Data: Some of the Golden State’s ‘best’ colleges and universities are in Southern California

Choosing the right step after high school is key — and for some, that means pursuing higher education.

College-bound seniors, especially in today’s day and age, have a plethora of options to choose from and even more metrics to sort their options. The stress of picking the right university or college can at times even exceed the stress of actually going

there, but fortunately, newly compiled data by experts at WalletHub, a personal finance company, might make that decision a bit easier, especially for those hoping to attend a California institution.

WalletHub recently released their 2026 Best College and University Rankings report, which compared nearly 800 higher-ed facilities across the U.S. on 30 key measures that were grouped into seven categories:

• Student selectivity (25 points)
• Cost/financing (20 points)
• Educational outcomes (20 points)
• Career outcomes (15 points)
• Faculty resources (10 points)
• Campus safety (5 points)
• Campus experience (5 points)

Each metric was graded on a 100-point scale, with a 100 representing the “best” school. WalletHub took into account both colleges and universities — the former were described as providing only undergraduate or baccalaureate degrees, while the latter were described as providing graduate programs, such as masters and/or doctoral degrees.

For Californians — or hopefuls from out of state waiting to be accepted — there are some great choices when broken down by these metrics, WalletHub found. What’s more, many of them are not too far away.

In fact, two of the top three are Southern California-based schools:

No. 1 ‘best’ college/university in CA: California Institute of Technology (77.72 points)

California Institute of Technology, known as Caltech, is located in Pasadena. According to WalletHub metrics, the school ranks first in the state when it comes to admission rate (first in the country, too), student-faculty ratio and post-attendance median salary. Caltech is third for graduation rate and eighth for gender and racial diversity, per WalletHub, but 29th for on-campus crime out of the 32 California universities that made the list.

Compared to the nation as a whole, Caltech finished as America’s “sixth-best” college/university, after Princeton (which, for comparison, finished with 79.66 points), Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth and MIT. It was one of 11 institutions to finish in WalletHub’s 99th percentile — considered the “best” — along with the aforementioned five schools, Carnegie Mellon University, Williams College, Rice University, Northwestern University and Columbia University.

All those accolades come at a steep price; WalletHub’s study found that Caltech placed 746th in the country in the cost and financing rank.

No. 2 ‘best’ college/university in CA: Stanford University (75.84 points)

California’s “second-best” college/university is, according to WalletHub, Stanford University. It tied Caltech for best post-attendance median salary and just missed out on the top spots for admission rate and student-faculty ratio, finishing second in both categories.

Stanford did finish first in gender and racial diversity in California, however, and on a nationwide scale, finished fourth in admission rate. It was ranked as WalletHub’s “14th-best” college/university, between Georgia Tech and Duke.

No. 3 ‘best’ college/university in CA: Claremont McKenna College (74.71 points)

Coming in at No. 3 on WalletHub’s list of California’s “best” colleges and universities is Claremont McKenna College. Finishing first in graduation rate and tying with Caltech and Stanford for high post-attendance median salary, Claremont McKenna ranked fourth in student-faculty ratio and sixth in both admission rate and gender and racial diversity.

Claremont McKenna finished in the 97th percentile of WalletHub’s ranking.

Rounding out WalletHub’s top ten “best” colleges/universities in California are:

• 4th: Harvey Mudd College
• 5th: Pomona College
• 6th: University of California, San Diego
• 7th: University of California, Los Angeles
• 8th: University of California, Berkeley
• 9th: University of California, Irvine
• 10th: University of Southern California

To read the complete study and view a more detailed look on the metrics, click here.