How long does a recommendation letter have to be?

Tiberium
Tue, 09 Dec 2014 01:03:36 +0000

See above.

Much like the other parts of an application, admissions officers have to read everything that you send them. They aren’t fond of needless fluff, and that’s understandable.

Therefore, it should be long enough to convey useful information about you, but short enough to not fall back on restatements or generalizations (the MIT link is a good example of what you would want to see avoided).

Have you waived your FERPA rights, though? If you have (which you should), you wouldn’t be involved in the editing process of the letter. Just trust that your teacher is capable of writing a good one.