Every student is different. For my son, he didn’t want to make any commitment to any college by Nov. 1, even though we’d visited all the colleges (and a few of them more than once) on his list. We kicked the tires as much as we could in the two years leading up to his applications. He sat in classes at colleges that offered them. He visited departments of those colleges that could provide such arrangements. He even slept in the dorms at a few colleges. But he still felt he needed to assess his options more closely the following March and April.
Having the options in March and April turned out be wonderful. Colleges hosted admitted students’ days or weekends, or even individualized visits (at least pre-pandemic). Students would have much greater access to schools’ resources including department faculties. The shoe was on the other foot and the student was in the driver’s seat.