time_consume_me

This was my approach too. Some things I might add, having seen it from the other side as an admit/ grad student:
1) Cut every program without a guaranteed five-year funding package, but I wouldn't start choosing between five year funding packages too early, e.g., not applying to a program because the funding "looks" to be "mostly" TA-ships or because it doesn't appear to offer summer funding and a bunch of other schools do. You won't know exactly what your departmental funding package looks like until you have an offer in hand. Also, a lot of time department pages are vaguely worded because there's a larger academic unit controlling their purse strings, and until the academic unit disburses the department's funding, the department itself isn't 100% sure what's available. 
2) Note, too, the definition of "fit." If you're a 20th century French historian, a 19th century French historian can be your advisor. Also, for our hypothetical 20th century France applicant, a lot of times programs will have just 1 French historian, so if you look for 2, you'll come up very short— instead think in terms of a committee, where in addition to your advisor, there's 3-4 folks who work on your major field (modern Europe), and ideally one to three people who work in different geographic areas but in your same thematic area/s (science and technology, gender, colonialism, etc). I think the most important of these is being in a program where your major field has a robust presence; being the only person who works on [insert major field here] in your cohort, and only having 1-2 professors to take classes with or guide you, is a very lonely road.
3) Like, really don't want to live. Like, there would be nothing that could sway you to live there. Like, if this were the only program you got into, you would prefer not going to a PhD program at all. Like, if this program had amazing funding and the best advisor and you got in, you would take the program with worse funding over great funding at this location. 
TLDR: Don't apply to everything under the sun, but don't reject too much out of hand, either. I think if you are striking the right balance, there should be about 6 to 8 schools that are reasonable fits for you to apply to. 

This is entirely normal and commonplace. I'm afraid you'll just have to get used to it. You were an exceptional student. Your students, by and large, will be average students.

I submitted 3/6 of my applications. The other three aren't due until the 15th, so I have some time to keep working on my SoPs and my Writing Sample. I'm with the other commenters, it's just a typo! I know someone who's very first sentence in their SoP started with a very obvious typo and she was accepted into all three of her programs. You got this!

Hello all, just dropping in to send you good vibes as deadlines approach! If anyone has questions about UC Davis, feel free to PM me  

The second guessing and checking and re-checking file names of what we uploaded and sent -- I guess this is life for the next little while.
In the meantime, I've got a thesis a bunch more applications to finish. Good luck to everyone

Again, this is going to vary by institution. Some have pretty strict cut-offs mandated by the university. For state schools, it may not affect your admissions, but in may cases whether or not you get awarded university vs. departmental funding (usually a $10,000+ difference) is purely dependent on your quantifiable metrics.

I'm definitely still keeping Washington on my list... after conferring with my POI there, her research is too compelling and relevant to my own. I have felt that it has been hard to find a decent number of schools with British historians related to my interests.
I've apparenty looked at Rappaport's page before, not sure why she dropped off my radar. I think UCSB scared me a bit with "competitive basis" funding, but I'll have to contact the graduate assistant for just how many have received packages.
Thank you for your suggestions!

