The 50 Best Colleges in Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania packs an Ivy, two of America's top liberal-arts colleges, and one of the deepest public systems in the country into one state — ranking its colleges is easy. Ranking them honestly means first subtracting the schools that no longer exist. We scored Pennsylvania's four-year colleges on published U.S. News and QS/THE lists, College Scorecard outcomes (median earnings, graduation rate, net price), and accreditor standing — then ran every name through an existence gate against federal and accreditor records.
The gate did real work. Fourteen names that still circulate on Pennsylvania college lists were killed: institutions that closed in 2024 alone include Cabrini University and the University of the Arts, and the University of Valley Forge shut its doors in August 2026 — weeks before this list was built. Merged names like the University of the Sciences and Philadelphia University are gone too, absorbed into schools that are ranked here on their own merits. All 50 survivors are operating, accredited, and in the town printed next to their name.
How this ranking was built — and what got cut
For a state ranking, the existence gate asks whether the institution on the draft is the institution that exists today, under that name, in that town. Every entry was checked against IPEDS/College Scorecard presence and Middle States accreditation status, and the location printed is the institution's home campus — Penn State appears at University Park, not State College, and the University of Pennsylvania and Penn State are treated as what they are: two entirely different institutions that happen to share a state and half a name.
The verdict: 49 of 50 clean, 1 flag, 0 failures. The flag is Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania at #43. Bloomsburg, Lock Haven, and Mansfield Universities stopped existing as separate institutions on July 1, 2022, when they integrated into Commonwealth; the surviving university is listed once, at Bloomsburg, its largest campus and administrative seat, rather than three times under names that have been dead for four years. Two more flagged institutions — Rosemont College, which will merge into Villanova in 2028 but operates independently today, and Keystone College, whose accreditation was reaffirmed in February 2026 after a show-cause fight — passed the gate but sit in the reserves, disclosed in our verification report.
The kills are the point. A Pennsylvania list assembled from stale sources would still offer you Cabrini (closed June 2024), the University of the Arts (closed June 2024), Clarks Summit University (closed 2024), the University of Valley Forge (closed August 2026), and degree programs at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (ended 2025) — plus six PASSHE names retired in the 2022 integrations and two Philadelphia institutions absorbed by merger in 2017 and 2025. Each of those names was in our candidate pool, and each was removed with dated evidence before a single score was assigned. What remains is the 50 that are actually there.
The full Top 50
Philadelphia, PA
Pittsburgh, PA
Swarthmore, PA
Haverford, PA
Bryn Mawr, PA
Bethlehem, PA
Lewisburg, PA
Easton, PA
Villanova, PA
University Park, PA
Pittsburgh, PA
Lancaster, PA
Gettysburg, PA
Carlisle, PA
Philadelphia, PA
Philadelphia, PA
Philadelphia, PA
Allentown, PA
Collegeville, PA
Grove City, PA
Pittsburgh, PA
Scranton, PA
Meadville, PA
Philadelphia, PA
West Chester, PA
Huntingdon, PA
Selinsgrove, PA
Bethlehem, PA
Elizabethtown, PA
Mechanicsburg, PA
Washington, PA
Philadelphia, PA
Millersville, PA
Indiana, PA
Slippery Rock, PA
Erie, PA
Erie, PA
Moon Township, PA
Center Valley, PA
Annville, PA
Wilkes-Barre, PA
York, PA
Bloomsburg, PA
Kutztown, PA
Loretto, PA
Latrobe, PA
Glenside, PA
Doylestown, PA
Chester, PA
Shippensburg, PA
How we rank
Ranked on U.S. News and QS/THE published lists, College Scorecard outcomes (earnings, graduation rate, net price), and accreditor standing — 2026 composite.
Before any scoring, every candidate passes our existence gate: confirmed open, operating at the location listed, and showing recent activity. Anything closed, moved, or mislabeled is removed — no exceptions, no grandfathering. Weights and sources are published on our methodology page.
Notes & corrections
Colleges close, merge, and rename themselves — Pennsylvania has seen all three in the last two years alone. This list is re-verified against federal and accreditor registries before it is posted anywhere, and spot-checked on a rolling basis. If you spot a change we haven't caught, email [email protected] and we will correct the record publicly. If it's listed, it exists.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best college in Pennsylvania?
The University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia, ranks #1. It tops the composite of published U.S. News and QS/THE lists and College Scorecard outcomes, and it passed the same existence gate as all 50: an operating, accredited institution at the location listed.
How was this ranking made?
Institutions were scored on published U.S. News national and liberal-arts lists and QS/THE tables, plus College Scorecard outcomes — median earnings, graduation rate, and net price — and accreditor standing, after passing an existence gate against IPEDS/College Scorecard and Middle States records. Fourteen closed or absorbed names were removed from the pool before scoring.
Is the University of Pennsylvania the same as Penn State?
They are separate institutions with similar names. The University of Pennsylvania is a private Ivy League university in Philadelphia, founded by Benjamin Franklin. Penn State is a public, state-related university whose flagship campus is at University Park. They are ranked separately here — Penn at #1 and Penn State at #10.
Why isn't Bloomsburg University on the list?
Because Bloomsburg University no longer exists as a separate institution. On July 1, 2022, Bloomsburg, Lock Haven, and Mansfield integrated into a single university, Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania, with Bloomsburg as the surviving institution. It is listed once, under its current legal name, at its main campus in Bloomsburg.
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