~ 6 (3 east coast, 3 west coast - in the U.S.) - Shirley Wu

As Neil: I looked at one, and was offered a scholarship (which I accepted) in a second. - Richard P Grant

Australia is (was?) like UK - I applied to three - Cameron Neylon

Four. - Chris Miller

Three. I might've applied to more, but I missed most of the application deadlines. - Donnie Berkholz

Three. Geography and an infant forced the limit. - Bora Zivkovic

~12 ... but I have already whetted groups in almost all of them. Withdrew most of those applications once I had my choices narrowed down to two. - Deepak Singh

11 -- too many. Though it was fun to travel all over the country, it got real tiring... - Andrew Su

Brazil, like Australia, UK. I was in the lab already for my Masters, and tried 2 or 3 for my PhD. - pn

Note that all my applying was done remotely from a few 1000 miles away at a time when email and the internets were in their infancy. Was a lot of fun actually - Deepak Singh

I applied to 7 or 8 programs four years ago. - Chris Lasher

4 - Kevin Z

4 - Aarthy

I did my PhD in Aus as well, and only applied to one lab. (This was incredibly stupid of me. I had no specific research interests beyond "whoa, cell biology is cool", and took the position I was offered because it dropped in my lap, more or less.) - Bill Hooker

8, in US, in 1999. - Brian Haugen