This has been a thread I'd like to contribute to for a while, and I am so very glad that I finally am in a position to do so! Please pardon my typos and the bad grammar. 
Current status (2017-2018): 
Applied (7): Columbia (History - East Asia), Michigan —Ann Arbor (History and Women's Studies joint program), UChicago (History), UCSB (History), Wisconsin - Madison (History) , U of Toronto (History), Princeton (East Asian Studies)
Accepted (declined) : UChicago, UCSB, U of Toronto, Columbia
Rejected: Princeton, Wisconsin-Madison, Michigan
Past status (2016-2017):
Applied (6): Columbia (PolSci), Berkeley (PolSci), GWU (PolSci), UVA (PolSci), Harvard (History), UPenn (History)
Accepted: N/A
Rejected: All of them (UPenn post-interview)
Executive Summary:
1. Choose programs that are the best fit (in my case, this begins with choosing the right discipline...)
2. Contact not just one but multiple POIs (not just to gauge fit, but for advice)
3. Ask multiple people to review SOP (make sure some of the reviewers are advanced PhD students)
4. Not just make an effort to revise the writing sample, but make sure that the original research in this writing sample is very strong
4. (if applicable) Think of ways to proactively make the non-History related work experiences/degrees in non-History disciplines into one's advantage
5. Make sure that one has a strong support system
6. (this may only apply to me, but at least in my case) If applying to PhD programs is like shooting a target under great pressure with your life at stake (to some extent), then one may want to present oneself as a professionally trained sniper, instead of a passionate soldier. 
Background Info:
I'm an international student with no degree in History but two Master's degrees from non-U.S. schools. I would like a career in the academia not bc this is the only option I have, but the one I desire most. So, to some extent, I am aware of the trade-off, the opportunity cost, and the risk, which means applying to PhD programs itself is an informed decision. And, in my humble opinion, the lessons I've learned are--
1. Choose programs that are the best fit
I know this is a bit cliche, but in my case this was a fundamental and challenging task to complete. To begin with, I needed to know who I am as an academic in order to choose the discipline that is the best fit given my intellectual identity. On paper, I am a significantly better applicant for PhD programs in PolSci than I am for programs in History.  And I wasn't sure if I wanted to become a historian or a political scientist during my first cycle of application. For instance, I didn't know if I want to approach international politics as a historian or become a political scientist with a historical perspective. When I was preparing for my applications to History programs in 2016, I felt like I was "defecting" from one field to another. That identity crisis did real damage to my first cycle, and completely turned my existent academic training against me. Multiple POIs  even (explicitly or implicitly) asked  me why I wanted to be trained into a historian. 
So, the lesson is, if I cannot even identify my intellectual self, then the committees and POIs cannot either.
I spent the past year painstakingly coming to terms with the fact that I want to be a historian (with my research interests encompassing field A, B, C...). And this has not only made the "searching for programs that are the best fit" process in 2017 a lot easier, but also helped me to concentrate all my energy on accumulating more research experiences in field A, B, C. And I am a lot happier. 
From the results you can see that I applied to Columbia twice, once to the PhD program in PolSci (rejected) and this time to the PhD program called History - East Asia (accepted). I think the results speak for themselves. (And I am openly glad that I only need to send TOEFL and GRE scores once!)
2. Contact POIs
For the first cycle, I only contacted one POI for each of the program I applied to, and the contacting itself was of a very superficial nature- I simply asked if a given POI was interested in my research plans/academic background and if they were taking students. That was helpful but not productive. For the second cycle, I made sure to at least contact 2-3 POI for every program I was considering to apply to, and also asked all of my POIs if they have any advice on how to further develop my research interests and prepare my application. Most of them replied and most of those who replied gave advice in great detail. Two POIs literally pointed out that some of my research topics were not as original as the others, and have been already well studied. As you can imagine, I avoided writing about those research topics in my SOP. Some POIs shared their idea about what a good writing sample was, e.g. based on solid and original work, creative narrating, etc. And others suggested that I elaborated on a few research topics I originally considered not so important, bc they thought these topics could potentially lead to important research.
In short, by contacting POIs via dozens of emails, I became a better applicant already, even before I made a decision on which programs I should apply to. In retrospect, contacting POIs was a significantly helpful experience where I had a perfect excuse to ask renowned historians to take time to mentor me on how the mind of a professional historian should work. 
3. Ask multiple people to review SOP
Many people have offered excellent advice on how to revise one's SOP, so my focus here is rather on asking reviewers to help with the revision. For the first cycle, I asked three PhD students to review my SOP, but none of them are actually doing PhDs in History (oops!). For this cycle, six PhD students selflessly offered insight. Three of them were my own senpai, who are doing PhDs in top History PhD programs and would like to go the extra mile to get me in a top program too. Three others were people I know from this very forum - I didn't ask for their permission, so please allow me to refrain from revealing their identities - with two of them being advanced PhD students/candidates. I did lots of heavy revisions to my SOPs according to their advice, e.g. I abandoned all the language about "passion", "hope", "enthusiasm" bc they show nothing about my expertise or my professionalism. 
