A total of 51 US universities appear in the Global University Employability Ranking 2023-24, designed by the HR consultancy Emerging and published exclusively by Times Higher Education. The ranking reveals which universities recruiters at top companies think are the best at preparing students for the workplace.
The top 10 includes many of the usual suspects – Harvard University, the California Institute of Technology and Stanford University – but also New York University, which is not always found at the top of university rankings.
Tuition fees at US colleges vary widely, particularly for international students, so value for money arguably depends on both the cost of tuition and the likelihood that graduates will succeed in their future careers.
A number of state universities in the US, such as the University of California, Berkeley, which generally have lower tuition fees, do particularly well when evaluated by employers.
According to the Caltech website, a high percentage of graduates go straight into the workforce. Many of these students have been recruited on campus.
The Career Development Center at the university provides networking sessions and twice-annual careers fairs to assist students in finding jobs. Some 150 recruiters from various fields are present at each fair.
Graduates of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have helped to develop some of the most innovative technologies of today, such as 3D printing and bionic prostheses.
Among MIT’s alumni are 89 Nobel laureates, 58 National Medal of Science winners and 48 MacArthur fellows.
Stanford University is located in Pasadena, California, right next to the world-renowned Silicon Valley.
In total, companies founded by Stanford affiliates and alumni generate more than $2.7 trillion (£21.5 trillion) in annual revenues, which would be the 10th-largest economy in the world. These firms include Google, Nike, Netflix, Hewlett-Packard, Sun Microsystems, Instagram and Charles Schwab.
Stanford alumni have also founded non-profit organisations such as Kiva and SIRUM.
Click each institution to view its full World University Rankings 2024 results
| US Employability rank 2023-24 | Employability rank 2023-24 | Employability rank 2022-23 | University | State |
| 1 | 1 | 2 | California Institute of Technology | California |
| 2 | 2 | 1 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology | Massachusetts |
| 3 | 3 | 5 | Stanford University | California |
| 4 | 5 | 3 | Harvard University | Massachusetts |
| 5 | 6 | 9 | Princeton University | New Jersey |
| 6 | 10 | 10 | Yale University | Connecticut |
| 7 | 16 | 13 | Columbia University | New York |
| 8 | 17 | 17 | New York University | New York |
| 9 | 20 | 21 | University of California, Berkeley | California |
| 10 | 25 | 22 | Boston University | Massachusetts |
| 11 | 26 | 24 | Carnegie Mellon University | Pennsylvania |
| 12 | 30 | 26 | Duke University | North Carolina |
| 13 | 34 | 34 | Arizona State University (Tempe) | Arizona |
| 14 | 42 | 38 | Johns Hopkins University | Maryland |
| 15 | 49 | 90 | The University of Chicago | Illinois |
| 16 | 54 | 46 | Georgia Institute of Technology | Georgia |
| 17 | 60 | 74 | Dartmouth College | New Hampshire |
| 18 | 77 | 76 | Florida Institute of Technology | Florida |
| 19 | 78 | 83 | Brown University | Rhode Island |
| 20 | 82 | 80 | University of California, Los Angeles | California |
| 21 | 84 | 77 | Cornell University | New York |
| 22 | 107 | 100 | Tufts University | Massachusetts |
| 23 | 109 | 110 | Rice University | Texas |
| 24 | 115 | 115 | Texas A&M University | Texas |
| 25 | 121 | 121 | University of Pennsylvania | Pennsylvania |
| 26 | 126 | 143 | Boston College | Massachusetts |
| 27 | 138 | 134 | Northwestern University | Illinois |
| 28 | 145 | 130 | Michigan State University | Michigan |
| 29 | 149 | 148 | Northeastern University | Illinois |
| 30 | 151 | 145 | University of Michigan-Ann Arbor | |
| 31 | 153 | 150 | Georgetown University | Washington DC |
| 32 | 157 | 176 | University of California, San Francisco | California |
| 33 | 163 | 166 | University of Southern California | California |
| 34 | 168 | 171 | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | North Carolina |
| 35 | 172 | 194 | Emory University | Georgia |
| 36 | 174 | 188 | University of California, San Diego | California |
| 37 | 176 | 186 | Babson College | Massachusetts |
| 38 | 179 | 167 | University of Florida | Florida |
| 39 | 182 | 174 | Purdue University West Lafayette | Indiana |
| 40 | 183 | 181 | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign | Illinois |
| 41 | 188 | 177 | Rutgers University | New Jersey |
| 42 | 194 | 193 | Penn State University (Main campus) | Pennsylvania |
| 43 | 196 | 189 | George Washington University | Washington DC |
| 44 | 197 | 197 | Case Western Reserve University | Ohio |
| 45 | 201 | 195 | University of Georgia | Georgia |
| 46 | 202 | 203 | Vanderbilt University | Tennessee |
| 47 | 224 | 229 | University of Notre Dame | Indiana |
| 48 | 228 | NR | Washington University in St Louis | Washington |
| 49 | 239 | NR | University of Massachusetts Amherst | Massachusetts |
| 50 | 243 | 211 | Brandeis University | Massachusetts |
| 51 | 246 | NR | Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute | New Jersey |