2025 Best Design & Applied Arts Bachelor's Degree Schools in Alabama

If you pursue a bachelor's degree in design & applied arts, you won't be alone. The field of study is the #27 most popular program in the country. This makes choosing the right school a hard decision.

In 2025, College Factual analyzed 4 schools in order to identify the top ones for its Best Design & Applied Arts Bachelor's Degree Schools in Alabama ranking. Combined, these schools handed out 221 bachelor's degrees in design & applied arts to qualified students.

What's on this page: * Our Methodology

• Best Bachelor’s Degree Schools List

Choosing a Great Design & Applied Arts School for Your Bachelor's Degree

Your choice of design & applied arts for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. Important measures of a quality design program can vary widely even among the top schools. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:

Quality Overall Is Important

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

Average Earnings

To determine the overall quality of a graduate school, one factor we look at is the average early-career salary of those receiving their bachelor's degree from the school. This is because one of the main reasons people pursue their bachelor's degree is to enable themselves to find better-paying positions.

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 design & applied arts students as compared to other majors.
• Major Demand - How many other design & applied arts students want to attend this school to pursue a bachelor'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 design & applied arts students go into to obtain their bachelor'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 design & applied arts related body.

Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for design & applied arts students working on their bachelor's degree.

One Size Does Not Fit All

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 Design & Applied Arts Bachelor's Degree Schools in Alabama list to help you make the college decision.

In addition to College Factual's rankings, you may want to take a look at College Combat, our unique tool that lets you pit your favorite schools head-to-head and compare how they rate on factors that most interest you. When you have some time, check it out - you may want to bookmark the link so you don't forget it.

Best Schools for Bachelor’s Students to Study Design & Applied Arts in Alabama

Below you'll see a list of the best colleges and universities for pursuing a bachelor's degree in design & applied arts.

Top Alabama Schools for a Bachelor's in Design

1

Auburn University
Auburn, AL

116 Annual Graduates

$46,585 Median Starting Salary

$74,308 Median Student Debt

Every student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in design & applied arts needs to take a look at Auburn University. Located in the small city of Auburn, Auburn is a public university with a very large student population.

Design & Applied Arts bachelor's degree recipients from Auburn University earn a boost of approximately $2,544 above the average income of design & applied arts majors.

More information about a bachelor’s in design & applied arts from Auburn University

2

Samford University
Birmingham, AL

33 Annual Graduates

$41,323 Median Starting Salary

Every student pursuing a degree in a bachelor's degree in design & applied arts needs to take a look at Samford University. Samford is a moderately-sized private not-for-profit university located in the large suburb of Birmingham.

Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the design program make an average of $41,323 in the first couple years of their career.

More information about a bachelor’s in design & applied arts from Samford University

3

The University of Alabama
Tuscaloosa, AL

43 Annual Graduates

$44,215 Median Starting Salary

The University of Alabama is a wonderful option for students pursuing a bachelor's degree in design & applied arts. Located in the medium-sized city of Tuscaloosa, UA is a public university with a fairly large student population.

Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the design program report average early career wages of $44,215.

More information about a bachelor’s in design & applied arts from The University of Alabama

4

Troy University
Troy, AL

26 Annual Graduates

It is hard to beat Troy University if you wish to pursue a bachelor's degree in design & applied arts. Located in the town of Troy, TROY is a public university with a fairly large student population.More information about a bachelor’s in design & applied arts from Troy University

Best Design & Applied Arts Colleges in the Southeast Region

Explore all the Best Design & Applied Arts Schools in the Southeast Area or other specific states within that region.

State	Colleges	Degrees Awarded
Florida	225	707
Georgia	224	1,028
Tennessee	220	208
North Carolina	213	529
Virginia	213	635
South Carolina	195	224
Kentucky	187	64
Louisiana	171	50
Mississippi	169	25
Arkansas	167	216
West Virginia	147	106

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Rankings in Majors Related to Design

One of 10 majors within the Visual & Performing Arts area of study, Design & Applied Arts has other similar majors worth exploring.

Design Focus Areas

Major	Annual Graduates
Interior Design	91
Visual Communications	49
Graphic Design	39
Industrial Design	37
Other Design & Applied Arts	3
Game & Interactive Media Design	2

Most Popular Related Majors

Related Major	Annual Graduates
Fine & Studio Arts	317
Music	262
Drama & Theater Arts	176
Dance	53
Arts & Media Management	27
Film, Video & Photographic Arts	8
General Visual & Performing Arts	2

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.