Half of America's 10 best undergraduate business schools are public universities

Five public universities made the top 10 of U.S. News & World Report's 2027 undergraduate business rankings, with the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School at No. 1.

Wharton scored 4.8 out of 5 in the ranking's peer assessment. MIT's Sloan School of Management, which shared first place with Wharton last year, slipped to No. 2 with 4.7., according to the report released last week.

The University of California, Berkeley's Haas School of Business held No. 3 with 4.6. New York University's Stern School of Business rose one place to share No. 4 with the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business, both at 4.5.

Five schools tie at No. 6 with 4.3. They are Carnegie Mellon University's Tepper School, Cornell University's Dyson School, Indiana University Bloomington's Kelley School, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Kenan-Flagler Business School and the University of Texas at Austin's McCombs School.

Cornell, Indiana and UNC each climbed two places from No. 8. The University of Southern California's Marshall School of Business, which shared No. 8 last year, fell to No. 11.

At the five public universities, in-state tuition and fees for 2026-27 range from $9,359 at UNC to $20,082 at Michigan, according to U.S. News figures. Out-of-state students pay from $42,703 at Indiana to $69,447 at Michigan.

The five private universities charge between $67,140 at MIT and $74,970 at Cornell. New York residents at Cornell's Dyson School pay less because it sits in one of the university's state-supported colleges.

These are university-wide rates, and business majors can pay more. Michigan charges out-of-state juniors and seniors at Ross $38,165 per semester this academic year, according to the university's tuition schedule.

University-wide SAT ranges also vary widely, from 1520-1580 at MIT to 1200-1410 at Indiana.

Huntsman Hall, the Wharton School's main building. Photo by WestCoastivieS

The ranking is based entirely on a reputation survey. In spring and summer 2026, U.S. News asked deans and senior faculty at business programs accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business to rate programs they knew on a scale from 1, marginal, to 5, outstanding.

U.S. News received 443 responses from 1,073 surveys, a 41.3% response rate, down from 49.9% a year earlier. Because so many programs receive identical scores, 96 of the top 100 share a rank with at least one other school. Only Wharton, Sloan, Haas and Marshall hold a position alone.

Wharton also leads the specialty rankings in finance, management and marketing, and places in the top five in 10 of the 13 specialties. Babson College, tied for No. 39 overall, again ranks first in entrepreneurship, ahead of MIT, Berkeley, Michigan and Wharton.

The business list is separate from U.S. News' overall Best Colleges ranking, released the same day, in which MIT ended Princeton's 15-year run at No. 1. That ranking added a measure of graduates' earnings by major this year; the business list did not.

It is also distinct from the MBA ranking U.S. News published in April, which placed Stanford first and Wharton second.

The biggest climber in the business top 100 was Rutgers Business School in New Brunswick, which rose 38 places from No. 77 to a tie at No. 39.