Postdoctoral Appointments Rise While Graduate Enrollment Slows

Between 2023 and 2024, the number of postdoctoral appointees (postdocs) rose by 6.1%, from 65,850 to 69,877-the highest number ever reported to the Survey of Graduate Students and Postdoctorates in Science and Engineering (GSS) (figure 1). Before 2024, the 66,247 postdocs reported in 2019 was the highest number of postdocs at GSS institutions. The number of postdocs declined from 2020 to 2022 before increasing for each of the last two survey cycles. Graduate student counts were more complex, with generally stable enrollment in the master's science, engineering, and health (SEH) program between 2023 and 2024 and a slight increase in enrollment in doctoral SEH programs during that period (table 1).

These and other findings in this InfoBrief are from the 2024 GSS. Data from the GSS provide insight into the composition of the current and future science and engineering (S&E) workforce by collecting data on graduate students, postdocs, and doctorate-holding nonfaculty researchers (NFRs) in SEH fields. This survey is funded by the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) within the U.S. National Science Foundation and by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In this InfoBrief, single-year changes in graduate enrollment have been adjusted to take the frame changes from the 2024 eligibility review into account. For more information on the eligibility review, see the section "Data Sources and Limitations " below.

Between 2023 and 2024, enrollment of master's students remained stable overall, but it grew 1.2% in science, remained stable in engineering (-0.9%), and decreased 2.5% in health (table 1). Doctoral enrollment increased slightly during this period, based on increases in science (1.9%) and engineering (2.0%), which offset a small decline in health programs (1.0%).

In 2024, 322,037 students were enrolled full time in master's programs, down slightly (1.0%) from the 2023 count of 325,267. Looking over the past 5 years, full-time enrollment in master's programs was lower in 2020 than in 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic (data tables: table 1-9 and NSF 22-313^​ ). From 2020 to 2024, full-time enrollment in master's programs increased 32.1%, but such enrollment decreased slightly (1.0%) between 2023 and 2024 (table 2). Full-time enrollment in doctoral programs rose by 2.3% from 2023 to 2024 (from 268,495 to 274,601), with an overall 10.9% increase from 2020 to 2024.

From 2023 to 2024, part-time enrollment in master's programs increased by 2.7% (4,881), and part-time enrollment in doctoral programs declined by 2.3% (865). Over the previous 5 years, from 2020 to 2024, part-time master's enrollment increased by 7.8%, whereas part-time doctoral enrollment increased 5.2%.

Overall, postdoc employment increased to a record high of 69,877 in 2024 (a 6.1% increase from 2023) (figure 1, table 3, and data tables: table 1-15). The number of NFRs reported to the GSS also rose between 2023 and 2024 (table 3). NFR employment counts have increased by 18.5% since 2020 and by 2.3% over the most recent year, from 34,342 in 2023 to 35,142 in 2024.

Conducted since 1966, the GSS is an annual survey of all academic institutions in the United States that grant research-based master's or doctoral degrees in SEH fields. The 2024 GSS collected data from 23,121 organizational units (departments, programs, affiliated research centers, and health care facilities) at 635 eligible institutions and their affiliates in the United States, Puerto Rico, and Guam. The unit response rate was 97.8%, and the 2024 GSS institutional response rate was 93.7%; an overview of the survey is available at https://ncses.nsf.gov/surveys/graduate-students-postdoctorates-s-e.

In summer 2024, the GSS conducted a comprehensive eligibility review of institutions with six or fewer organizational units in the 2023 GSS. As a result of the eligibility review, 53 institutions were identified as no longer offering research-based master's or doctoral programs in GSS fields and thus no longer GSS eligible. In 2023, these institutions reported 0.8% of graduate students, including 1.3% of master's students, under 0.1% of doctoral students, postdoctoral appointees, and doctorate-holding NFRs. Thus, the tables in this InfoBrief show both the published (2023) and adjusted (2023adjusted) GSS counts, whereas the discussion focuses on the 2023 adjusted values only. This adjustment allows for more accurate comparisons between 2023 and 2024 data and prevents attributing changes in trends due to the eligibility review to 2024. For more information on the eligibility review and the impact on the GSS, see the 2024 survey's Technical Notes and the publication Impact of the 2024 GSS Institutional Eligibility Review on Counts of GSS Master's Students.^​

In 2020, the GSS amended its taxonomy to align with a revised NCSES Taxonomy of Disciplines (TOD) and 2020 National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP). As such, these changes did not lead to a large shift in overall reported GSS counts, and data remain comparable to data from 2017 to 2019. New CIP codes, such as data science and medical clinical sciences were added, along with other CIP codes in the GSS-eligible series; although these CIP codes are newly eligible, a review of unit names from prior years indicates that many of them were being reported prior to 2020. Some additional adjustments in the GSS reporting taxonomy allow for additional detail in some fields based on the 2020 CIP codes reported to GSS. Finally, similar to the structure for science and health in the GSS taxonomy, engineering was reorganized to report broad fields. For more information about the 2020 GSS taxonomy change, see the 2020 data tables: table A-17, table A-18a, and table A-18b.^​

GSS health fields are collected under the advisement of NIH. These GSS fields are about a third of all health fields in the Department of Education's CIP taxonomy. NIH information on trends seen within these selected health fields can be found at https://report.nih.gov/nihdatabook/.

The full set of data tables from the 2024 survey is available at https://ncses.nsf.gov/surveys/graduate-students-postdoctorates-s-e. Data are also available in NCSES's interactive data tool (https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/builder/gss). For more information about the survey, contact NCSES.

1 National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES). 2021. Universities Report Growth in U.S. Citizen and Permanent Resident Enrollment Along with Declines in Enrollment of Temporary Visa Holders at Master's and Doctoral Levels Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. NSF 22-313. Alexandria, VA: U.S. National Science Foundation. Available at https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf22313.

2 National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES). 2025. Impact of the 2024 GSS Institutional Eligibility Review on Counts of GSS Master's Students. NSF 25-346. Alexandria, VA: U.S. National Science Foundation. Available at https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf25346.

3 National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES). 2022. Survey of Graduate Students andPostdoctoratesin Science and Engineering. NSF 22-319. Alexandria, VA: U.S. National Science Foundation. Available at https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf22319.

National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES). 2026. Postdoctoral Appointments Rise While Graduate Enrollment Slows.NSF 26-308. Alexandria, VA: U.S. National Science Foundation. Available at https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf26308.

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