Which State Has the Most Colleges (2023 Edition)

The United States comprises 50 states with different histories, characters, Cultures, and educational systems and institutions. Different state approaches education differently.

Thousands of Colleges and universities are present in the different states of the United States and comprise both public and private colleges. U.S. students attend public and private universities and colleges, but which state comprises most colleges? 

• Curious to know about the exact number of colleges in the US? Read our stats here.

To know more about the number of colleges in different states of the United States, go through the statistical data provided in this article. 

Key Findings: 

Before diving deep into the article, here are some of the key findings you can glance through. 

1. There are over 6.270 colleges and institutes in the US, among which 1,990 are public colleges, and 4,281 are private colleges.
2. California in the United States has the most number of schools, with 658 schools, out of which 171 are Public, and 487 are private. 
3. Having 4,360 higher education institutions in the United States, 1,582 are two-year colleges, and 2,832 are four-year colleges. 
4. The states with the lowest number of university and college students are Hawaii, with 23, Nevada, with 38; and Alaska, with 9. (Insurify)
5. As of 2021, the most educated region in the United States was Washington, DC. (USAFacts)
6. States like California, Florida, Arizona, and Colorado have the highest enrollment for college students.
7. Harvard University in Massachusetts has a US rank of 1 and a world university rank of 2 for the year 2023. 
8. The total student population in the US in 2023 is around 18,887,557.
9. The college with the lowest acceptance rate (61.81%) is Rhode Island. 
10. Wyoming is the highest acceptance rate of 96.78%.

Colleges In Different States Of The U.S.

Based on the data from NCES from 2019-2020, the below table demonstrates the number of colleges on the basis of institution type and duration in different states of the United States. 

9. California, New York, Texas, and Pennsylvania are the states having the most colleges and Universities.

Let’s have a look at the detailed data on the states with the most colleges in the United States.

State	Total Number Of Colleges	Private	Public	Four-Year	Two-Year
California	416	265	151	262	154
New York	299	220	79	234	65
Texas	244	135	109	148	96
Pennsylvania	218	155	63	155	63
Florida	176	133	43	128	48
Ohio	162	102	60	113	49
Illinois	156	96	60	98	58
Georgia	113	63	50	71	42
Virginia	111	70	41	71	40
Massachusetts	107	77	30	88	19
Michigan	92	46	46	62	30
Missouri	97	70	27	75	22
Washington	74	31	43	63	11
Indiana	74	58	16	60	14
Alabama	62	24	38	36	26

Source: NCES. 

Number Of Colleges In The United States By State.

To know the number of schools or colleges in different states of the United States, refer to the table provided below.

The following data demonstrates six states with the highest number of schools and six states with the lowest number of schools in the United States, along with their acceptance rates and graduation rates for the year 2023. 

States	Number of Schools	Public	Private	Acceptance Rate.	SAT score	Graduation Rate.
California	658	171	487	65.58%	1,274	54.96%
New York	418	116	359	68.99%	1,232	54.77%
Texas	410	119	334	75.63%	1,106	43.87%
Florida	385	97	331	72.19%	1,131	55.82%
Pennsylvania	307	127	262	74.05%	1,173	61.74%
Ohio	285	109	200	73.02%	1,135	50.94%
Hawaii	23	11	16	86.64%	1,141	45.06%
District of Columbia	26	2	24	63.25%	1,277	63.54%
Rhode Island	24	3	21	61.87%	1,265	71%
Delaware	23	7	16	73.01%	1,248	49.33%
Vermont	22	7	15	70.85%	1,279	57.54%
Wyoming	10	8	2	96.78%	–	45.67%
Alaska	10	6	4	71.51%	1,235	37.50%

Source: UNIVSTATS. 

States With Higher Education Institutions For The Academic Year 2020-2021. 

Along with having the most number of colleges by state, California has the highest number of educational institutions. 

