In Its 60th Year, IESE’s MBA Hits New Highs In Apps, Class Size & Women

The IESE MBA Class of 2026: 445 students, a new record in the program’s 60th year. IESE photo

One of the premier B-schools in Europe announced in May that because of record applications to its full-time MBA program, it would increase the next class size by 20%.

For IESE Business School, Poets&Quants‘ No. 2 school in Europe, the app cycle that produced the MBA Class of 2026 was even better than announced.

The B-school of the University of Navarra, in Barcelona, Spain has enrolled a record MBA class of 445 students, nearly 100 — and 27% — more than the previous class.

A HISTORIC CLASS TO MARK SCHOOL’S 60TH YEAR

IESE received 16% more apps in the 2023-2024 cycle, growth that allowed the school to expand not only its class size — the first such expansion since 2010 — but also the number of electives offered in the program.

“Prior expansions have always enhanced the quality of our MBA program by attracting more recruiters, enlarging the network of our students and alumni, and allowing us to extend our offering of electives, modules and other extracurricular activities,” says Marc Badia, deputy dean of IESE, noting that the school’s management master’s program — currently ranked 17th by The Financial Times — also saw a spike in applications. “The continued strength of our MBA and MiM programs reflects our focus on offering transformational educational opportunities to young talent at all stages of their careers.”

Spurred by greater international interest, IESE’s MBA expansion also helped the school enroll 40% women in its program for the first time — up 5 percentage points from the previous class and better by 2 points than the school record of 38% set in 2022.

UPTICK IN INTERNATIONAL APPS, ENROLLMENT

Altogether, it’s a heck of a way to mark the MBA program’s 60th anniversary. IESE was founded in 1958, and in 1964 launched its full-time MBA as part of an alliance with Harvard Business School; over the decades the program has trained around 11,000 business leaders.

The spike in MBA apps also suggests that the renewed interest in full-time MBA programs seen in early class profile data at such elite B-schools as Yale SOM and Duke Fuqua is not restricted to the United States. Notably, 88% of IESE’s new class is international, hailing from outside of Spain, with 44% from the Americas (including the U.S., Canada, Latin America, and the Caribbean), 30% from Asia, and 26% from Europe.

IESE’s previous MBA class was 85% international.

DON’T MISS MEET IESE’S MBA CLASS OF 2025 and AN MBA APP SLUMP? NOT FOR IESE, WHICH IS INCREASING THE SIZE OF ITS MBA INTAKE BY 20%