<p>the ULTIMATE battle!</p>
<p>Best to get into both first before comparing. ;-)</p>
<p>^what are the odds of that?</p>
<p>There are probably many other threads on this topic, but oh well.</p>
<p>The letters that Caltech send to high school students have far more interesting envelopes than the letters that MIT sends. For that reason alone, Caltech is obviously better. :)</p>
<p>I think it's a close call. They are both awesome schools; they simply excel in different areas. Someone who wants to major in engineering might see MIT as being superior to Caltech, whereas someone who dreams of becoming an astrophysicist might see Caltech as being superior MIT. It depends on how you look at it.</p>
<p>Depends on who you are, now doesn't it?</p>
<p>Go to the MIT and Caltech boards and look at who applied for 2008 and who got in. There are detailed statistics and info if you look back a bit. Compare yourself to them.</p>