The Best Online Colleges ranking is based on rigorous analysis of academic, admissions, financial, and student life data from the U.S. Department of Education along with millions of reviews from students and alumni. List includes 100% online universities as well as colleges that offer a majority of their degrees online. Learn where our data comes from.
| Factor | Description | Source | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Academics Grade | Niche Academics grade, which incorporates factors such as acceptance rate, quality of professors, as well as student and alumni surveys regarding academics at the school. | Multiple Sources | 40.0% |
| Value Grade | Niche Value grade, which incorporates statistics such as average loan amount, alumni earnings and student surveys regarding value. | Multiple Sources | 27.5% |
| Professors Grade | Niche Professors grade, which incorporates factors such as number of awards won by faculty, student-faculty ratio, as well as student surveys regarding professor quality. | Multiple Sources | 7.5% |
| Campus Grade | Niche Campus Quality grade, which incorporates factors such as quality of campus food and housing, as well as student surveys regarding facilities on campus. | Multiple Sources | 5.0% |
| Diversity Grade | Niche Diversity grade, which incorporates factors such as ethnic composition of the student body, proportion of international students and out-of-state students, as well as student surveys regarding diversity on campus. | Multiple Sources | 5.0% |
| Student Life Grade | Niche Student Life grade, which incorporates statistics such as safety, diversity, athletics and student surveys regarding student life. | Multiple Sources | 5.0% |
| Student Surveys on Overall Experience | Niche survey responses scored on a 1-5 scale regarding the overall experience of students and alumni at each school. | Self-reported by Niche users | 5.0% |
| Local Area Grade | Niche Local Area grade, which incorporates factors such as median rent, local crime rates, access to amenities, as well as student surveys regarding the local area around campus. | Multiple Sources | 2.5% |
| Safety Grade | Safety grade, which incorporates factors such as campus crime rate, local crime rate, as well as student surveys regarding health and safety services on campus. | Multiple Sources | 2.5% |
This ranking assesses 4-year colleges and universities who have at least 25% of their students enrolled exclusively online. Statistics obtained from the U.S. Department of Education represent the most recent data available, as self-reported by the colleges. Niche also collects data directly from schools via our school data update form. If you work for a school and would like to update your data, please claim your school.
For more details about how we calculate our rankings, click here.