Harvard SCEA vs RD 2023

There was an increase in SCEA applicants this year, and the acceptance rate was lower than last year. Is RD going to be less or more competitive than SCEA this year?

My guess is that as Harvard is admitting about half their freshman class SCEA, more students will be applying SCEA next year than this year, which will further decrease the SCEA acceptance rate for next year. So SCEA next year will probably be more competitive.

I predict the RD acceptance rate will be lower than LY. They’ve already said that they are planning on admitting fewer students upfront, and relying more on the WL to fill/balance the class.

Would RD this year (2023) be slightly harder / more competitive than SCEA?

How do you quantify competitiveness of SCEA vs RD?

Based on the acceptance rate this year and the number of accepted applicants in the SCEA round? Does applying SCEA this year give the applicant a slight advantage?

@PianoWinterfell a lot of people have tried to calculate it exactly, but with recruited athletes and legacies, i think RD and SCEA basically have the same acceptance rate for the average applicant.