What prevented me from asking more people to review my SOP during the first cycle was that I was shy, and unconsciously afraid of hearing people say "this wouldn't work, you need to rewrite everything". Yes, showing my SOP - a piece of my mind and my intellectual self - to other people, especially strangers made me feel exposed and vulnerable, but this was nevertheless a must do. It's way much better to consciously feel vulnerable rewriting a SOP for the 17th time than to unknowingly submit a vulnerable SOP to the committee and get it slaughtered. I am so very grateful that so many people took their time (while being crazy busy with their own work) to selflessly rescue my SOP again and again. And in my humble opinion, it is significant that one always humbly asks for permission to send a SOP to a potential reviewer in advance, with great respect and gratitude, before sending out the SOP.
4. Not just make an effort to revise the writing sample, but make sure that the original research in this writing sample is very strong
My writing samples for both of the two cycles are actually about the same research topic. And no, my English skill/narrating style didn't improve that much in the past year. What changed is that I wrote my master's thesis based on the 2016 version of the writing sample, adding to it a lot more original research, then wrote the 2017 version of the writing sample based on the thesis. In other words, the research itself was stronger, more sophisticated, and significantly more mature. I thought revising the writing of a writing sample took a lot less time than enriching the original research the writing sample was based on, so in 2016 i focused solely on the "writing" part of the writing sample. But this was a tactical decision instead of a strategic one. A stellar research may end up producing a good (but not extraordinary) writing sample, but i feel it is unlikely that an immature and weak research can produce an original and solid writing sample. After all, the people who make decisions are established historians themselves, they can see.
4. Think of ways to proactively make the non-History related work experience/degrees in non-History disciplines into one's advantage
I don't have any degree in History, so this is more like my own "demon" to deal with. Please ignore the following if you don't have the awkward disadvantage of never having majored or even minored in History. 
This is easier to say than to do, but is doable. I have been spending my gap year working as a researcher for an NGO and was hired bc of my expertise in politics instead of history.(ironic~)  Bc of the nature of my work, I got to travel a lot (domestically and internationally) and communicate with academics from non-History disciplines, activists, and other professionals on a regular basis. At first, I was afraid that this kind of non-History experience was bound to further add to my disadvantage of not having a degree in History, but i was wrong. Many of the ideas - especially the good ones- in my SOP were a result of my learning from these people's perspectives. Hypothetically speaking, if one's interested in the historical transformation of gender norms, it doesn't hurt to work with those who endeavor to shape gender norms in our era. No, they are not the historians who study what I study and what happened one century ago, but they (are trying to) make or shape the history someone's gonna write about 100 years later.
So how did this play out? During my first interview with Columbia, the professor asked nothing about my research in History but a lot of my "work", and was very interested in knowing how i make connections between my work and my research. I later learned that another applicant who was also interviewed was asked similar questions - not about their research in History, but their non-History experiences. So, when it comes to the final decision and the quality of everything else  is the same/highly similar, the committee may also look at applicants' non-History experiences.
So, if you are also in a similar situation where you have a significant amount of non-History training and (work) experiences for whatever reasons, which can potentially lead the committee to assume that you are not committed to/experienced in History,  don't think about defending or justifying yourself (like i desperately tried doing in 2016 but in vain). Instead, think about how you can offer the program something special which they don't usually find in other applicants. 
5. Make sure that one has a strong support system
And don't just confine it to family and friends. For instance and in my case, I would say a very important part of my support system is my colleagues from work. After I failed my first cycle, my supervisor made an effort to send me to attend more conferences and do more business trips. I think part of this was bc I was obliviously very upset and needed distraction, and part of this was bc (my supervisor from work confirmed) my supervisor believed that this kind of experience would help me mature more as a researcher (regardless of the discipline), which, in turn, could help with my second cycle of application.
Meanwhile, a colleague from work who's a native English speaker checked the language of all my SOPs and writing sample for me, that was A LOT of time-consuming work. 
In addition, I would also say that all the POIs I contacted were also part of this support system. First, they were all very kind and encouraging. (and this is pretty much a guaranteed response from them) More importantly, many of them would offer advice on how to better prepare one's application if one asks nicely and skillfully, and this kind of support is what, in my humble opinion, an applicant might need more - even more than the emotional support (not saying emotional support is not important, though) from family and friends.
6. (this may only apply to me, but at least in my case) If applying to PhD programs is like shooting a target under great pressure with your life at stake (to some extent), then one may want to present oneself as a professionally trained sniper, instead of a passionate soldier. 
In my humble opinion, one won't be offered admissions to top programs bc one is passionate about one's research. I believe I was only offered admissions bc, first of all, the committees and POIs saw me as a professional historian in the making. In retrospect, during the first cycle i acted like a passionate soldier marching towards my targets like (no offense) a lot of people did or would do, but during the second cycle I somehow managed to behave, to some extent, like a sniper -  I was a lot more precise, I made calculations,  and I shot at my target professionally with the intention of getting the job done. 
My final two cents: there are many many soldiers and significantly fewer snipers in this world. Many soldiers can be replaced by other soldiers, but each good sniper has their professional signature and style (and even self-made bullets!) which eventually make them stand out and get "caught" by the "good people". (yes, I've watched too much crime drama...)
 
