Each year, The Princeton Review aims to offer guidance for students as they search for their “best-fit” school. On August 27, 2024, The Princeton Review has launched the newest college rankings, ratings and student opinion narratives from the 2025 edition of The Best 390 Colleges. Some quick info nuggets about this year’s book:
- 15%: Percent of U.S. four-year colleges in the book / 263 are private, 127 are public
- 50: Categories of ranking lists in the book / each one names the 25 top colleges
- 168,000: Surveys of students tallied for the ranking lists / average: 430 students per school
Based on college students’ ratings of their schools, the company’s unique rankings name the top 25 colleges in 50 categories. Among them are: Great Financial Aid, Profs Get High Marks, Best Campus Food and Best Career Services.
Unlike rankings that focus on academics and that are based on institutional data and college administrators’ opinions of peer schools, The Princeton Review’s Best Colleges rankings are in multiple categories and based solely on the company’s surveys of students attending the schools in its annual Best Colleges book.
Some of The Princeton Review’s 50 categories of Best Colleges ranking lists and the #1 on them for 2025 are:
- Professors Get High Marks — Sarah Lawrence College (NY)
- Best Classroom Experience — Wellesley College (MA)
- Best-Run Colleges — High Point University (NC)
- Great Financial Aid — Skidmore College (NY)
- Best Career Services — Bentley University (MA)
- Best Student Support and Counseling Services — University of Richmond (VA)
- Best Health Services — University of Virginia
- Best Campus Food — University of Massachusetts—Amherst
- Best College Dorms — Bowdoin College (ME)
- Most Beautiful Campus — University of San Diego (CA)
- College City Gets High Marks — American University (DC)
- Most Politically Active Students — Claremont McKenna College (CA)
- Least Politically Active Students — State University of New York at Geneseo
- Most Conservative Students — Thomas Aquinas College (CA)
- Most Liberal Students — Mount Holyoke College (MA)
- Most Religious Students — Hillsdale College (MI)
- LGBTQ-Friendly — Reed College (OR)
- Lots of Greek Life — Bucknell University ¶
- Lots of Race/Class Interaction — Rice University (TX)
- Friendliest Students — Kansas State University
You can learn more about the specifics here: