Wharton MBAs Saw Their Pay Rise In 2025, But Job Offers & Accepts Slipped Again

Despite a tougher hiring climate at the top end of the MBA market, The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania delivered higher pay for its MBA Class of 2025, even as offer and acceptance rates slipped for a second year in a row. The school’s latest employment report shows a rebound in median base salary alongside continued pressure on placement outcomes, reinforcing a bifurcated market in which those who land jobs do well, but fewer students are converting interviews into offers.

The median base salary for Wharton MBAs rose to $185,000 in 2025, up from $175,000 in 2024 and flat at that level for the two prior classes. The increase marks Wharton’s strongest overall median since the pandemic-era downturn, when the figure fell to $150,000 for the Class of 2020 and $155,000 in 2021.

That pay gain did not translate into stronger placement results. Of the 879 graduates in the Class of 2025, 608 were seeking employment. Among them, 90.5% reported receiving at least one job offer, while 87% reported accepting an offer within the reporting window – both modest declines from the Class of 2024 and down significantly from the 99% of grads who had job offers 90 days after graduation in 2021.

WHARTON CLASS SIZE & JOB SEEKERS 2013-2025

Class	Class Size	# Seeking Employment	% Seeking Employment
2013	800	590	73.7%
2014	815	610	74.8%
2015	826	624	75.5%
2016	850	639	75.2%
2017	819	648	79.1%
2018	813	633	77.9%
2019	863	664	76.9%
2020	904	681	75.3%
2021	754	585	77.6%
2022	852	633	74.3%
2023	917	688	75.0%
2024	916	634	69.2%
2025	879	608	69.2%

Source: Wharton

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PLACEMENT PRESSURE CONTINUES

Those figures extend a softening trend. In 2024, 93.1% of Wharton job seekers reported offers and 88.2% reported acceptances. While the declines are incremental, they come against a backdrop of historically high expectations for M7 placement rates and underscore the continued selectivity of the post-MBA hiring market.

The pressure is partly structural. From 2013 through 2023, between 74% and 79% of Wharton MBAs sought employment each year. For the Classes of 2024 and 2025, that figure fell to 69.2%, lowest in more than a decade. Even during the pandemic-disrupted Class of 2021, more than three-quarters of Wharton grads entered the job market.

The shift reflects a growing share of company-sponsored students, founders, investors, and others pursuing nontraditional or delayed paths. The result is a smaller job-seeking pool within a still-large class – a dynamic that helps explain why placement rates can soften even as salaries rise for those who secure roles.

INDUSTRY MIX DRIVES SALARY MEDIAN

Wharton’s salary increase – the first after three years of stasis – was driven by pay resilience within its core sectors. Financial services remained the largest destination, accounting for 38.2% of placements (up from 36.6% in 2024) with a median base salary of $175,000, unchanged from recent years but well above pandemic-era levels.

Consulting strengthened its position in 2025, rising to 28.2% of placements while holding firm at a $190,000 median base salary for a fourth straight class. Private equity stood out both for growth and compensation, climbing to 13.4% of placements with a $200,000 median, the highest among major sectors.

Technology showed steadier, more restrained gains. The sector accounted for 15.3% of placements with a median base salary of $164,250 – up from earlier years, but still trailing consulting and finance, underscoring a recalibration from the boom conditions of the early 2020s rather than a full recovery.

Notably, Wharton’s MBA employment report remains the sparsest among the M7 schools, offering less detail on timelines and job-search dynamics than peer reports – for example, Wharton does not report any details on sign-on or other bonuses, making median total pay calculations impossible.

