If you plan on majoring in physics, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #68 in the country in terms of popularity. So, you have a fair amount of options to choose from when looking for a school.
College Factual looked at 3 colleges and universities when compiling its 2025 Best Physics Schools in Iowa ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 128 degrees in physics annually.
The physics program you select can have a big impact on your future. That's why we developed our collection of Best Schools for Physics rankings. In order to come up with a best overall ranking for physics schools, we combine our degree-level rankings, weighting them by the number of degrees awarded at each level.
In order to find the schools that are the best fit for you, you may want to filter to one of the degree levels below.
When choosing the right school for you, it's important to arm yourself with all the facts you can. To that end, we've created a number of major-specific rankings, including this Best Physics Schools in Iowa list to help you make the college decision.
More interested in schools in a specific area of the country? Filter this list by region or state.
To further help you make the college decision, we've developed a unique tool called College Combat that allows you to compare schools based on the factors that matter the most to you.
Go ahead and give it a try, or bookmark the link so you can check it out later.
If you aren't interested in a particular degree level and want to know which schools are the overall best at delivering an education for the physics degrees they offer, see the list below.
Iowa State University is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a degree in physics. Iowa State is a fairly large public university located in the small city of Ames. This university ranks 2nd out of 37 schools for overall quality in the state of Iowa.
There were about 31 physics students who graduated with this degree at Iowa State in the most recent year we have data available.
University of Iowa is one of the best schools in the United States for getting a degree in physics. Located in the small city of Iowa City, Iowa is a public university with a very large student population. A Best Colleges rank of #80 out of 2,152 schools nationwide means Iowa is a great university overall.
There were about 32 physics students who graduated with this degree at Iowa in the most recent data year.
It is hard to beat University of Northern Iowa if you want to pursue a degree in physics. UNI is a medium-sized public university located in the small city of Cedar Falls. This university ranks 3rd out of 37 colleges for overall quality in the state of Iowa.
There were approximately 8 physics students who graduated with this degree at UNI in the most recent data year.
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).
Credit for the banner image above goes to A. T. Service.
The physics program you select can have a big impact on your future. That's why we developed our collection of Best Schools for Physics rankings. In order to come up with a best overall ranking for physics schools, we combine our degree-level rankings, weighting them by the number of degrees awarded at each level.
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