Engineering

What Is Engineering?

Engineering refers to the application of scientific principles for practical purposes including architecture, machinery, electricity, infrastructure, and much more. Engineering is an extremely diverse discipline and its applications touch on virtually every aspect of our lives from the cars we drive and the houses we inhabit to the smartphones in our hands and the appliances in our kitchens. The engineering discipline is composed of numerous concentrations in areas like mechanical engineering, computer engineering, nuclear engineering, and more, which means a degree in engineering can lead to a wide range of well-paying career opportunities.

The Best Colleges and Universities for Engineering Degrees

We rank universities and colleges from around the world based on the scholarly work of their faculty and alumni. These colleges and universities are making the biggest impact on the engineering discipline today.

To view the entire list of top engineering schools, including schools offering online degrees and a breakdown of the best engineering colleges and universities in your state, visit our look at the Best Colleges and Universities for Engineering Degrees.

Earning a degree in electrical or computer engineering can lead to a versatile and future-proof career. Engineering jobs have a projected growth rate of at least 7% between 2020 and 2030, and is either complimentary to the rise of automation, or represents functions that can only be performed by human beings.

Our guide to college majors and programs can help students nail down what to study in college. Our roundup of some of the most popular college majors is a central place to explore all college subjects.

For a dynamic, real-time listing of the most influential engineering schools in the world, use our Custom College Ranking.

Engineering Degrees

What Will I Study as an Engineering Major?

Your concentration will determine many of the courses you’ll take as an engineering major. Likewise, you will be required to take a number of requisite courses on foundational topics such as calculus and differential equations. However, you will also have the chance to dive into a specific dimension of engineering by exploring courses within one of the engineering field’s many subdisciplines. Common Engineering courses include Engineering Principles; Mathematical Operations; Linear circuits; Surveying Principles; Calculus; Physics; Differential Equations; Industrial Systems; Mechanics, Electricity, and Magnetism.

What Can I Do With a Degree in Engineering

Majoring in engineering can put you on the path toward a wide range of roles in architecture, mechanics, automotive, aerospace, computer science, healthcare, and so much more. Bear in mind that if you wish to become a Professional Engineer (PE), you must earn a bachelor’s degree from a school accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET), pass the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) examination, and amass at least four years of engineering work experience. This makes the engineering major a necessary step on your way to a career as an engineer. However, the skills and knowledge you’ll gain as an engineering student will also be highly transferable to a wide range of other industries and roles.

How To Get a Degree in Engineering

• Find out How to Major in Engineering
• Find out what you can do with a Master’s Degree in Engineering

Who are the top engineering influencers in history?

The following are the top engineering influencers in history (1800-2020) according to our machine-powered Influence Rankings, which are drawn from a numerical score of academic achievements, merits, and citations across Wikipedia/data, Crossref, and an ever-growing body of data. It is noteworthy that many of the most influential figures in the early history of modern engineering are most widely recognized for their contributions to the field of architecture.

1. Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator who designed more than 1,000 structures over a career that spanned 70 years.
2. Le Corbusier was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture.
3. Walter Gropius was a German architect and founder of the Bauhaus School who is widely regarded as one of the pioneering masters of modernist architecture.
4. Henry Ford was an American industrialist, business magnate, and founder of the Ford Motor Company, as well as the chief innovator behind the assembly line technique of mass production.
5. John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American physicist, computer scientist, engineer, polymath, and the foremost mathematician of his time.
6. Thomas Edison has been described as America’s greatest inventor for his work in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures.
7. Philip Johnson was an American architect best known for his works of modern and postmodern architecture, such as the famous Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut.
8. Frank Gehry is a Canadian-born American architect and designer whose works in contemporary architecture have earned him recognition as “the most important architect of our age.”
9. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was a German architect who is regarded as one of the pioneers of modernist architecture.
10. Isambard Kingdom Brunel was an English civil engineer who is considered “one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history” for his groundbreaking designs in British dockyards, the Great Western Railway, and numerous steamships, bridges, and tunnels.

Now that you have a bird’s eye view of some of the most influential engineers of all time, explore these pioneers and others in more depth

Who are the top engineering influencers today?

The following are the top Engineering influencers in the field today according to our machine-powered Influence Rankings, which are drawn from a numerical score of academic achievements, merits, and citations across Wikipedia/data, Crossref, and an ever-growing body of data.

1. Bin He is a biomedical engineering scientist, head of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University and Editor-in-Chief of the IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering.
2. Leo Rafael Reif is the current president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, an electrical engineer, and a pioneer in the field of micro and nanotechnologies.
3. Robert Samuel Langer, Jr. is an Institute Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a faculty member of the Harvard-MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology and the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, as well as a chemical engineer, inventor and entrepreneur.
4. Karen Bausman is the only American woman to hold both distinguished design chairs as the Eero Saarinen Chair at Yale University’s School of Architecture and the Eliot Noyes Chair at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University.
5. Chris Toumazou is Chief Scientist of the Institute of Biomedical Engineering and Professor of Circuit Design at Imperial College London, Founder of Toumaz Holdings, Ltd., Chief Scientific Advisor to GENEU, Co-founder of DNAnudge, Executive chairman and Founder of DNA Electronics Ltd, and Imperial College London’s first Regius Professor of Engineering.
6. Dawn Bonfield currently holds the titles of Royal Academy of Engineering Visiting Professor of Inclusive Engineering at Aston University, as well as Director of Engineering Equality Diversity and Inclusion at Aston University, and is widely known in engineering and beyond as an advocate of diversity and inclusion in STEM fields.
7. John Perkins is a retired engineering scientist, academic, and government adviser with particular expertise in process systems engineering.
8. Moshe Kam is Dean of the Newark College of Engineering at the New Jersey Institute of Technology and an engineering educator whose work has focused on decision fusion and distributed detection.
9. Subra Suresh is a Distinguished University Professor and President of Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, a biological engineer and materials scientist whose book, Fatigue of Materials, has been cited over 5,000 times.
10. Ravi V. Bellamkonda is the Vinik Dean of Engineering and professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Duke University and is a well-known biomedical engineer, who has focused on the use of biomaterials to repair spinal nerves, improve neural interfaces and therapeutically improve brain tumors.

Learn about other top Engineering influencers.

Interviews with Top Thinkers in Engineering

• Bin He discusses mind control, flying drones, and noninvasive brain-computer interfaces in our interview, How brain-computer interfaces will alter our interactions with reality.
• Dr. Robert Langer discusses Moderna and COVID-19, mRNA vaccines, and biotech companies in our interview, How new mRNA vaccine technology battles COVID-19.
• Dr. Matthew Tirrell discusses nanoparticles, atherosclerosis, and the importance of explaining difficult concepts well in our interview, How to use engineering to address heart disease.
• Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell discusses women in STEM in our interview, How to be a pioneering woman in STEM.

Engineering Controversial Topics

Because engineering touches on so many dimensions of human life, it necessarily invokes controversy. We often disagree on how to apply technology, how to place ethical limitations on the use of technology, and how technology should or shouldn’t be leveraged to face humanity’s biggest challenges. Read on for a look at the top controversies in the engineering discipline today.

• Nuclear Energy
• Vaccines
• Hacking
• Artificial Intelligence
• Climate Change

Feature Topics in Engineering

Engineering is a dynamic field where new findings, achievements and innovations continue to have a profound impact on the real world. Our features emphasize the individuals and innovations driving the engineering discipline forward today.

• Highly Influential Women in Engineering
• Top Women in STEM