Best wishes to everyone!

I tend to agree that it may be daunting to try to find people that were influenced by Foucault (as surely he is to the history profession what Camus/Sartre are to philosophy or perhaps Chomsky to linguistics. Not all scholars may agree with their ideas, but most recognize their influence.)

I suggest looking around for some general Historiographical, Intro to History, Intro to the Study of History syllabi online. Most of these syllabi will have an array of intellectuals who have critically assessed the historical discipline through their works on power (as Foucault), but also other important "themes" that historians should know:

Just a non-exhaustive list in no particular order:
E.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class (class consciousness)
E.P. Thompson, Customs in Common
Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, eds., The Invention of Tradition (really every article in this edited book is worth reading)
Eric Hobsbawm, the four-party long-19th century series
Margaret L. Andersen and Patricia Hill Collins, eds., Race, Class, and Gender: An Anthology
Dennis Dworkin, Cultural Marxism in Postwar Britain: History, the New Left, and the Origin of Cultural Studies
Historians of gender: Lyndal Roper, Isabel Hull, Natalie Zemon Davis, Elizabeth Heineman, Bonnie G. Smith
Historians of postcolonialism: Dipesh Chakrabarty, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Gyan Prakash, Partha Chatterjee

From my experience, it is helpful to be in touch with professors during the application process so that they can be aware (hopefully) of your research potential and actually look at your application.  If they give a damn and don't get your application, they will find out where your application went (immediate desk reject before distributing to the faculty?). Yes, I got a lot of rejections with a 3.1 undergrad GPA and meh MA GPA and low GRE score (I had language issues) and it took several cycles with different groupings of schools.  Ultimately, it's a matter of faculty being persuaded by your commitment to producing good research and a promising dissertation, who's currently sitting on the graduate admissions committee, who else is applying in your field, and, well, the size of your field.

At this point, entering into my 8th (and final!) year, my comps feel like another lifetime.  I do agree with both @Sigaba and @AP.  
DO go to the job talks in your department even if no other graduate student does. Even if it's not in your field.  Do it. You're going because you need to see how job candidates draw out big themes in his or her work to connect to the audience and how the audience-- faculty members in DIFFERENT fields-- find ways to connect. I recall one job talk by a 18th century French cultural historian and a 20th century Chinese cultural historian raised his interest and question to her project. "I'm a Chinese historian BUT I LOVE your work on cultural networks of presses in France!  Here's my question...."  Not only this but you will be SO far ahead of the game from your peers. Do ask what the committee member's expectation is.  Every person is going to be different. Either I was awful at phrasing my questions of "what are we really going to talk about?" as @Sigaba warned of, or my committee was reluctant to be specific, either way, I actually failed my oral exam for that reason (among a few other critical areas).  Once I picked up the pieces (with the help of my saint adviser), we were able to outline clear expectations in writing. Only with this list was I able to determine when I was truly ready to re-take my oral exam. Truthfully, try to have at least one committee member who is very down-to-earth (but intense), patient, and "harmless" (like a whale shark among the white sharks).  The person will make a huge, huge difference to your sanity.  I had a senior, top-of-the-field professor who had nothing to lose in her ranking by throwing soft balls in my way while everyone else (including my adviser) wanted to engage deeper, provoking, out-of-the-left field questions. I could not wait for her turn during the orals. It's okay to be traumatized, even if you have (mostly) nice group of professors who mean well. Until that point, you will never have experienced that kind of stress.  (Ask me again the spring when I finish my dissertation and whether that was more stressful...)

