Best Colleges in Delaware 2024

Badge for BEST IN DELAWARE COLLEGES & UNIVERSITIES

By Dr. James Barham
Reviewed By Jenn Finley

Published: Mar 25, 2021
Updated: May 16, 2024

Best Colleges and Universities in Delaware

University of Delaware

Most Popular Degree Programs: Computer Science, Mass Communication, Psychology

Delaware State University

Most Popular Degree Programs: Psychology, Human Resource Management, Kinesiology

Wilmington University

Most Popular Degree Programs: Business Administration, Education, Nursing

Wesley College

Most Popular Degree Programs: Nursing, Psychology, Social Work

Key Takeaways

Four schools in Delaware meet our criteria for the best colleges and universities in the state.
Students attending one of the top Delaware colleges will be taught by some of the most influential professors in the world.
Pursuing a degree at a public university in Delaware is one of the most affordable options for a higher education in the state.

Table of Contents

Colleges and Universities in Delaware

Our ranking of the best schools in Delaware contains four higher learning institutions that offer associate, bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees for both traditional and online students. Despite its small size, Delaware has excellent options among the brick-and-mortar and online colleges.

With two public schools and two private schools, Delaware excels in awarding degrees in fields such as mathematics, political science, criminal justice, and publishing. Prospective students can also choose from between affordable traditional courses and online degree programs at either the Delaware State University or the University of Delaware.

In-state students will pay roughly $8,000 for a year at Delaware State University and about $15,000 for tuition at the University of Delaware. Out of state students will pay more.

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The student body size of these schools is, however, vastly different. Just a little over 4,000 students attend Delaware State. By contrast, more than 22,000 on-campus and online students are currently taking courses at the University of Delaware.

Among private colleges in Delaware, Wilmington has the highest student population among private colleges at just under 10,000 students. Wilmington University is also the most affordable private college in Delaware at $12,000.

Residents who earn degrees in the medical or mental health fields have the opportunity to get state-sponsored financial aid through Delaware’s State Loan Repayment Program (SLRP). Applicants must agree to work in underserved areas of Delaware for two or three years and can receive up to $105,000.

Just above the nation’s average annual college tuition cost at $12,274, Delaware provides prospective students with an array of highly respected traditional and online degree programs. Discover more about Delaware’s colleges and universities.

What are Delaware’s Colleges & Universities?

Delaware’s Best Overall

How do we determine Delaware's best colleges and universities?

Methodology

The people affiliated with a school are ultimately what make it great! If you are serious about finding the best colleges and universities for a bachelor’s degree, you should be asking where the most influential professors are teaching and whether their graduates are themselves advancing the school’s reputation for academic excellence in their fields of study.

Most ranking sites rely on an opaque combination of reputation surveys and arbitrary performance metrics. Concentrated Influence provides a ranking that is freer from bias, insulated from manipulation, and reflective of real-world educational outcomes.

To rank the influence of schools, we first determine the influence of scholars and professionals based on the number of citations and publications they have had over the past 10 years. In addition to publications and citations, we consider the web links to and from these sources, and the page views of those sources. We then match the influential people to their alma maters and institutions of employment, so that their influence is attributed to those schools. Our machine-learning Influence Ranking algorithm produces a numerical score of academic achievements, merits, and citations across Wikipedia, wikidata, Crossref, Semantic Scholar and an ever-growing body of data. If you are interested in exploring how and why we rank by influence, explore our methodology in more depth.

We’ve identified 4 colleges and universities in Delaware that meet our criteria. This list of the top 30 colleges in Delaware below focuses on schools that offer bachelor’s degrees. The ranking features fully accredited public and private colleges and universities in Delaware.