What You Need to Know About the New FAFSA
Recent changes to the FAFSA have made it faster, easier, and more accessible. See how you can get federal financial aid for your education — including Pell Grants — with this streamlined version of the application.
The 2025-2026 FAFSA is scheduled to open to all applicants on or before December 1. Reach out to the experts at the Office of Financial Aid and Scholarships to get all your questions answered before submitting your application for federal student aid.
Originally passed by Congress in 2021, the FAFSA Simplification Act has made qualifying for federal student aid more accessible than ever.
Every year since the Act’s passing, the FAFSA has become more streamlined, taking what was once a tedious and complicated process and greatly expanding FAFSA eligibility.
So whether this is your first time filling out the FAFSA or returning to it after several years, knowing what’s new can help you tackle it with ease.
Here are the five biggest changes to the most recent version of the FAFSA that you should know.
1. The EFC has been Replaced with the SAI
In previous versions of the FAFSA, each applicant was given a figure which the federal government would use to determine their level of need — the higher the figure, the less federal student aid would be allotted.
However, this number, called the Expected Family Contribution (EFC), was misleading, as its name made it appear as though the figure was instead the amount a student’s family was expected to contribute to the cost of college.
To alleviate this confusion, the FAFSA has replaced this figure with something called the Student Aid Index (SAI), which more accurately represents the amount of financial aid applicants are able to receive. In addition to the name change, the factors used to calculate the SAI have been recalibrated from how the EFC was calculated. One important result is that — in some cases — the calculated SAI for some students will be a negative number, identifying those in greatest need of financial aid.
2. There are Fewer FAFSA Application Questions
In previous years, there have been as many as 108 individual questions on the FAFSA.
This large number of questions was often seen as a barrier to submitting a complete application, making filling out the FAFSA more inaccessible for more people.
The current FAFSA consists of only 36 questions, and much of the information needed will be pulled directly from federal income tax returns.
Fewer questions means fewer roadblocks and fewer places where you have to pause your application to find the information you need.
3. More Financial Aid is Now Available for Single Parents
The FAFSA has always given unique support to single-parent families, including specialized protections for low and nontaxable income households.
The current FAFSA includes even more aid for single parents, including expanded eligibility for the maximum Pell Grant funds and a larger increase in Income Protection Allowance (IPA).
A higher IPA benefits FAFSA applicants due to the fact that it raises the amount of income that doesn’t get counted when determining federal financial aid.
The FAFSA defines single-parent households as having student applicants with just one parent or students who are themselves single parents.
4. There is More Emphasis on Wealth When Determining Financial Aid
In previous versions, how much financial aid the FAFSA distributed was based primarily on income.
The new FAFSA still accounts for income, but it now places a greater emphasis on a parents’ assets reported on their tax returns and generational wealth, including:
-
Real estate
-
Stocks, bonds, and investments
-
Trusts and inheritance
While there are now more sources of wealth considered by the most recent version of the FAFSA, the process of importing this information into the application remains the same.
Like income, these will be automatically added to the FAFSA through recent tax returns.
5. Verification is Now Faster and Easier
How the FAFSA verifies identity, a family’s assets, and income data has long been time-consuming and confusing, prolonging the application process and creating stress.
But now, thanks to the current FAFSA’s stronger link to federal income tax returns, verifying application information is much faster and takes less effort on your part.
Should the FAFSA need further verification, the federal government will reach out, but these new changes allow you to focus your energy on other aspects of the college application process.
Learn more about financial aid and scholarships at Pacific and read our post debunking common FAFSA myths.