Recently, my friends and I have discussed the advantage to take two honors classes sophomore year and two AP classes junior year. Since I have taken very rigorous classes, I’m sitting at a 4.06 UC GPA halfway through my junior year while many of my friends are below a 4.0 capped weighted. How much do the UCs care about taking rigorous classes and having a much higher uncapped than capped GPA? We all have 34s/1500s, it’s just the called weighted that’s killing many students at my school. We all want to go to UCI. Thanks.
UC’s will look at 3 GPA’s: Unweighted UC GPA, Capped weighted UC GPA and Fully weighted UC GPA.
https://rogerhub.com/gpa-calculator-uc/
UC Capped weighted GPA is the most common GPA quoted in Freshman profiles and the UCOP website but your overall rigor will be evaluated also.
UC’s consider HS course rigor Very Important in their application review (check Common Dataset) but HS course rigor is considered in the context of what is offered at each HS.
Like all competitive schools, they expect good grades in rigorous courses but you do not have to take every AP/IB/Honors course available. The UC’s want to see students challenge themselves in comparison with their HS peers.
Studies have shown that GPA is the best indicator of academic success but all students need to find a balance that is best for them when it comes to academic rigor.
So to answer your question, not taking hard/rigorous classes can hurt your chances along with not doing well grade wise in these classes.
UCs get flooded with aps and they have to do a pretty coarse sort based on easily verified info. Most big CA HS have lots of AP and honors options now so, it would be hard for a student to take them all. Getting way into the weeds about whether you took the hardest classes at your school is probably beyond their scope of analysis. At Irvine - they got something like 95k applicants. Applicants with a sub 3.8 GPA represent 44% of applicants and just 7% of admits. While 4.0+ GPA applicants had a 62%admit rate. So, someone with a relatively low GPA and high course rigor is going to have a tough time standing out - no matter how hard their school and course load.
https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/infocenter/freshman-admissions-summary
Practically, an A in a relatively easy AP class like Stat is better for your transcript than a B in AP Calc. And an A in an a non-honors/AP class beats a C, D or F in the hardest class your school offers. Assuming you have lots to choose from, taking 2-3 AP/honors each semester Soph-Sr years while getting mostly As will probably maximize your UC chances.