π Six destinations Β· official data only
Where should you study β and what can anyone actually tell you?
Every country publishes different things about its universities. Some publish what you'll pay, some what you'll earn, some almost nothing. This page shows you both β the facts, and the gaps.
Why we don't give you one combined ranking
You'll see league tables that rank countries on βgraduate salaryβ. They shouldn't. The US measures earnings ten years after you enrol; the UK five years after you graduate; Singapore your gross monthly pay six months out. Those are three different questions in three different currencies. Converting them into one score would look authoritative and be misleading β so every figure below keeps its own definition attached, and we never rank them against each other.
The six destinations
United States
1,596 four-year colleges
- What it costs
- $19,859/yrmedian net price after grant aid, across colleges β the only country here that publishes what families actually pay
- What graduates earn
- $54,869/yrmedian earnings 10 years after entering, across colleges
- If you're coming from overseas
- $21,114/yrmedian out-of-state tuition at public colleges β the closest published proxy for what an international student pays
- Entry system
- GPA + SAT/ACT, essays, recommendations
- Typical degree
- 4 years
The gap: Sticker price varies enormously; net price depends heavily on family income.
Find your United States matches βUnited Kingdom
165 universities
- What it costs
- Not published as open data
- What graduates earn
- Β£29,439/yrmedian earnings 5 years after graduating, across universities
- If you're coming from overseas
- 88%median share of graduates in work or further study, 15 months out
- Entry system
- UCAS tariff points (A-levels, BTEC, Highers, IB)
- Typical degree
- 3 years (4 in Scotland)
The gap: Tuition fees are not open data β they sit behind a paid UCAS licence, so we can't show what any course costs.
Find your United Kingdom matches βAustralia
52 universities & university colleges
- What it costs
- Not published as open data
- What graduates earn
- Not published as open data
- If you're coming from overseas
- 52 of 52CRICOS-registered, meaning legally able to enrol international students β in Australia's case, all of them
- Entry system
- ATAR rank
- Typical degree
- 3 years (4 with honours)
The gap: ATAR cut-offs, fees and graduate earnings exist in Course Seeker and ComparED but are copyrighted with no open licence, so we link to them rather than reproduce them.
Explore Australia βNetherlands
49 research universities & universities of applied sciences
- What it costs
- Not published as open data
- What graduates earn
- Not published as open data
- If you're coming from overseas
- 686 programmesconfirmed taught in English, out of 2,943 β the strongest English-taught offering of any non-anglophone country here
- Entry system
- VWO/HAVO diploma or equivalent; numerus fixus on some courses
- Typical degree
- 3 years (wo bachelor), 4 years (hbo)
The gap: Tuition and entry data sit in the Studiekeuzedatabase, which is free but requires an application whose terms would require publishing our ranking algorithm.
Explore Netherlands βSingapore
6 autonomous universities
- What it costs
- Not published as open data
- What graduates earn
- S$3,911/monthmedian gross starting salary six months after graduating β published per DEGREE, the finest granularity of any country here
- If you're coming from overseas
- 91%median employment rate six months after graduating, across degrees
- Entry system
- Indicative Grade Profile, set per university
- Typical degree
- 3β4 years
The gap: No central entry requirements or fees β each university sets and publishes its own.
Explore Singapore βNew Zealand
26 universities, polytechnics & wΔnanga
- What it costs
- Not published as open data
- What graduates earn
- Not published as open data
- If you're coming from overseas
- 14%of all tertiary students are international (48,195 people) β 8 universities in total
- Entry system
- NCEA rank score, set per university
- Typical degree
- 3 years
The gap: No open tuition or entry-score data; NCEA rank scores are set course by course.
Explore New Zealand βSpain
91 universities
- What it costs
- Not published as open data
- What graduates earn
- Not published as open data
- If you're coming from overseas
- 10,861 programmesacross 91 universities and 1,729,577 students β enrolment per degree shows which courses are established and which are tiny
- Entry system
- EvAU/PAU exam score and nota de corte, set per degree
- Typical degree
- 4 years (grado)
The gap: Spain does publish tuition prices and graduate employment through SIIU, and notas de corte region by region β we haven't wired those in yet.
Explore Spain βStart from what matters to you
Knowing what it costs
Only the US publishes what students actually pay after aid. Everywhere else, fees are set institution by institution and aren't open data β you'll need to check each university's own pages.
Graduate earnings
The US, UK and Singapore all publish earnings β but they measure different things over different timeframes, so compare each against its own national average rather than against each other.
Studying in English
The US, UK, Australia, Singapore and New Zealand teach in English by default. The Netherlands is the outlier worth knowing about: hundreds of degrees are taught entirely in English.
Breadth of choice
If you want the widest range of institutions and programmes to pick from, scale matters β and the US is an order of magnitude larger than anywhere else here.
Planning to study abroad?
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