ANALYSIS: Law Students Are Still Not Well, Despite Help

Over the past three years, law student well-being has remained stagnant, according to data from Bloomberg Law. Despite significant changes to how well-being is addressed in law schools, high percentages of future lawyers continue to report anxiety (68%) and disrupted sleep (65%).

With limited exceptions, the overall reported well-being of law students hasn’t improved or declined more than a few percentage points since Bloomberg Law began asking students about their well-being in 2022.

One exception is a 10-point decrease in law students who reported depression from 2024 (42%) to 2025 (31%). However, this decline may be rooted in the student demographics of the surveys. The largest percentage of respondents (37%) were 1Ls in 2025, whereas in 2024 the largest respondents were 3Ls (34%). Data indicate that as students progress through law school the likelihood that they will report issues with anxiety, depression, and other well-being concerns increases.

Law School Well-Being Drops From 1L to 3L Year

The most recent Path to Practice survey results found that law student health issues appear to worsen in every category surveyed as law students spend more time in school, corroborating Bloomberg Law findings from 2024.

For depression, the difference is stark: Only 18% of 1Ls reported experiencing depression, compared to 33% of 2Ls and 58% of 3Ls. This progression indicates that the overall “improvement” of reported depression is not as positive as it seems. Further, if more 3Ls had been among the respondents in 2025, the overall percentages of reported issues in all categories may have been much higher.

More Support, But More Stress?

As the legal industry has taken steps over the past two decades to address mental health within the profession, so have law schools:

• Multi-law school studies were completed in 2014 and 2021 to evaluate mental health among law students.
• The American Bar Association changed its curriculum standards in 2022 to encourage law schools to address well-being.
• Law schools are incorporating well-being into their curricula and inviting lawyer assistance programs like the Virginia Judges and Lawyers Assistance Program into the schools.

Yet law students are still struggling. With the advent of artificial intelligence—a helpful resource for students in terms of legal research and drafting—perhaps some pressures may lift. Yet the looming threat that students will be competing with generative AI for jobs after graduation likely adds to the pressures they’re facing.

Bloomberg Law subscribers can find related content on our In Focus: Legal Professional Well-Being page, our Well-Being Programs & Organizational Health page, and our Surveys, Reports & Data Analysis page.

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