College Azimuth

Research brief & institution hub

University of California-San Diego

CALarge public institution · Overall rank #1 nationally

Data snapshot Updated

Azimuth ranks UC San Diego #1 nationally among 1,467 four-year institutions.

Who it’s a good fit for

University of California-San Diego is a public university in La Jolla, California, where the degree mix is led by Biological Sciences, Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies, and Social Sciences. Mobility is among the highest we track, and most graduates are estimated to go into jobs rather than on to further study.

Graduates out-earn what predicts for students like them. The model attributes more of that gain to what it cannot explain than to the factors it measures—field of study, enrollment, and the local labor market.

Return is among the highest we track. Students who arrive with Pell Grants finish within a fraction of a point of the rate for the entering cohort as a whole.

Families at the bottom of the income scale pay well below the published cost, while those at the top pay closer to it. The admission rate is far below the median for comparable institutions.

A student drawn to the largest programs should know that the best-paid ones are not the largest.

UC San Diego at a glance

Admissions and outcomes

Admission rate[1]
26.7%
Six-year completion[2]
86.1%
Four-year earnings[3]
$83,130

Cost and family borrowing

Average annual net price · $48–75K family income[6]
$9,942
Median student debt[4]
$15,500
Median Parent PLUS debt[7]
$24,257

UC San Diego rankings: how Azimuth assesses value[5]

University of California-San Diego is a public university in La Jolla, California, enrolling 34,948 undergraduates. Its composite standing is near the very top of the Azimuth ranking among nonprofit four-year institutions (99th percentile).

The shape is a selective public campus where mobility is the strongest and affordability the weakest, with access and return sitting between them. The university admits 26.7% of applicants, a rate well below the 78.1% median for comparable institutions of the same type and size.

Of students who start full time, 94.0% return for a second year and 86.1% finish within six years. Both figures run above the peer medians of 83.1% and 65.0%.

An estimated 34.0% of entrants arrive as transfers or part-time students. Mobility sits at the 99th percentile, access at the 97th, and return at the 93rd.

Affordability is the weakest of the four, at the 90th percentile. The pillars are tightly grouped near the top of the ranking, with no wide gap separating the strongest from the weakest.

Azimuth evaluates the University of California-San Diego across four pillars among nonprofit four-year institutions. The university's strongest pillar is mobility, where it ranks in the 99th percentile.

Access follows at the 97th percentile, and the return pillar sits at the 93rd percentile. Affordability, the weakest pillar, lands at the 90th percentile, still well above the national median.

34.2% of undergraduates receive Pell Grants. Those students complete at 85.5%, 0.6 percentage points below the rate for the entering cohort as a whole.

Azimuth ranks the university #43 for access among nonprofit four-year institutions. Azimuth ranks the university #1 for mobility among nonprofit four-year institutions. Graduates earn about $24,112 more than the model expects for similar students.

How value-added outcomes are assessed · How to interpret program rankings

UC San Diego rankings in context
GeographyRank
National#1
California#1
West#1

Azimuth overall value rankings within each geographic comparison group.

National pillar percentiles

Economic mobility
National percentile: 99
Access & reach
National percentile: 97
Affordability
National percentile: 90
Return on investment
National percentile: 93

Top-ranked majors

  1. Biological/Biosystems Engineering#1
  2. English Language and Literature/Letters, Other#1
  3. Biomathematics, Bioinformatics, and Computational Biology#1

This school’s three highest-ranked programs nationally. Each rank compares bachelor’s programs in the same field; field sizes differ.

Explore major rankings

01 / UC San Diego briefing

UC San Diego cost & financial aid[6][7]

The published cost of attendance at University of California-San Diego is $38,701. In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, the university reported in-state tuition of $14,202 and required fees of $3,789 for the 2026-27 academic year; out-of-state tuition was $53,472.

On-campus food and housing added $20,443. After grants and scholarships, the average net price for aid recipients is $12,470, which is $3,164 below the $15,634 median for comparable institutions (same type and size).

Financial aid reduces the published cost by $26,231 on average. Azimuth ranks the university #136 for affordability among nonprofit four-year institutions.

The University of California-San Diego publishes a cost of attendance of $38,701. For families earning under $30,000, the average net price is $7,525; for the $48,001–$75,000 band it is $9,942; and for families earning over $110,000 it is $28,785.

The spread between the lowest and highest bands is $21,260. Azimuth ranks the university #136 for affordability among nonprofit four-year institutions.

