Every engineering program ABET accredits meets the same eight general criteria. Most also have to meet a second layer: program criteria, written for a specific discipline. Which set applies, and how many, is decided by a single factor that surprises many faculty the first time they plan a review: the words in the program's name. This guide explains how that works under ABET's criteria for the 2026-27 review cycle.

Credential Review is an independent publication. It reports on ABET's criteria and does not speak for ABET.

What program criteria are

ABET's Engineering Accreditation Commission describes program criteria as discipline-specific interpretations of the general criteria. They are deliberately narrow. Under the 2026-27 criteria, program criteria may set requirements in only two areas: curricular topics and faculty qualifications. Everything else, from student outcomes to continuous improvement to facilities, is governed by the general criteria alone.

That is why two programs with very different program criteria still share the same backbone: at least 30 semester credit hours of college-level mathematics and basic sciences, at least 45 hours of engineering topics, a broad education component, and a culminating major design experience.

The program's title decides which set applies

The applicable program criteria are determined by the technical specialties named in the program's title. A program called Mechanical Engineering triggers the mechanical criteria. A program whose title names two specialties, such as Civil and Environmental Engineering, triggers both, and it must satisfy each set. Where the two sets overlap, the overlapping requirement only has to be met once.

ABET also maintains a set for Engineering, General Engineering, Engineering Physics, Engineering Science and similarly named programs, which covers programs whose names do not point to a single specialty.

The practical effect is that renaming a program is also an accreditation decision. Adding a word such as Robotics or Systems to a title can bring in a second set of curricular and faculty requirements that the program must then document at its next review.

Thirty-one sets, each led by a society

The 2026-27 engineering criteria list 31 sets of program criteria. Each has a lead society: the ABET member society responsible for that discipline's criteria. A few examples from the current list:

  • Mechanical and Engineering Mechanics: the American Society of Mechanical Engineers
  • Civil, Architectural and Construction: the American Society of Civil Engineers
  • Electrical, Computer, Communications, Telecommunication and Optical or Photonic: IEEE
  • Chemical, Biochemical and Biomolecular: the American Institute of Chemical Engineers
  • Software: CSAB
  • Mechatronics and Robotics: ASME and IEEE jointly
  • Systems: seven societies jointly, including ASME, CSAB, IEEE and INCOSE

Joint lead societies matter for interdisciplinary programs, because the criteria wording comes from more than one professional community.

What the requirements look like in practice

Program criteria vary widely in how specific they are. The mechanical criteria are brief: graduates must apply engineering, basic science and mathematics, including multivariate calculus and differential equations, to the modeling, analysis, design and realization of physical systems, covering both thermal and mechanical systems with depth in one of them. Faculty teaching upper-level professional courses must stay current in their specialty.

The civil criteria are far more detailed. They require mathematics through differential equations, probability and statistics, calculus-based physics, chemistry, and one more area such as computer science or data science; design in at least two civil contexts; problem solving in at least four civil specialty areas; experiments in at least two contexts; and an explanation of topics including licensure and safety. Faculty who mainly teach design courses must be qualified through professional licensure or through a combination of education and design experience.

Changes in the pipeline

The 2026-27 criteria document also carries proposed revisions to two sets, released for comment on October 24, 2025, with comments accepted until June 15, 2026. The chemical proposal would name specific engineering topics, including material and energy balances, thermodynamics, transport, reaction engineering, process control and separations, and would require faculty teaching program courses to have had training or professional development in teaching within the past six years. The environmental proposal would add computational tools to design work and widen the professional practice requirement to include economics and ethics. Proposed criteria are not in force until ABET adopts them, and adopted changes appear in a later cycle's criteria document.

How to check your own program

Start with the exact title on the transcript and in the catalog, then find every set of program criteria that title triggers in the current cycle's criteria document. List each curricular topic and faculty requirement from those sets beside the courses and faculty that meet them. If a title change is under discussion, run the same exercise for the new name before it is approved, and check the proposed changes section so a review two or three cycles away is planned against the criteria that will apply then.

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