Top Law Schools

Interested in corporate (probably capital markets and M&A). Want to go in-house after 4-5 years. Like people at all three, so no strong fit reasons for any.

These are three gangbusters firms for corporate that are in a solid place financially. Your best bet is probably to go the place you felt the best personal connection and to see where friends are going (not necessarily to "pair up" but a lot of people have noticed trends in how people choose firms that can be helpful). Second visits could be in order if you have the time and energy. The way they staff junior associates will make a big difference on your life and how you think you'd like each system should weigh heavily on your decision.

If you think there's a very high chance you would prefer M&A and M&A only, Cravath/STB might get a slight nudge (though at Cravath your ability to get on M&A deals could be limited due to their system). DPW's M&A group is great, but it's smaller and not always quite as head-of-the-pack as the groups at Cravath/STB (but also not that meaningfully far behind if you have other reasons to prefer DPW. IIRC DPW is elite/band 2 nationally but elite/band 1 NYC while the other two are both elite/band 1 nationally and in NYC according to Chambers, which is the closest to a good source we have).

CSM, DPW and STB are cream of the crop, and as I try to emphasize whenever these questions come up, are amongst the group that splits all of the best/major/interesting/high value work that comes through NYC. Trying to rank amongst them is pretty pointless.

There we go again, Cravath being hammered in polls.