I can tell you, more or less, how admission works at Ivies. I am now at a top 10 ivy, and got accepted to one more. My supervisor volunteered to tell me how I got accepted. And I was also told by one POI how admission works to explain why I got rejected.
At Harvard, Columbia, and Princeton, there are admin committees. Committees are assembled at random and are rotational. These committees are made up of professors culled from different subfields. These are the people, if you get accepted, will remember your application with striking accuracy, and they will make small talk with you during visiting days. I am almost certain the DGS is not on the admin committee. 
Princeton, Harvard, and Columbia get about 400-500 applications each, of those only about 50-75 (sometimes 100) are good ones. Those get ranked by GRE, GPA, etc (such as, grants, awards). Yes GRE verbal matters. It doesn't matter for all committee members, but good students do get rejected for a low verbal score. You don't need a perfect score, but a decent score. MA gpa trumps BA gpa. LORs are very important. And Languages! My cohort,  Americanists included, commands at least two languages, at least! Most have three or four under their belt. You are expected to sit for your language exam in September. 
But it's the SOP that makes or breaks your app. If your SOP is compelling, and fits with the general theme of the history department, your package is sent to your future supervisor (whomever you named in your SOP), and other professors in your sub-interests. You need sub-interests, which signal you can work with a few professors, not just one, who may retire or die or you just don't jive with. Committees know this. Students who have very particular singular interests, and can only work with one single professor, and no one else, tend to get rejected. Even excellent students.  
Your (future) supervisor and other professors (in your secondary field/s of interest) review your app, and approve or reject it. If they approve it, it goes back to the admin committee to be discussed further. At this point, it is up to the whims (and I kid you not WHIMS) of the admin committee to narrow the list of candidates further. Your supervisor and professors in your sub-fields who read your SOP and file, can exert some pressure on the admin committee to get you in. But to an extent, and usually only faculty with endowed chairs. Again, to an extent.
Once you make it to the top 40 or so candidates, and you get rejected or waitlisted, know it is not a reflection of your potential, but the people on the admin committee the year you applied. If they specialize in French or British history, and you have a sub-interest or have background in those regions, you may get accepted. If you have an LOR whom the head of the admin knows because both attend same conferences, and like each other, you may get accepted. 
Also know, committees know students change their interests once they get in. I did, dramatically, and I know other students who did as well. That is why admin committees do not strictly choose students by their professed interests, or the presence of a POI in the department. They choose students with accolades, proven ability to do historical research, and ask critical, and probing questions. Cohorts are themed. It is rather strange but I find that each cohort has students that somehow connect with each other, not directly, but generally. So say, most have an underlying interest in global studies, or transnational history. Someone on this forum mentioned that historians are now more transnational rather than strictly regional. That is true. I notice that it is becoming more and more passé to focus on a single region. It narrows down your job prospects. Committees also choose candidates with an eye to the future. How will those students fair on the job market 6-7 years down the line, with a singular interest?
If you don't get an interview, don't sweat it. Most people are not interviewed, unless specifically indicated on the relevant school website that they will be solicited for an interview! If you get an interview, cool! 
If you want to get into a top-history program and you are not successful in this cycle, don't settle or despair, but apply again next year (of course, if it is within your financial means to do so). Committees change from year to year. Best of Luck! 
 
