Via Market Report 2026

A full journey, start to finish

20,191 students, each watched for at least a year. Where the funnel narrows, how long each step takes, and which losses are biggest.

Why your conversion rate is probably wrong

The same students convert at 48.3% over a full year and 31.3% inside one academic year. If you measure on the academic calendar, you are understating your own pipeline.

What money actually does

Cost doesn't stop students from browsing. It stops them at the application. The gap opens exactly where most cost interventions haven't arrived yet.

The provider handoff

For 13.4% of applications, approval is a midpoint, not a finish. Those students wait 42 days to commit against everyone else's 14, in a process campuses can't see.

Why institutions can't be compared

Conversion runs from 3.2% to 97.2% across 202 campuses on the same platform. Size, type, and program mix together don't come close to explaining it.

Five questions nobody can answer yet

Including what happened to the 2,602 students who said they were going, said cost wasn't the issue, and still didn't commit.