Psychology is the #2 most popular US major. Compare 1,400+ programs by real degree output, admission odds, and outcomes — from federal IPEDS data.
Find Your Matches FreePsychology is offered nearly everywhere, so program strength — not availability — should drive your list. Look at: annual psychology degrees awarded (a proxy for department scale and course depth), research opportunities with faculty, and the school's placement into PhD, PsyD, and counseling master's programs. The table below ranks national universities by their real psychology degree output from IPEDS.
Psychology is rarely a capped major, so admission usually follows the university's general rate — unlike CS or nursing. That makes strong psychology schools accessible targets for students with solid but not perfect stats. Check each school's profile for its middle-50% GPA and SAT ranges.
Nationally ranked universities ordered by rank, with each school's annual psychology degrees awarded (IPEDS). Click any school for admission stats and a free chance estimate.
| University | Location | Psychology Grads/Yr |
|---|---|---|
| Princeton University | Princeton, NJ | 38 |
| Harvard University | Cambridge, MA | 69 |
| Stanford University | Stanford, CA | 74 |
| Yale University | New Haven, CT | 62 |
| University of Pennsylvania | Philadelphia, PA | 67 |
| Duke University | Durham, NC | 113 |
| Northwestern University | Evanston, IL | 125 |
| Johns Hopkins University | Baltimore, MD | 39 |
| Brown University | Providence, RI | 66 |
| University of Chicago | Chicago, IL | 74 |
| Columbia University in the City of New York | New York, NY | 116 |
| Cornell University | Ithaca, NY | 125 |
| University of California-Los Angeles | Los Angeles, CA | 1107 |
| University of California-Berkeley | Berkeley, CA | 307 |
| Rice University | Houston, TX | 38 |
| Vanderbilt University | Nashville, TN | 83 |
| Dartmouth College | Hanover, NH | 60 |
| University of Notre Dame | Notre Dame, IN | 66 |
| University of Michigan-Ann Arbor | Ann Arbor, MI | 646 |
| Georgetown University | Washington, DC | 81 |
| Washington University in St Louis | St. Louis, MO | 167 |
| Carnegie Mellon University | Pittsburgh, PA | 18 |
| University of Virginia-Main Campus | Charlottesville, VA | 179 |
| University of Florida | Gainesville, FL | 578 |
Data from IPEDS & College Scorecard. Browse all 3,500+ universities →
Stanford, UC Berkeley, Harvard, UCLA, and Michigan top research rankings for psychology, but the best program for you depends on scale and access: large programs like Michigan and UCLA award 500+ psychology degrees a year with deep course catalogs, while smaller selective schools offer more faculty contact. Admit Coach ranks programs by real IPEDS degree output and matches them to your admission profile.
Usually no — unlike computer science or nursing, psychology is rarely a capped or impacted major, so admission follows the university's overall acceptance rate at most schools. A handful of UC campuses are exceptions where psychology is selective. That makes top-100 universities with strong psychology departments realistic targets for students with a 3.4-3.8 GPA.
The largest paths are counseling and clinical work (which require graduate school), human resources, UX research, market research, and behavioral health roles. Median earnings for psychology BAs are modest at first but rise sharply with a master's; industrial-organizational psychology and UX research are the highest-paying tracks. Each Admit Coach school profile shows real median-earnings data for its graduates.
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