriel Admissions.
What Is Plan II Honors?
The most searched question about this program is definitional, and the answer is what separates Plan II Honors from most honors programs: it is a major. Established in 1935, Plan II is a four-year interdisciplinary arts and science honors major with a core curriculum, leading to the Bachelor of Arts degree, and the program says it differs from most honors programs in that its core curriculum is a major (About Plan II). Over a third of the courses required for the degree are restricted to Plan II students, who also have access to other honors-level courses at the university. Where an honors college like Schreyer at Penn State wraps honors courses and benefits around any major on campus, Plan II is the academic program itself, a small liberal arts college, in effect, operating inside a large public research university.
What Do Plan II Students Take?
| Core Component | Structure |
|---|---|
| World literature | Year-long first-year sequence, the ancients to the present |
| Philosophy | Year-long philosophy course in the sophomore year |
| Interdisciplinary seminars | Three semesters building analytic and synthesizing capacity |
| Honors sciences | Four-semester sequence: modes of reasoning, theoretical math or calculus, life sciences, physical sciences |
| Social science, history, and fine arts | A semester of honors social science, two semesters of non-US history, and a fine arts or humanities sequence |
| Senior thesis | A required senior thesis: a major independent research and writing project |
The design is a building process: each semester and year builds skills and knowledge for the next, the core requirements are relatively inflexible, and very few substitutions of test credit, transfer courses, or concurrent enrollment credit are accepted for them. The counterweight is more than 30 hours of open elective credit (About Plan II), which is why the program’s FAQ reports that over 75 percent of Plan II majors complete the requirements for a second major and close to 35 percent complete a second degree, such as a BS or a BBA, which may take longer than four years (Plan II FAQs). Plan II can also be combined with most other UT Austin honors programs, including the Canfield Business Honors Program, Engineering Honors, Dean’s Scholars, and Turing Scholars. That combination, a broad liberal arts core stacked on a professional or scientific specialization, is the Plan II trade.
How Do You Apply to Plan II Honors?
Admission to Plan II is competitive and separate from admission to UT Austin (About Plan II), which is the sentence every Texas family should read twice: automatic admission to the university does not extend to Plan II, and being denied Plan II takes nothing away from a UT admission. For fall 2027, the application opens August 1 and is due December 1, and the honors programs do not participate in Early Action (Plan II application). Liberal Arts must be one of the applicant’s two college choices, in either order, and Plan II has been removed as a major choice on the application, so listing it as a major no longer counts as applying: a complete Plan II application requires the five-sentence personal statement, a short answer of up to 250 words, and an expanded resume, submitted on the Common App or through the honors application in MyStatus, along with all UT materials. SAT or ACT scores are required for fall 2027 review, and no teacher or counselor recommendation is required, although the program suggests a letter for unusual or outstanding circumstances (Plan II FAQs). Students who are not admitted to UT Austin are no longer considered for Plan II, including those offered alternative pathways to admission. Decisions come on or before March 1, 2027, some earlier, and admitted students have until May 1 to decide. Plan II does not offer interviews, and the program tells parents that how an applicant takes charge of the application speaks volumes, so the student should send the emails.
How Hard Is It to Get Into Plan II Honors?
Plan II publishes its scale directly. Its FAQ says the program receives around 2,500 complete applications for the fall cycle and offers admission to roughly 370 applicants to reach an entering class of about 175, an offer rate of about 15 percent (Oriel Admissions calculation); its About page cites around 1,400 applications for the 175 spots (Plan II FAQs; About Plan II). The program says admission is never strictly about test scores, class rank, and GPA, that no single number keeps an applicant out or guarantees admission, and that there are successful applicants from outside the top 5 percent (Plan II evaluation); it looks for a lively spirit of intellectual adventure, leadership and initiative, a genuine desire for a broad education in the humanities, sciences, and social sciences, and the capacity for imagination and originality. Two structural notes shape strategy. First, because Liberal Arts need not be the first-choice college, a student can pursue Plan II alongside a first-choice application to business, engineering, or natural sciences, and the second major many Plan II students carry often begins exactly there. Second, for out-of-state families, Plan II sits on top of a competitive nonresident admission channel; our UT Austin out-of-state acceptance rate analysis covers that layer, and our UT Austin engineering guide shows how competitive the parallel doors run.
Is Plan II Worth It Compared With a Private Liberal Arts College?
This is the comparison Plan II was built to win. The program delivers the defining features of a strong liberal arts college, a closed cohort, seminar teaching, an interdisciplinary core, a required thesis, and faculty proximity, at public-university prices, inside a university whose research depth, recruiting pipelines, and second-major options few liberal arts colleges can match. For a Texas family the in-state arithmetic is hard for a private alternative to beat; for an out-of-state family the question becomes what, precisely, the private admission buys that Plan II does not. The honest answers are brand portability in a handful of fields and the residential intimacy of a true small college, both real and worth pricing. The program also reports that about 160 to 165 of the roughly 175 entering students graduate with the Plan II major in four or five years, with a minimum GPA of 3.0 to stay in the program. Families running this decision across the merit landscape should see how programs of this tier compare in our merit aid finder.
Frequently Asked Questions About Plan II Honors
Plan II Honors is a four-year interdisciplinary arts and science honors major at UT Austin, established in 1935, whose core curriculum is itself the major. The core includes a year-long world literature course, interdisciplinary seminars, a year-long philosophy course, honors social science, non-US history, a four-semester honors science sequence, and a senior thesis, and over a third of required courses are restricted to Plan II students.
Yes. The program FAQ reports around 2,500 complete applications and roughly 370 offers for an entering class of about 175, an offer rate of about 15 percent by an Oriel Admissions calculation. Admission is not based on scores and grades alone, and the program looks for intellectual adventure, leadership, initiative, and originality.
Through the UT Austin application with Liberal Arts as one of your two college choices, plus the Plan II honors application: a five-sentence personal statement, a short answer of up to 250 words, and an expanded resume. For fall 2027 everything is due December 1, honors programs do not take part in Early Action, and decisions come on or before March 1.
No. Admission to Plan II is separate from admission to UT Austin, so automatic admission to the university does not extend to the program. Students who are not admitted to UT Austin, including those offered alternative pathways, are no longer considered for Plan II.
Yes. The program reports that over 75 percent of Plan II majors complete the requirements for a second major and close to 35 percent complete a second degree, such as a BS or a BBA, using more than 30 hours of open electives; second degrees may take longer than four years.
Yes. The senior thesis, a major independent research and writing project, is the culmination of the Plan II curriculum, and it functions as a signature credential for graduate schools and employers.
The program does not state a percentage, but its FAQ reports around 2,500 complete applications and roughly 370 offers for an entering class of about 175, an offer rate of about 15 percent by an Oriel Admissions calculation. Its About page cites a lower figure of around 1,400 applications for the 175 spots.
For most families, yes. Plan II delivers the closed cohort, seminar teaching, interdisciplinary core, and required thesis of a strong liberal arts college at public-university prices, plus research depth and second-major options few small colleges can match. What a private admission still buys is brand portability in select fields and residential intimacy, both real and worth pricing explicitly.
Sources: Plan II Honors Program, About Plan II, Plan II Honors Program, Application, Plan II Honors Program, FAQs, Plan II Honors Program, Evaluation, UT Austin Office of Admissions.
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