HEAD-TO-HEAD
Two schools, one number.
The question families actually ask isn’t “is college worth it” — it’s “this school or that one.” Each pair below is run through the same model as the calculator, at the price a student actually pays, so the comparison is apples-to-apples. Both schools always pay off — the number is the margin.
IPEDS 2023 tuition · FREOPP 2021 earnings · BEA 2023 cost-of-living · both schools NPV-positive · same model as /worth-it.
Same-state public flagships
At resident pricing — a home-state student’s real choice.
- University of Michigan vs Michigan State University+$2.84M top
- University of Texas at Austin vs Texas A & M University+$2.54M top
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill vs North Carolina State University+$2.22M top
- University of Virginia vs Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University+$2.63M top
- University of Florida vs Florida State University+$1.75M top
- University of Georgia vs Georgia Institute of Technology+$5.16M top
- Indiana University vs Purdue University+$3.05M top
- University of Alabama vs Auburn University+$2.20M top
- Pennsylvania State University vs University of Pittsburgh+$2.20M top
- University of California-Berkeley vs University of California-Los Angeles+$2.50M top
- Ohio State University vs University of Cincinnati+$1.97M top
- University of Arizona vs Arizona State University Campus Immersion+$1.55M top
- University of Oregon vs Oregon State University+$1.20M top
- University of Washington vs Washington State University+$1.82M top
- University of Oklahoma-Norman Campus vs Oklahoma State University+$2.47M top
- University of Kansas vs Kansas State University+$1.97M top
- University of Iowa vs Iowa State University+$2.67M top
- University of Mississippi vs Mississippi State University+$1.56M top
- Clemson University vs University of South Carolina-Columbia+$2.05M top
- University of Colorado Boulder vs Colorado State University-Fort Collins+$1.35M top
- University of Kentucky vs University of Louisville+$1.48M top
- University of Utah vs Utah State University+$1.79M top
- University of California-Los Angeles vs University of California-San Diego+$1.30M top
- University of California-Berkeley vs University of California-Davis+$2.50M top
- Texas Tech University vs University of Houston+$2.24M top
- University of Tennessee-Knoxville vs University of Memphis+$1.34M top
- University of Arkansas vs Arkansas State University+$2.22M top
- West Virginia University vs Marshall University+$1.76M top
- University of New Mexico vs New Mexico State University+$995K top
- University of Nevada-Reno vs University of Nevada-Las Vegas+$1.44M top
- University of Idaho vs Boise State University+$1.48M top
- University of Montana vs Montana State University+$1.58M top
- University of North Dakota vs North Dakota State University+$2.62M top
- University of South Dakota vs South Dakota State University+$2.24M top
- Louisiana State University and Agricultural & Mechanical College vs Louisiana Tech University+$2.02M top
- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign vs University of Illinois Chicago+$2.31M top
- University of Wisconsin-Madison vs University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee+$2.30M top
Cross-admit private peers
Same tuition for everyone — a clean head-to-head.
- Harvard University vs Yale University+$2.84M top
- Stanford University vs Massachusetts Institute of Technology+$5.63M top
- Duke University vs Vanderbilt University+$2.75M top
- Northwestern University vs University of Chicago+$1.43M top
- University of Pennsylvania vs Cornell University+$3.50M top
- Brown University vs Dartmouth College+$2.47M top
- Columbia University in the City of New York vs Cornell University+$1.90M top
- Rice University vs Washington University in St Louis+$2.89M top
- Emory University vs Georgetown University+$2.15M top
- Boston College vs University of Notre Dame+$2.49M top
- Tufts University vs Boston University+$432K top
- Carnegie Mellon University vs Northeastern University+$4.73M top
- University of Southern California vs New York University+$555K top
- California Institute of Technology vs Massachusetts Institute of Technology+$10.06M top
- Southern Methodist University vs Texas Christian University+$923K top
- Case Western Reserve University vs University of Rochester+$1.28M top
- Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute vs Worcester Polytechnic Institute+$2.99M top
- Baylor University vs Texas Christian University+$847K top
- Villanova University vs Boston College+$2.48M top
- Howard University vs Spelman College+$119K top