2025 Best Urban & Regional Planning Master's Degree Schools
If you plan on getting your master's degree in
urban & regional planning, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #92 in the country in terms of popularity. So, you have a fair amount of options to choose from when looking for a school.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 34 schools in the United States to determine which ones were the best for urban & regional planning students pursuing a master's degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 1,266 master's degrees in urban & regional planning during the 2021-2022 academic year.
What's on this page: * Our Methodology
Choosing a Great Urban & Regional Planning School for Your Master's Degree
Your choice of urban & regional planning for getting your master's degree school matters. Important measures of a quality urban planning program can vary widely even among the top schools. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
Overall Quality Is a Must
The overall quality of a master's degree school is important to ensure a quality education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To account for this we include a school's overall Best Colleges for a Master's Degree ranking which itself looks at a host of various factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.
Average Early-Career Salaries
Average early-career salary of those graduating with their master's degree is one indicator we use in our analysis to find the schools that offer the highest-quality education. After all, your master's degree won't mean much if it doesn't help you find a job that will help you earn a living.
Other Factors We Consider
The metrics below are just some of the other metrics that we use to determine our rankings.
- Major Focus - How many resources a school devotes to urban & regional planning students as compared to other majors.
- Major Demand - How many other urban & regional planning students want to attend this school to pursue a master's degree.
- Educational Resources - How many resources are allocated to students. These resources may include educational expenditures per student, number of students per instructor, and graduation rate among other things.
- Student Debt - How easy is it for urban & regional planning to pay back their student loans after receiving their master's degree.
- Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized urban & regional planning related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for urban & regional planning students working on their master's degree.
More Ways to Rank Urban & Regional Planning Schools
Since picking the right college can be one of the most important decisions of your life, we've developed the Best Urban & Regional Planning Master's Degree Schools ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.
Best Schools for Master’s Students to Study Urban & Regional Planning in the United States
The following list ranks the best colleges and universities for pursuing a master's degree in urban & regional planning.
10 Top Schools for a Master's in Urban Planning
Every student pursuing a degree in a master's degree in urban & regional planning has to take a look at University of Southern California. Located in the large city of Los Angeles, USC is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
Master's students who receive their degree from the urban planning program earn about $63,583 in their early career salary.
More information about a master’s in urban & regional planning from University of Southern California
University of California - Los Angeles is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a master's degree in urban & regional planning. UCLA is a fairly large public university located in the city of Los Angeles.
Master's recipients from the urban & regional planning degree program at University of California - Los Angeles make $5,910 more than the typical graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
More information about a master’s in urban & regional planning from University of California - Los Angeles
It's difficult to beat Columbia University in the City of New York if you want to pursue a master's degree in urban & regional planning. Columbia is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the large city of New York.
Master's recipients from the urban & regional planning major at Columbia University in the City of New York make $8,680 above the typical college graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
More information about a master’s in urban & regional planning from Columbia University in the City of New York
University of Washington - Seattle Campus is a good choice for students interested in a master's degree in urban & regional planning. UW Seattle is a fairly large public university located in the city of Seattle.
Master's recipients from the urban & regional planning major at University of Washington - Seattle Campus earn $4,119 more than the average college grad in this field shortly after graduation.
More information about a master’s in urban & regional planning from University of Washington - Seattle Campus
University of Virginia is a fairly large public university located in the midsize suburb of Charlottesville.
Master's graduates who receive their degree from the urban planning program make around $58,018 in their early career salary.
More information about a master’s in urban & regional planning from University of Virginia - Main Campus