Aid covers about 68% of the published cost for the average aid recipient, an offset of $26,231. The across all aid recipients is $12,470, which is below the median of $15,634 for comparable institutions (same type and size) by $3,164.

The median federal student loan debt at completion is $15,500, with about 74.1% of federal aid recipients borrowing. That median is below the peer median of $20,076 by $4,576.

Median Parent PLUS borrowing stands at $24,257. The median federal student debt corresponds to an estimated payment of $176 a month if repaid over ten years.

Your family income

Choose a household income range to see estimated net price.

Reported average annual net price · $48–75K$9,942

After grants and scholarships. Your aid offer may differ.

Averages within each income band; individual aid packages vary.

Borrowing and repayment at UC San Diego

At University of California-San Diego, 74.1% of federal aid recipients rely on federal loans. For borrowers who complete, the median federal debt at completion stands at $15,500.

The gap to comparable institutions (same type and size) is $4,576, with the university's median below the peer figure of $20,076. For parent borrowers, the median Parent PLUS debt is $24,257; this figure covers a separate parent-borrower population.

The University of California-San Diego combines earnings that run well ahead of its peers with debt that stays below them. Graduates earn about $24,112 more than the model expects for similar students, an outcome in the 98th percentile among nonprofit four-year institutions.

The median earnings figure four years after completion is $83,130, which lands in the 91st percentile nationally. Earnings scenarios based on the university's program mix show a typical earnings level of $83,130, with a downside scenario of $56,810 and an upside scenario of $128,687.

On the borrowing side, the median federal student debt at completion is $15,500, which is below the $20,076 median for comparable institutions (same type and size). The estimated monthly payment if repaid over ten years is $176.

Median Parent PLUS borrowing, a separate parent-borrower population, is $24,257. The estimated monthly student payment if repaid over ten years is $176.

How Financial GPS measures payment burden · The four risk-and-reward zones

Financial GPS

What does repayment look like?

Institution median student debt
$15,500
Institution Parent PLUS debt
$24,257

Federal loans only; private or institutional loans aren’t included.

Estimated student payment · monthly
$176/mo
Estimated Parent PLUS payment · monthly
$308/mo

Payments use school-wide median balances, not a specific major’s.

Payment assumptions

Payments are 10-year standard payments on the median balance, before loan fees, used as a yardstick. Rates for newly issued loans may differ, and loans made after July 1, 2026 can repay over a longer term; existing loans keep their original fixed rates.

Explore your own numbers in Financial GPS
Read the full cost & aid brief

02 / UC San Diego briefing

UC San Diego career outcomes & earnings[3][8][9]

University of California-San Diego reports median earnings of $83,130 four years after completion. That institution-wide figure is a starting point; results for particular fields can differ.

Read earnings alongside retention and completion. Earnings among completers do not include every student who entered the institution, while the lower and higher planning estimates describe modeled mixes of program outcomes rather than observed salary percentiles.

What explains value-added earnings?
Program & institutional factors The part attributed to observed institutional characteristics.
+$9,785
Unexplained remainder What remains after the model’s observed factors.
+$14,327
Total modeled value added The modeled difference from expected earnings.
+$24,112

These are statistical model components, not proven causal effects; the remainder is not a direct measure of teaching quality.

Read the full outcomes brief

03 / UC San Diego briefing

UC San Diego acceptance rate & admissions[1][10][11]

University of California-San Diego admitted 26.7% of applicants, well below the median of 78.1% for comparable institutions (same type and size).

Admissions
Admission rate
26.7%
Read the full admissions brief

04 / UC San Diego briefing

What are the largest majors at UC San Diego?[12]

The largest program records at University of California-San Diego, by reported degrees awarded, are: Cell/Cellular Biology and Anatomical Sciences (769 awards); Cognitive Science (759 awards); Computer Science (591 awards); International/Globalization Studies (537 awards); Economics (430 awards). These counts describe degree output in the source reporting period, not current enrollment or unique people.

Among those larger programs, reported median earnings four years after completion include Cognitive Science at $81,160; Computer Science at $159,487; International/Globalization Studies at $81,174. Program size and earnings answer different questions; the largest program need not have the highest earnings.

Keep individual program records separate from broader degree categories and from records for other reporting periods. Those views can describe different parts of the university’s academic mix.