WHARTON MBA CAREER OUTCOMES 2020-2025

Industry	2025%	2025 Median Salary	2024%	2024 Median Salary	2023%	2023 Median Salary	2022%	2022 Median Salary	2021%	2021 Median Salary	2020%	2020 Median Salary
ALL INDUSTRIES	100%	$185,000	100%	$175,000	100%	$175,000	100%	$175,000	100%	$155,000	100%	$150,000
Consulting	28.2%	$190,000	25.2%	$190,000	28.8%	$190,000	24.3%	$175,000	27.2%	$165,000	24.5%	$165,000
Consumer Products/Retail	0.9%	$137,500	1.4%	$137,500	0.9%	$128,000	1.6%	$120,000	1.4%	$120,000	5.6%	$122,500/$140,000
Energy	1.1%	$165,000	1.8%	$165,000	1.3%	$160,000	1.0%	$150,000	0.9%	NA	0.2%	N/A
Financial Services	38.2%	$175,000	36.6%	$175,000	37.3%	$175,000	38.6%	$173,513	35.1%	$150,000	36.2%	$150,000
Diversified Financial Services/Insurance	2.1%	$165,000	2.1%	$145,000	1.1%	$175,000	1.8%	$162,000	2.1%	$125,000	1.4%	$125,000
Hedge Funds	0.4%	–	1.1%	$200,000	0.9%	$212,500	2.0%	$175,000	1.9%	$150,000	3.2%	$150,000
Investment Banking/Brokerage	14.2%	$175,000	15.2%	$175,000	14.2%	$175,000	11.7%	$175,000	12.9%	$150,000	12.2%	$150,000
Investment Management	5.3%	$175,000	4.8%	$170,000	3.8%	$177,500	6.4%	$170,559	3.7%	$150,000	4.5%	$150,000
Private Equity/Buyout Firms	13.4%	$200,000	10.0%	$175,000	14.0%	$189,322	12.6%	$175,000	11.1%	$167,500	11.9%	$170,000
Venture Capital	2.8%	$170,000	3.4%	$200,000	3.3%	$180,000	4.1%	$150,000	3.4%	$157,500	3.1%	$171,500
Healthcare	3.8%	$155,000	5.0%	$163,000	5.4%	$157,500	5.6%	$160,000	5.3%	$131,000	6.7%	$140,000
Manufacturing	1.9%	$155,000	1.6%	$165,000	1.3%	$125,356	1.3%	$155,000	1.4%	$142,500	0.8%	N/A
Media & Entertainment	0.8%	–	3.0%	$140,000	1.3%	$157,500	1.3%	$150,000	1.6%	$150,000	1.3%	$150,000
Real Estate	1.9%	$150,000	2.0%	$150,000	2.2%	$150,000	2.3%	$147,500	2.1%	$130,000	2.9%	$120,000
Social Impact	1.5%	$147,806	2.7%	$120,000	1.4%	$133,500	1.3%	$135,000	1.2%	$130,000	1.8%	$89,250
Technology	15.3%	$164,250	14.1%	$162,750	13.5%	$162,750	16.9%	$153,500	18.6%	$141,000	16.2%	$139,345
FinTech	1.5%	$165,000	1.4%	$157,500	2.2%	$162,500	2.3%	$155,000	1.2%	$152,500	2.1%	$140,000
Retail	2.1%	$162,500	1.8%	$145,000	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA
Legal & Professional Services	2.5%	$235,000	2.1%	$225,000	2.0%	$215,000	0.8%	NA	0.9%	$190,000	1.8%	$190,000
Future Mobility	NA	NA	0.5%	–	0.5%	NA	0.2%	NA	0.5%	NA	NA	NA
Travel & Hospitality	0.4%	–	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA

Source: Wharton 

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INTERNSHIPS SIGNAL A DIFFERENT STORY

While full-time outcomes remain selective, internships paint a more encouraging picture. For the MBA Class of 2026, nearly all students seeking internships secured positions, according to Wharton’s report, suggesting sustained employer engagement earlier in the talent pipeline.

Internship compensation remained robust. The median monthly internship salary stood at roughly $10,400, with consulting internships paying about $15,750 per month and investment banking roles around $14,600 – levels broadly consistent with pre-pandemic norms and signaling continued demand for elite MBA talent.

GEOGRAPHY & PEER COMPARISONS

Geographically, Wharton’s Class of 2025 remained overwhelmingly U.S.-focused. Ninety-four percent of full-time jobs were based in the United States, with just 6% of graduates working internationally. The Northeast dominated placements at 54.5%, followed by the West at 19.2% and the Mid-Atlantic at 10.3%. Median base salaries clustered at the top end of the market, reaching $190,000 in the Mid-Atlantic, Midwest, and South, compared with $185,000 in the Northeast and $175,000 in the West. International roles paid far less, with a median base salary of $135,000.

That geographic profile distinguishes Wharton from several M7 peers. While most elite MBA programs remain U.S.-centric, Wharton’s domestic concentration exceeds that of Stanford GSB and Harvard Business School, where international placements play a larger role. Chicago Booth and Northwestern Kellogg tend to show broader regional dispersion across the Midwest, South, and West, while MIT Sloan occupies a middle ground with a more balanced U.S.-international mix tied to technology and entrepreneurship. Wharton’s heavy Northeast skew reinforces both its enduring strength in finance and the compensation premium attached to U.S.-based roles.

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