 
 

Obviously a livable stipend for 5 years + health insurance, but that should be your baseline. 
YMMV for the following points, but I've spent a lot of time crunching numbers and (as a grad student) sitting in town hall meetings and here would be my $0.02. 
TAship vs fellowship breakdown is the first thing to consider. When you have your 5 years of funding, how many of those are TAships? TAships eat up your time, even if you love it. Fellowship years give you more flexibility — work on developing other skills, time to go to faraway archives. If your departmental funding is mostly through TAships, what fellowships are available through the graduate school? Yes, there are always external fellowships to take time off and go to archives — but those are competitive, and at any rate, you want to assess what resources this program and this school has.
Second thing is to consider is funding beyond the 5th year. What do 6th and 7th years do for funding? Are there additional TAships for those students? Assistantships in the school writing center, or in another department? Does the department offer completion fellowships that students can apply for? What about the graduate school, and if so, is the history department competitive in those competitions? You're looking for some sign that those students are being given some support, not that they're adjuncting at 3 different universities to make ends meet. 
After this point, there's a number of other things to look for — what all fit into the nebulous category of "financial resources." By and large, they won't be enumerated in your offer letter, but they make a material difference on your life in the program regardless.
Summer funding. It's unlikely that you'd have a school that always gives you money every summer. So 1) you want to see if the stipend is generous enough to allow you to save money for the months in the summer in which you are not getting paid, and 2) if you get some amount of money, $1000 to $3000, that you can do with as you will, either for maintenance costs (if #1 is a no-go) or (even better) to do some preliminary research. That is important because getting to do preliminary research trips your 1st and 2nd summers will jumpstart your research. So if your offer letter comes with, say, a special $2500 stipend for your first summer — very nice.  If there isn't designated summer money (and even if there is), are there travel grants for graduate students? I'm talking small grants, like $500 or $750, but those add up. A $750 grant is 3/4 of the way to an international plane ticket.  Conference travel is a similar game. While it's unlikely that a school will bankroll all your conference expenses all the time, is there a travel fund that students can apply for money from? Many schools have these across the graduate school (so look out for those) but if there's a department travel fund, so much the better.  Also, your graduate student union. Is there one? Hopefully there is. What concessions has it gotten for grad students recently?  A lot of grad school finance is fluid. Money that's available for students one year can disappear the next as funding sources dry up, grant periods end, or a particular pool of money gets distributed in a different way. And alternatively, new funding sources can become available! So looking for specific things (does the program have X, Y, Z) is helpful only to a point. You could talk to a fifth year who says yes, she applied for a departmental travel grant to do summer research, a third year who says she applied for summer money from the graduate school, and a first year who says, I got $1000 from the department free of charge. You could talk to one sixth year who got a TA-ship in the English department, another who won a grad school completion fellowship, and another who got a semester of dept fellowship and a semester TA-ship. It's six of one and half dozen of the other. The commonality here is that most people were able to piece something together and do what they needed to do, which is what you're looking for. 
Finally, you want to know what resources are available through the department, and which are available through the graduate school (School of Graduate Studies) or other multi-departmental bodies (School of Arts and Sciences, International Programs, etc). It's important that both have opportunities available. A school that cares about its graduate students has resources devoted to them at the level of the graduate school; it's not a bunch of balkanized departments fighting over scraps. These are usually listed online, so you can do your research. This is a list of internal grad school fellowships at my undergrad – https://www.grad.uiowa.edu/internal-fellowships — you can see at the bottom of the page that some fellowships are listed as "discontinued," because the money that supported them either ran out or wasn't renewed. But you can also see how some fellowships are listed as "new." This stuff changes ALL the time.

Programs could at least refund your application fee when they reject you. What a sweet deal that is for them. I guess we were dumb enough to pay it though.

