Best Colleges for History: Ranked by Graduate Salary, Not Prestige
We rank by what graduates actually earn — not by reputation surveys.
Top Schools for History — Ranked by Graduate Salary
These schools produce the highest-earning History graduates, based on federal earnings data. We rank by salary outcomes, not prestige.
| # | School | History Salary | Acceptance Rate | Degrees/Year | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brown University Providence, RI |
$62,000 | 5.2% | 43 | Reach |
| 2 | Columbia University New York, NY |
$62,000 | 4.2% | 118 | Reach |
| 3 | Cornell University Ithaca, NY |
$62,000 | 8.2% | 18 | Reach |
| 4 | Dartmouth College Hanover, NH |
$62,000 | 6.2% | 33 | Reach |
| 5 | Duke University Durham, NC |
$62,000 | 6.8% | 26 | Reach |
| 6 | Harvard University Cambridge, MA |
$62,000 | 3.5% | 150 | Reach |
| 7 | Johns Hopkins University Baltimore, MD |
$62,000 | 7.6% | 9 | Reach |
| 8 | New York University (NYU) New York, NY |
$62,000 | 9.4% | 54 | Reach |
| 9 | Northwestern University Evanston, IL |
$62,000 | 7.1% | 20 | Reach |
| 10 | Princeton University Princeton, NJ |
$62,000 | 4.5% | 72 | Reach |
| 11 | Stanford University Stanford, CA |
$62,000 | 3.9% | 16 | Reach |
| 12 | UCLA Los Angeles, CA |
$62,000 | 9.0% | 222 | Reach |
| 13 | University of Chicago Chicago, IL |
$62,000 | 4.8% | 52 | Reach |
| 14 | University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia, PA |
$62,000 | 5.9% | 39 | Reach |
| 15 | Yale University New Haven, CT |
$62,000 | 4.5% | 75 | Reach |
| 16 | Georgetown University Washington, DC |
$58,000 | 13.1% | 32 | Reach |
| 17 | Tufts University Medford, MA |
$58,000 | 10.1% | 18 | Reach |
| 18 | UC Berkeley Berkeley, CA |
$58,000 | 11.7% | 90 | Reach |
| 19 | USC Los Angeles, CA |
$58,000 | 10.0% | 72 | Reach |
| 20 | Georgia Tech Atlanta, GA |
$54,000 | 16.5% | 14 | Match |
| 21 | University of Michigan Ann Arbor, MI |
$54,000 | 17.9% | 84 | Match |
| 22 | University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, NC |
$54,000 | 18.7% | 68 | Match |
| 23 | University of Virginia Charlottesville, VA |
$54,000 | 16.9% | 78 | Match |
| 24 | Texas A&M University Austin, TX |
$50,000 | 29.1% | 104 | Match |
| 25 | UC Irvine Irvine, CA |
$50,000 | 25.6% | 63 | Match |
| 26 | UC San Diego La Jolla, CA |
$50,000 | 24.5% | 60 | Match |
| 27 | UC Santa Barbara Santa Barbara, CA |
$50,000 | 27.8% | 142 | Match |
| 28 | University of Florida Gainesville, FL |
$50,000 | 24.0% | 93 | Match |
| 29 | UC Davis Davis, CA |
$46,000 | 41.6% | 101 | Safety |
| 30 | University of Illinois Champaign, IL |
$46,000 | 43.7% | 85 | Safety |
Data source: IPEDS, College Scorecard.