Following up on Kevin Johnson’s post on the best law schools for BigLaw jobs, Law360 has its updated employment analysis for Class of 2025 law school graduates. The highlights: school-by-school data on BigLaw placement, clerkships, public interest jobs, government jobs, and jobs in business or industry.
Top-ten lists for BigLaw and federal clerkships, as well as links to coverage and an interactive jobs tracker, below the fold.
Daniel Moritz-Rabson, The Top Law Schools For Legal Industry Jobs: A Data Review, Law360 Pulse (May 6, 2026):
The rate of graduates starting their careers at law firms continued a yearslong increase, rising from 54.4% to 55.9% for the class of 2025. Meanwhile, the proportion of graduates taking jobs in government, business and public interest roles, as well as landing clerkships, all declined.
Tracey Read, Aiming For BigLaw? These Schools Deliver, Law360 Pulse (May 6, 2026):
Cornell University Law School, which ranked No. 1 in the class of 2024 in percentage of grads employed by law firms of 501 or more lawyers, slipped to No. 10 in that category as more found work in other sectors.
Law360’s interactive jobs tracker is here.
And finally, top-ten lists for BigLaw and federal clerkships. The only schools on both lists? Duke University and the University of Chicago, with combined percentages of 82.6% and 82.4%, respectively.
Please note: just as with the U.S. News rankings, small variations in outcomes can cause big movements in numeric rank. And small class sizes may produce varying year-over-year outcomes. So these lists should be used for amusement only.
Top Ten Law Schools by 2025 Grads in BigLaw (Percentage)
| Rank | Law School | 2025 Grads in BigLaw (Percentage) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Duke University | 70.9% |
| 2 | Columbia Law School | 70.1% |
| 3 | Northwestern University (Pritzker) | 67.4% |
| 4 | University of Pennsylvania (Carey) | 67.1% |
| 5 | University of Virginia | 64.0% |
| 6 | New York University | 62.1% |
| 7 | University of Chicago | 59.7% |
| 8 | University of Southern California (Gould) | 58.6% |
| 9 | University of California – Berkeley | 57.2% |
| 10 | Cornell University | 56.9% |
Top Ten Law Schools by 2025 Grads in Federal Clerkships (Percentage)
| Rank | Law School | 2025 Grads in Federal Clerkships (Percentage) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Yale Law School | 23.3% |
| 2 | University of Chicago | 22.7% |
| 3 | Stanford Law School | 19.5% |
| 4 | University of Notre Dame | 17.1% |
| 5 | Harvard Law School | 16.6% |
| 6 | University of Texas – Austin | 14.3% |
| 7 | University of Alabama | 12.3% |
| 8 | Duke University | 11.7% |
| 8 | Washington University – St. Louis | 11.7% |
| 10 | Vanderbilt Law School | 11.3% |
Previous TaxProf Blog coverage:
- The Best Law Schools For Getting A Biglaw Job (2026)—What Does It Mean? (May 9, 2026)
- Legal Ed News Roundup (May 1, 2025) (covering Law360’s Class of 2024 analysis)
