<p>None of my supplement essays (vitality, roommate, "Why Stanford?") go over the character limit. All are under the character limit by at least 2 characters. But they say I can't submit my application because the supplement essays are too long?? Please help. :(</p>
<p>Hm, that’s odd…are you sure you counted the number of characters WITH spaces in Word?</p>
<p>Yeah, I did! 
And it even says clearly on the website “5 characters available” or whatnot for each response…I’m so confused.</p>
<p>Ugh, that’s so weird! D:</p>
<p>I know! Ugh, does anyone know what to do? Anyone else experiencing this problem?</p>
<p>I think their character limit is just lower than they actually say. Try cutting off like 20 characters or so</p>
<p>Okay, I’ll try it. :)</p>
<p>Okay, it worked! 
But now my question is: is it okay if the entire essays don’t show on the “Print Preview”?</p>
<p>Anyone? 10char</p>
<p>dude, take this all as a sign that Stanford doesn’t want you.</p>
<p>It happened to me last year when I was </p>
<p>writing
like
this</p>
<p>instead of writing like this. What shows up on the .pdf is what the admission officers will be reading, so make sure your whole essay fits.</p>
<p>^Omg, really? So your whole essays are supposed to be on the Print Preview version?..Okay, I usually don’t say this but…■■■. Why would they give you that much space if you really can only use like…half of it?</p>
<p>My S had a similar issue last yr. He uploaded the essay in parts (cut n paste) and it fit well within the character limit. The whole essay showed in the print preview too.
Hope thi helps.</p>
<p>Well from what I understand, yes, because the pdf thingie is presumably what they get after you submit the supplement (otherwise there would be no need for it?) I do not quite remember, but I think if you do not make new paragraphs etc. then most of what you write fits. If it is really critical for you to use all of the characters allowed I would recommend contacting admissions office and asking them how to go about it – maybe you could write the essays in the Additional Info section of your application, which I think is not really limited.</p>
<p>^Okay, I deleted all the spaces in between lines and had to cut some stuff, but it all fits now. And it’s submitted! 
Thanks for your help, guys, and sorry for the freak-out earlier; I was just worried because I had already cut them down a lot and feared that I would have to completely ruin them by cutting anymore, but luckily, that wasn’t the case!</p>
<p>Haven’t read the responses so maybe you’ve got this figured out already, but there’s also a “line limit.” So try taking out some of your new lines (merging paragraphs, removing spacings between paragraphs, etc.) to decrease the vertical length, and you should be able to get it under the limit.</p>