Ranked #117 in popularity, film & video production is one of the most sought-after degree programs in the nation. This means there are lots of options to choose from when you decide to get your degree.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 115 schools in the United States to determine which ones were the best for film & video production students pursuing a degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 8,361 degrees in film & video production annually.
The cinematography program you select can have a big impact on your future. That's why we developed our collection of Best Schools for Film & Video Production rankings. In order to come up with a best overall ranking for film & video production schools, we combine our degree-level rankings, weighting them by the number of degrees awarded at each level.
You may want to choose one of the degree levels below to find the schools of most interest to you.
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 Film & Video Production Schools list to help you make the college decision.
If you'd like to restrict your choices to just one part of the country, you can filter this list by location.
In addition to our rankings, you can take two colleges and compare them based on the criteria that matters most to you in our unique tool, College Combat.
Test it out when you get a chance! You may also want to bookmark the link and share it with others who are trying to make the college decision.
Best Schools for Film & Video Production in the United States
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 cinematography degrees they offer, see the list below. Only those schools that rank in the top 20% of all the schools we analyze get awarded with a place on this list.
Any student who is interested in film & video production has to take a look at University of Southern California. USC is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Los Angeles. A Best Colleges rank of #13 out of 2,152 colleges nationwide means USC is a great university overall.
There were roughly 211 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at USC in the most recent year we have data available.
New York University is a great decision for students interested in a degree in film & video production. Located in the city of New York, NYU is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population. A Best Colleges rank of #16 out of 2,152 colleges nationwide means NYU is a great university overall.
There were roughly 415 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at NYU in the most recent year we have data available.
Any student pursuing a degree in film & video production needs to take a look at Chapman University. Chapman is a moderately-sized private not-for-profit university located in the city of Orange. This university ranks 24th out of 161 schools for overall quality in the state of California.
There were approximately 292 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Chapman in the most recent data year.
Any student who is interested in film & video production needs to take a look at Washington University in St Louis. Located in the suburb of Saint Louis, WUSTL is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population. A Best Colleges rank of #21 out of 2,152 colleges nationwide means WUSTL is a great university overall.
There were about 5 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at WUSTL in the most recent data year.
Ithaca is a small private not-for-profit college located in the suburb of Ithaca. This college ranks 23rd out of 136 colleges for overall quality in the state of New York.
There were about 73 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Ithaca in the most recent data year.
Located in the large city of Philadelphia, Temple is a public university with a very large student population. A Best Colleges rank of #97 out of 2,152 colleges nationwide means Temple is a great university overall.
There were roughly 166 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Temple in the most recent year we have data available.
Located in the city of Chicago, Columbia is a private not-for-profit college with a medium-sized student population. This college ranks 9th out of 85 colleges for overall quality in the state of Illinois.
There were roughly 111 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Columbia in the most recent data year.
Located in the large city of Boston, Emerson is a private not-for-profit college with a moderately-sized student population. A Best Colleges rank of #127 out of 2,152 schools nationwide means Emerson is a great college overall.
There were roughly 359 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Emerson in the most recent data year.
The American University is a large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Washington. A Best Colleges rank of #61 out of 2,152 colleges nationwide means The American University is a great university overall.
There were approximately 24 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at The American University in the most recent year we have data available.
Syracuse is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the medium-sized city of Syracuse. A Best Colleges rank of #62 out of 2,152 schools nationwide means Syracuse is a great university overall.
There were about 46 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Syracuse in the most recent year we have data available.
RIT is a large private not-for-profit school located in the large suburb of Rochester. This school ranks 13th out of 136 colleges for overall quality in the state of New York.
There were approximately 69 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at RIT in the most recent data year.
Located in the large city of Riverside, UCR is a public university with a fairly large student population. This university ranks 28th out of 161 colleges for overall quality in the state of California.
There were roughly 108 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at UCR in the most recent year we have data available.
Located in the large city of New York, FIT SUNY is a public school with a medium-sized student population. A Best Colleges rank of #32 out of 2,152 schools nationwide means FIT SUNY is a great school overall.
There were approximately 14 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at FIT SUNY in the most recent year we have data available.
Located in the large city of New York, Columbia is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population. A Best Colleges rank of #15 out of 2,152 schools nationwide means Columbia is a great university overall.
There were roughly 78 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Columbia in the most recent data year.
Located in the city of Chicago, DePaul is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population. This university ranks 7th out of 85 schools for overall quality in the state of Illinois.
There were approximately 198 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at DePaul in the most recent data year.
Located in the large suburb of Dallas, SMU is a private not-for-profit university with a large student population. This university ranks 5th out of 115 colleges for overall quality in the state of Texas.
There were about 21 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at SMU in the most recent year we have data available.
Loyola Marymount is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the large city of Los Angeles. This university ranks 29th out of 161 colleges for overall quality in the state of California.
There were about 109 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Loyola Marymount in the most recent data year.
Located in the large city of Philadelphia, Drexel is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population. A Best Colleges rank of #115 out of 2,152 colleges nationwide means Drexel is a great university overall.
There were approximately 34 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Drexel in the most recent data year.
Located in the city of Boston, Massachusetts College of Art and Design is a public college with a small student population.
There were about 38 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Massachusetts College of Art and Design in the most recent data year.
Purchase College is a small public college located in the large suburb of Purchase. This college ranks 53rd out of 136 schools for overall quality in the state of New York.
There were about 21 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Purchase College in the most recent data year.
Located in the large city of San Francisco, Academy of Art University is a private for-profit university with a medium-sized student population. This university ranks 47th out of 161 colleges for overall quality in the state of California.
There were approximately 64 film & video production students who graduated with this degree at Academy of Art University 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).
The cinematography program you select can have a big impact on your future. That's why we developed our collection of Best Schools for Film & Video Production rankings. In order to come up with a best overall ranking for film & video production schools, we combine our degree-level rankings, weighting them by the number of degrees awarded at each level.