Four-year earnings · six largest reported fields
Cell/Cellular Biology and Anatomical Sciences 769 degrees awarded
Too few graduates to report
Cognitive Science 759 degrees awarded
$81,160
Computer Science 591 degrees awarded
$159,487
International/Globalization Studies 537 degrees awarded
$81,174
Economics 430 degrees awarded
$87,307
Political Science and Government 366 degrees awarded
$67,713

Fields selected by reported completions. Counts describe credentials awarded, not unique students or the earnings sample. Bars show median four-year earnings.

Read the full majors brief

05 / UC San Diego briefing

How does UC San Diego serve students from different backgrounds?

Azimuth ranks University of California-San Diego #1 for mobility among nonprofit four-year institutions. That places the pillar in the 99th percentile.

The six-year graduation rate for the first-time full-time cohort is 86.1%, while Pell recipients complete at a rate of 85.5%, a figure that sits below the overall rate by 0.6 percentage points. Graduates earn about $24,112 more than the model expects for similar students, a result that lands in the 98th percentile nationally.

Azimuth places the access pillar of University of California-San Diego in the 97th percentile among nonprofit four-year institutions. The public university admits 26.7% of applicants, well below the 78.1% peer median, and enrolls 34,948 undergraduates.

Pell Grant recipients account for 34.2% of the undergraduate body, and an estimated 34.0% of undergraduates arrive as transfers or part-time students.

06 / UC San Diego briefing

What colleges are similar to UC San Diego?[15]

The comparisons for University of California-San Diego cover higher reported admission rates, similar admissions profiles, lower reported cost with similar earnings and options in the same state or region. The similar-schools brief keeps these questions in separate groups, with related institutional profiles shown as another comparison.

Each group has its own candidate list and ordering. A high position within one group is not a rank against all the schools in the other groups, and a school can appear more than once for different reasons. Check the source definition and earnings period for the comparison you choose.

A shortlist for different decisions

Choose a row to compare the figures with UC San Diego.

Admissions peerUniversity of California-Irvine28.6% admitted
Comparison with UC San Diego
MeasureUC San DiegoUniversity of California-Irvine
Peer earnings · 4 years$83,130$74,438-$8,692 vs UC San Diego
Average annual net price$12,470$14,251+$1,781 vs UC San Diego · higher cost
Admission rate26.7%28.6%
Explore University of California-Irvine →
Higher-admission alternativeConcordia University-Irvine66.0% admitted
Comparison with UC San Diego
MeasureUC San DiegoConcordia University-Irvine
Peer earnings · 4 years$83,130$83,064-$66 vs UC San Diego
Average annual net price$12,470$28,115+$15,645 vs UC San Diego · higher cost
Admission rate26.7%66.0%
Nearby alternativeUniversity of California-IrvineNearby option · CA
Comparison with UC San Diego
MeasureUC San DiegoUniversity of California-Irvine
Peer earnings · 4 years$83,130$74,438-$8,692 vs UC San Diego
Average annual net price$12,470$14,251+$1,781 vs UC San Diego · higher cost
Admission rate26.7%28.6%
Explore University of California-Irvine →
Lower-cost alternativeCUNY Bernard M Baruch College$3,033 average net price
Comparison with UC San Diego
MeasureUC San DiegoCUNY Bernard M Baruch College
Peer earnings · 4 years$83,130$82,748-$382 vs UC San Diego
Average annual net price$12,470$3,033-$9,437 vs UC San Diego · lower cost
Admission rate26.7%47.5%
Explore CUNY Bernard M Baruch College →
Similar profileUniversity of California-Los AngelesMatched across several measures
Comparison with UC San Diego
MeasureUC San DiegoUniversity of California-Los Angeles
Peer earnings · 4 years$83,130$77,677-$5,453 vs UC San Diego
Average annual net price$12,470$12,548+$78 vs UC San Diego · higher cost
Admission rate26.7%9.0%
Explore University of California-Los Angeles →

Each school is the first-ranked match in its category, not a recommendation across every measure. The same college may lead more than one category. Figures use the matching snapshot; earnings reflect the matched four-year cohort. — means unavailable.

Read the full similar schools brief

Data scope & methodology

Structured payloads generated Governed hub narrative Governed spoke corpus

Four-year earnings describe cohorts of completers. Figures for other horizons describe different cohorts and are not joined into a career-growth projection.

Azimuth's overall rank and pillar percentiles come from the school profile. Absolute pillar ranks, city, enrollment and official-site links are shown only when structured data supplies them.

Detailed earnings, cost, admissions and program values come from the endpoint responsible for each measure. Missing values are not replaced with zero. Value-added estimates are model associations, not causal effects.

