2024 Best Computer Engineering Master's Degree Schools

Computer Engineering is above average in terms of popularity with it being the #39 most popular master's degree program in the country. As a result, there are many college that offer the degree, making your choice of school a hard one.

College Factual looked at 108 colleges and universities when compiling its 2024 Best Computer Engineering Master's Degree Schools ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 5,020 master's degrees in computer engineering during the 2020-2021 academic year.

What's on this page: * Our Methodology

• Best Master’s Degree Schools List

Choosing a Great Computer Engineering School for Your Master's Degree

Your choice of computer engineering for getting your master's degree school matters. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.

A Great Overall School

The overall quality of a master's degree school is important to ensure a good education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To take this into account we include a college's overall Best Colleges for a Master's Degree ranking which itself looks at a collection of different factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.

Early-Career Earnings

One measure we use to determine the quality of a school is to look at the average salary of master's graduates during the early years of their career. That is, everyone wants their master's degree to be worth something, and salaries are one measure of determining that.

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 computer engineering students as compared to other majors.
• Major Demand - How many other computer engineering 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 much debt computer engineering students go into to obtain their master's degree and how well they are able to pay back that debt.
• Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized computer engineering related body.

Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for computer engineering students working on their master's degree.

More Ways to Rank Computer Engineering Schools

The ce school you choose to invest your time and money in matters. To help you make the decision that is right for you, we've developed a number of major-specific rankings, including this list of the Best Computer Engineering Master's Degree Schools.

Best Schools for Master’s Students to Study Computer Engineering in the United States

The following list ranks the best colleges and universities for pursuing a master's degree in computer engineering. Only those schools that rank in the top 15% of all the schools we analyze get awarded with a place on this list.

16 Top Schools for a Master's in CE

1

Santa Clara University
Santa Clara, CA

168 Annual Graduates

$125,788 Median Starting Salary

It's hard to beat Santa Clara University if you wish to pursue a master's degree in computer engineering. SCU is a medium-sized private not-for-profit university located in the city of Santa Clara.

Computer Engineering master's degree recipients from Santa Clara University get an earnings boost of approximately $26,837 above the average earnings of computer engineering graduates.

More information about a master’s in computer engineering from Santa Clara University

2

Harvard University
Cambridge, MA

90 Annual Graduates

$137,302 Median Starting Salary

Harvard University is one of the finest schools in the country for getting a master's degree in computer engineering. Located in the midsize city of Cambridge, Harvard is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population.

Those computer engineering students who get their master's degree from Harvard University earn $38,351 more than the standard ce student.

More information about a master’s in computer engineering from Harvard University

3

University of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA

49 Annual Graduates

It's hard to beat University of Southern California if you want to pursue a master's degree in computer engineering. Located in the large city of Los Angeles, USC is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from University of Southern California

4

Duke University
Durham, NC

19 Annual Graduates

Duke University is a wonderful option for students pursuing a master's degree in computer engineering. Duke is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the large city of Durham.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from Duke University

5

Northwestern University
Evanston, IL

43 Annual Graduates

Located in the small city of Evanston, Northwestern is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from Northwestern University

6

Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA

140 Annual Graduates

Carnegie Mellon is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the large city of Pittsburgh.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from Carnegie Mellon University

7

University of Michigan - Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor, MI

123 Annual Graduates

$123,561 Median Starting Salary

Located in the city of Ann Arbor, U-M is a public university with a very large student population.

Computer Engineering master's degree recipients from University of Michigan - Ann Arbor earn a boost of approximately $24,610 over the typical income of computer engineering majors.

More information about a master’s in computer engineering from University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

8

San Jose State University
San Jose, CA

511 Annual Graduates

$124,052 Median Starting Salary

Located in the city of San Jose, San Jose State is a public university with a fairly large student population.

Those computer engineering students who get their master's degree from San Jose State University make $25,101 more than the average ce grad.

More information about a master’s in computer engineering from San Jose State University

9

Washington University in St Louis
Saint Louis, MO

12 Annual Graduates

WUSTL is a large private not-for-profit university located in the large suburb of Saint Louis.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from Washington University in St Louis

10

Northeastern University
Boston, MA

619 Annual Graduates

Located in the large city of Boston, Northeastern is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from Northeastern University

11

University of California - San Diego
La Jolla, CA

82 Annual Graduates

$122,641 Median Starting Salary

Located in the large city of La Jolla, UCSD is a public university with a very large student population.

Computer Engineering master's degree recipients from University of California - San Diego earn a boost of around $23,690 above the typical income of computer engineering graduates.

More information about a master’s in computer engineering from University of California - San Diego

12

University of California - Irvine
Irvine, CA

87 Annual Graduates

Located in the large city of Irvine, UC Irvine is a public university with a very large student population.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from University of California - Irvine

13

University of Virginia - Main Campus
Charlottesville, VA

15 Annual Graduates

Located in the suburb of Charlottesville, University of Virginia is a public university with a very large student population.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from University of Virginia - Main Campus

14

New York University
New York, NY

329 Annual Graduates

NYU is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the city of New York.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from New York University

15

University of Notre Dame
Notre Dame, IN

17 Annual Graduates

Notre Dame is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the suburb of Notre Dame.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from University of Notre Dame

16

Columbia University in the City of New York
New York, NY

16 Annual Graduates

Columbia is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the city of New York.More information about a master’s in computer engineering from Columbia University in the City of New York

Honorable Mentions

These are some additional schools worth mentioning that are also great but just didn't quite make the cut to earn our top Best Computer Engineering Master's Degree Schools award.

Rank	College	Location
16	University of California - Los Angeles	Los Angeles, CA
17	Case Western Reserve University	Cleveland, OH
18	Southern Methodist University	Dallas, TX
19	North Carolina State University	Raleigh, NC
20	Stevens Institute of Technology	Hoboken, NJ
21	Iowa State University	Ames, IA
22	Virginia Tech	Blacksburg, VA
23	Texas A&M University - College Station	College Station, TX
24	Tufts University	Medford, MA
25	Villanova University	Villanova, PA

Computer Engineering by Region

View the Best Computer Engineering Master's Degree Schools for a specific region near you.

Region
Southeast
New England
Rocky Mountains
Plains States
Middle Atlantic
Far Western US
Southwest
Other U.S. Territories
Great Lakes

View All Rankings >

Rankings in Majors Related to CE

One of 41 majors within the Engineering area of study, Computer Engineering has other similar majors worth exploring.

CE Focus Areas

Major	Annual Graduates
General Computer Engineering	2,742
Software Engineering	2,180
Computer Hardware Engineering	50
Other Computer Engineering	48

Majors Similar to CE

Related Major	Annual Graduates
Electrical Engineering	8,658
Mechanical Engineering	7,218
Civil Engineering	4,884
Biomedical Engineering	3,089
General Engineering	2,969
Industrial Engineering	2,483
Systems Engineering	2,186
Aerospace & Aeronautical Engineering	1,880
Chemical Engineering	1,558
Other Engineering	1,409

Notes and References

• The bars on the spread charts above show the distribution of the schools on this list +/- one standard deviation from the mean.
• The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a branch of the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) serves as the core of the rest of our data about colleges.
• Some other college data, including much of the graduate earnings data, comes from the U.S. Department of Education’s (College Scorecard). More about our data sources and methodologies.