Goldman Sachs internships are among the most difficult to secure in the finance sector, with less than 1% of applicants getting accepted for the coveted summer position.
Still, that didn’t stop over 360,000 people from around the world from applying. Only 2,600 of them, or 0.7%, were accepted into the 2025 internship class.
Though not impossible, the odds have become increasingly stacked against candidates as the applicant pool continues to grow under CEO David Solomon’s leadership.
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While the number of applicants has grown 15% compared to a year ago, it has surged more than 300% since Solomon took the helm in 2018.
Last week, the incoming group of interns was welcomed to Goldman Sachs offices around the world, where they will “spend the summer learning from the firm’s leaders, working on the most consequential challenges in finance, and growing as professionals,” according to the firm’s LinkedIn Post.
However, the 2026 class is already being picked. The company started the final rounds for candidates, typically in their sophomore year of college, applying to its 2026 class earlier this year.
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It’s not uncommon in the financial sector for interns to face steep odds. For instance, more than 490,000 candidates applied for JPMorgan’s 2024 internship, and only 4,000 were accepted, which was a less than 1% acceptance rate, according to several reports.
Citadel, a hedge fund founded by Kenneth Griffin, accepted only 0.4% of applicants for its 2025 summer intern program, according to Business Insider.
The odds of getting a spot at one of these financial institutions are similar to acceptance to be a NASA astronaut. NASA has an incredibly rigorous selection process and an exhaustive list of requirements. It also only opens its application cycle every four years.
In 2020, more than 12,000 people submitted applications to become astronauts, only 10 of whom were selected, equating to an acceptance rate of 0.083%, according to The Seattle Times.
To be considered, candidates need to already have a master’s degree in a STEM field, including engineering, biological science, physical science, computer science or mathematics, from an accredited institution, have a minimum of three years of related professional experience obtained after degree completion, or 1,000 Pilot-in-Command hours with at least 850 of those hours in high performance jet aircraft for pilots.
For medical doctors, time in residency can count toward experience. All candidates must also successfully complete the NASA long-duration flight astronaut physical.
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