To know the number of four-year and two-year colleges in different States of the United States, Go through the data provided below. 

11. California has the highest number of colleges, with 247 four-year colleges and 137 two-year colleges. 

States	Number Of Four-Year Colleges	A Number Of Two-Year Colleges.
California	247	137
New York	225	58
Texas	135	83
Pennsylvania	129	58
Florida	125	38
Ohio	107	48
Illinois	95	57
Massachusetts	88	19
Wyoming	1	8
Alaska	6	2
Delaware	7	1
Idaho	9	5
Hawaii	10	7
Rhode Island	12	1
Montana	12	11
Nevada	13	7

Source: Statista. 

States With Top-Ranked Universities. 

All higher education institutions have strengths and weaknesses, and taking the rankings into consideration helps in the selection of the top-notch University or college. 

12. California, in the U.S., has the maximum number of top-ranked Universities like Stanford University, California Institute of Technology, University of California Berkeley, etc.

To determine the states with top-ranked universities or colleges, check out the following data. 

State	City	University	US Rank 2023	World University Rank 2023.
Massachusetts	Cambridge	Harvard University	1	2
California	Stanford	Stanford University	2	3
Massachusetts	Cambridge	Massachusetts Institute of Technology	3	5
California	Pasadena	California Institute of Technology.	4	6
New Jersey	Princeton	Princeton University	5	7
California	Berkeley	University of California, Berkeley	6	8
Connecticut	New Haven	Yale University	7	9
New York	City of New York	Columbia University	8	11
Illinois	Chicago	The University of Chicago	9	13
Pennsylvania	Philadelphia	University of Pennsylvania	10	14

Source: Times Higher Education. 

States With The Highest College Enrollments. 

13. Alaska has 19,394 college enrollments, whereas the college enrollment in Connecticut was demonstrated to be 167,120.

To determine the college enrollments for states with the highest college enrollments in the U.S., here is the enrollment data provided below.  (2022)

State	College Enrollment
California	2,722,983
Texas	2,307,592
Florida	2,245,613
New York	2,062,381
Pennsylvania	1,322,334
Ohio	1,270,130
Michigan	1,239,047
North Carolina	1,192,976
Georgia	1,178,364
Illinois	1,155,542

14. The number of college students in the United States has been growing steadily for many years. In Fall 2022, there were over 17 million students enrolled in college, up from just over 10 million in Fall 1990.

15. Public institutions enrolled more students (14.1 million) than private nonprofits and for-profits combined (5.6 million total) in 2020.

Most Educated States. 

Education is crucial as it helps boost the country’s economic growth, promotes peace and gender equality, and ends poverty. 

Over the past decades, the rate of individuals receiving an education has been on an upward trend as more people are graduating and pursuing education from top-notch Universities and colleges. 

To get an insight into the top most educated States in the U.S., scroll down to the below table. 

Rank	State	% of Adults with Bachlor’s Degree or Higher
1	Massachusetts	44.5%
2	Colorado	41.6%
3	Maryland	40.9%
4	New Jersey	40.7%
5	Connecticut	40%
6	Vermont	39.7%
7	Virginia	39.5%
8	New Hampshire	37.6%
9	New York	37.5%
10	Minnesota	37.4%

According to the US news and world report, below are the top 10 most educated states in the United States for the year 2021. 

15. The graduation rate of Colorado (39.3%) is slightly less as compared to that of Massachusetts (66.4%) in the United States. 

Source: US news. 

Related Read:

• Admission Statistics
• Interview Statistics
• College Student Statistics
• Average College Professor Salary
• Community College Statistics

Conclusion: State With The Most Colleges (2023)

As it can be clearly demonstrated, there are thousands of Universities and colleges in different states of the United States, so if you are in the process of exploring colleges or universities, you have many options to check out. 

Go through the above article to get an insight into the highest Univesity population in the States of United States. 

Let us know your thoughts on the article in the comments section below. 

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