The school offers undergraduate and graduate level courses, for their BS, MS, and PhD degree programs.

Known for most of its life as the Computer Science & Engineering (CSE) department, it was elevated to a school on its 50th anniversary in 2017.

[2] It is housed in two adjacent buildings: the Bill & Melinda Gates and Paul G. Allen Centers for Computer Science & Engineering.

[3] On March 9, 2017, CSE's 50th anniversary, the UW Board of Regents voted to elevate the CSE department to a school, naming it after Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen with a $50 million endowment from Allen and Microsoft.

[3][2] As of 2023, the Allen School employs an equivalent of 92 full-time employees across tenure-track, teaching-track, and research professors.

On February 28, 2019, the Bill & Melinda Gates Center for Computer Science & Engineering officially opened, with classes starting inside the following quarter.

[6][8][9] The site formerly housed More Hall Annex, which contained a nuclear research reactor.

[15][13] The direct admission pathway is designed primarily for Washington state residents, and approximately one quarter of applications from in-state are accepted.

The term "redshirting" is derived from athletes in US college sports who delay their entrance into games by spending a year training.

The racial demographics of undergraduate majors were 78% white and Asian, 10% Black, Hispanic, Latina/x/o, American Indian, and Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, while the 12% of students who are international were not counted.