Not sure how those programs compare but keep in mind New York City attracts top scholars on weekly, if not on daily, basis. And you’ll be a part of the greater NYC consortium, Columbia-NYU-CUNY. That has a big payoff. 
We had a course offered last fall that was structured on bringing in a new scholar every week to lecture to us on a relevant topic to the discussion, which included the scholar’s own work. Basically a private workshop. Scholars from Penn, Brown, Harvard, and MIT. 
And if it isn’t Columbia or NYU inviting or hosting weekly scholars or workshops, it is scholarly societies that are based in New York doing it.

Thank you @EAstudies and @potsupotsu for your kind responses. It's given me a broader perspective from which to consider this: what kind of work do I want to do; what kind of scholar do I want to be? Thank you for reminding me of these questions. My stay in the US does not have to be permanent, but the training I receive at a US institution would indeed greatly influence my future prospects and capabilities as a researcher.
Now to weigh a US Ph.D. program against secure employment in a country with healthcare relatively figured out...a whole different sort of problem, haha.

Your GRE scores are fine, but not amazing. They likely won't help or hurt you. Your GPA is bad, but you should be helped by your major GPA. At this point, work on your qualitative material (SOP, LoRs, etc.). Also, you should consider applying to some lower-ranked schools in addition to the schools you listed. For places like Princeton, Columbia and Chicago, even many students with "perfect" application profiles get rejected, so it's best to keep your options open.

Greetings! I've been a lurker here for some time, and figured I might as well ask my question directly. This fall, I'm planning on applying to a number of history Ph.D. programs. The institutions I'm most interested in are Princeton, Columbia, Cornell, NYU, Chicago, and CUNY. My GRE scores are as follows: 163 (VR), 147 (QR), and 5.5 (AW). I'm currently in an M.A. program for historical studies in which I have a 4.0; I graduate in May. I will also be serving as a teaching assistant this fall, as well as a research assistant for this final year. I know that the GRE only comprises one component of the application as a whole. Additionally, I recognize that one's research interests and project fit some institutions better than others. Given my scores, would I be better served to spend my time on focusing on my statement of purpose, writing sample, and gathering letters of recommendation (of which I have formed excellent relationships with my letter writers) rather than taking it again to improve my QR score? I should also add that for my undergraduate studies, in which I earned a B.S., my GPA was a 3.28 overall and a 3.8 in history (my major). I know many programs vary from one to the next, but I figured it couldn't hurt to have an idea of everyone else's experiences here.
Thank you all for your time and input!

Hi, I am a bit late to reply, but for laptops I would suggest something with a great keyboard. Historians type a lot. A good screen and small size should also be up there. My recommendations would be the Dell XPS 13 - good keyboard, great screen and size - or the Lenovo X1 Carbon - extremely durable and excellent keyboard. The Microsoft surface laptop is good too. The new Macs are horrid. The keyboards fail, and they overheat. Also, Macs have too few ports. 

Not really an answer to the OP's question, but you'll definitely want to take notes on all your seminar readings for your exams.

Different programs do different things, but I will say this: academics can only be rigorous if they're funded, and a dumb student with lots of financial support will almost certainly write a better dissertation than a smart student with no support. If a program does not offer a livable stipend, cover tuition, provide affordable health care, and provide access to pots of money for travel and research, it is not worth applying to, never mind attending. 

My process was to identify the professors with whom I wished to work, and then to narrow down the list by excluding programs that offered insufficient resources. Aim for a final list of 4-6.

Finally got some good news: I was admitted to Central European University's MA program in Late Antique, Medieval, and Renaissance Studies with a full tuition waiver, so it looks like I'll be in Vienna for the next two years. After a 4 month slog of non-stop disappointment, it's nice to end my season with some good news. 