Figures are refreshed with each data release, at most a quarter apart. The underlying source dates can be earlier than the release.

Explanatory text is AI-assisted drafting checked against those figures; it is not an additional data source.

Analysis and methodology by Daniel Rogers, founder of College Azimuth.

Read the ranking methodology, data definitions and limitations · About College Azimuth

Read the analysis behind value-added earnings and the change to four-year graduate earnings. These articles are published on collegeazimuth.com.

Data notes & source fields

Scorecard field codes identify the underlying measure; Azimuth-derived values are labeled separately. Snapshot dates are not measurement years. Source populations and reporting periods differ across measures. Field definitions are in the U.S. Department of Education · College Scorecard documentation; notes with a different source link it below.

  1. Admission rate. Reported applicants admitted; not a transfer-specific or individual admission probability.

    Source fields: ADM_RATE

  2. Six-year completion. First-time, full-time students completing at the institution within 150% of normal time, typically six years for a bachelor’s degree.

    Source fields: C150_4

  3. Four-year institutional earnings. Median earnings of graduates in the reported cohort who are working and not enrolled, four years after completion.

    Source fields: MD_EARN_WNE_4YR

  4. Median federal student debt. Federal student-loan debt among completers in the reported borrowing cohort. Excludes Parent PLUS and is not total debt across all students.

    Source fields: GRAD_DEBT_MDN

  5. National, regional and state ranks; pillar percentiles; major ranks. Derived scores within the stated eligible comparison set, not raw Scorecard fields. Major ranks compare institutions within a field; their denominators differ.

    Source fields: Azimuth rankings

    College Azimuth · Ranking methodology

  6. Annual net price by family income. Average annual cost after grants and scholarships for the eligible first-time, full-time aid-recipient cohort. Public-school figures reflect in-state tuition. Includes living costs; these are averages, not medians or individual offers.

    Source fields: NPT4_PUB/PRIV; NPT41_PUB/PRIV through NPT45_PUB/PRIV

  7. Parent PLUS debt, payments and GPS illustration. Stored payments use Financial GPS loan and repayment assumptions. The adjustable spectrum applies the published framework to annual student payments divided by earnings minus an expense allowance; its initial allowance uses the frozen 2024 framework baseline. It is an illustration rather than a school rating. Parent PLUS uses the completer median where available, otherwise the all-borrower median; these describe different borrowing populations.

    Source fields: PLUS_DEBT_ALL_COMP_MD; fallback PLUS_DEBT_ALL_MD; Azimuth Financial GPS calculations

    College Azimuth · Financial GPS methodology

  8. Downside and upside earnings; yellow band. The band spans the modeled lower and higher scenarios. It is not the P25–P75 interval for individual graduates. The median marker is the separately reported institutional median.

    Source fields: Azimuth modeled program-mix scenarios

    College Azimuth · Earnings scenario methodology

  9. Value added and its components. Observed-factor attribution plus the unexplained remainder equals total modeled value added. These are associations, not proven causal effects; the remainder is not a direct measure of teaching quality.

    Source fields: Azimuth statistical model

    College Azimuth · Value-added methodology

  10. SAT score range and reported midpoint. Reported scores of enrolled score-submitters, not admission cutoffs. The midpoint field is not necessarily the middle of the displayed range.

    Source fields: SATVR25 + SATMT25; SATVR75 + SATMT75; SAT_AVG

  11. First-year retention. Retention of the reported full-time cohort at four-year institutions.

    Source fields: RET_FT4

  12. Program earnings, completion counts and major-mix dots. Included bachelor’s programs have at least five reported completions. Counts are aggregated credentials, not unique people or an earnings sample. Major-mix dots group those counts by field of study; excluded programs are not zero activity.

    Source fields: EARN_MDN_4YR; IPEDSCOUNT1; CIPCODE

    College Scorecard · Field-of-study technical documentation

  13. Pell recipients. Share of undergraduates receiving a Pell Grant in the reported academic year.

    Source fields: PCTPELL

  14. Entering students outside the first-time, full-time group. This is not an observed transfer-in rate. It includes part-time entrants and other entering-student attendance patterns.

    Source fields: 1 − PFTFTUG1_EF

  15. Peer earnings and signed differences. Differences are peer minus this school, from the same matching snapshot. A positive earnings difference does not mean the peer is better on every measure.

    Source fields: Azimuth peer model using MD_EARN_WNE_4YR

    College Azimuth · Comparison methodology

How to interpret program rankings