EALC 10-month stipends are same as history ones. I think the people saying $35,000 are including summer funding, which does differ between history and EALC in that EALC students only get 2 years of summer funding while History students get 4 years (this is supposedly made up for by EALC only requiring 3 semesters of teaching in the 5 year package while History requires 4, but, frankly, I don't know anyone who wouldn't have traded an extra $12,000 in guaranteed funding for one more term as a TF). Anyway, unless something has changed, you should get about $35,000 the first two years (does your offer letter not say anything about summer funding? - it's been 8 years since I was in your shoes, so I can't swear things are the same).
Anyway, as to practicalities, HEAL is not an area studies degree, it's a History degree from a program managed by an area studies department (it actually used to be jointly managed by History and EALC, but that changed for obscure bureaucratic reasons. Did that change make the degree less valuable? Given that I don't think anyone who's not Harvard-affiliated even knows how the HEAL program is managed, I very much doubt it). I have seen no evidence that this hurts anyone on the job market (the first word of the degree is, indeed, History, and HEAL has historically produced quite a lot of very successful historians employed in history departments).
On funding. Harvard's funding is indeed not up to par with several peer programs, and my impression is that there is no money available to improve the offer (you can ask, I just don't think you should expect a positive response). In addition to the money being less, unless something has changed, there are still only 5 guaranteed years of funding as opposed to 6 at Yale. If all else is equal for you (that is, if you don't have scholarly or personal reasons to choose one over the other) then the money should send you to Yale. That said, Harvard funding is indeed enough to live on reasonably comfortably (as long as you're willing to have roommates and/or have an employed partner you can live with and share expenses with. I even know people who lived as small families on a single Harvard student stipend, though I don't think I'd recommend that). This is a different sort of choice than choosing between Yale and a place that's offering $18,000/yr and requiring you to teach all 5 years. That is, since both are viable packages with reasonable teaching requirements, I'd argue that you should choose the place where you think you will be better able to do your work. Which depends on what your work is and who you can work with at each place, your rapport with advisors/other students, etc. The money could be a nudge factor, but it probably isn't a crucial enough difference to be the main factor.

Yes, I'd echo what @EAstudies said. I'm not an American citizen myself, and I definitely agree that the situation in the US seems incredibly scary, but remember that the current president is fairly unpopular and the election is coming up soon, so you will very likely not have to experience this for the entire 6 years you spend in graduate school in the US.
Also, while Toudai is a great school, keep in mind @EAstudies point about the way a foreign degree will be looked at in the US. I'd also encourage you to think about the way the training you will receive in Japan will be perceived in the US because there are major differences between Japanese-style scholarship and US-style scholarship. Japanese historians, for example, tend to produce works that are very descriptive and focus narrowly on a particular subject or particular documents, while in the US you will be encouraged to make a more analytic "big picture" argument. Both styles have their positives, but it might be difficult to make a name for yourself in the US if you produce Japanese-style work. 

Just my personal opinion:
The U.S. is indeed in a precarious state, to put it generously. Nonetheless, I don't think the U.S. will completely "eat itself" in the next six or seven years to the point academia will also collapse. Major U.S. schools have large endowments compared to schools in other countries due to how they operate the schools, and they still have influential scholars, resources, and research networks here. State schools are indeed more dependent on the government grant, but if you're a student from the U.S., I don't think your stipend will be affected any time soon. And regional studies like EALC/EAS are not an exception.
If any, after doing a Ph.D. in the United States, you can be a professor in another country. Every year, there are quite a few Ph.D. recipients who get a tenure-track job in Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, etc. This is a very common practice. However, the other way is simply not an option. There are numbers of scholars who have a B.A. or M.A. from East Asian schools, but all of them (or at least I haven't seen a single exception yet) have their final degrees, i.e., Ph.D., in the United States. This sounds unfair since this is East Asian studies, but this is the reality. So you should consider where you'd really like to stay after graduation. If you are sure that you only want to stay in Japan and nowhere else, then U Tokyo is a great option. But if you seriously want to remain in academia and do not work in an industry, a Ph.D. degree from the United States will open a bigger academic job market for you, and this includes moving back to Japan.
Lastly, you should remember that methodologies and the academic trend may differ in the United States and Japan. Even if you're studying the same discipline, let's say Japanology, the U.S. schools are becoming more and more inter-regional and interdisciplinary (though in varying degrees). Also, grad schools here and there have different cultures or vibes (e.g., a relationship between a grad student and professor), so that would be another thing to consider. 
And congrats on your acceptances!