Total Cost & Scholarships At P&Q’s Top-Ranked Business Schools

Of all the factors that go into choosing a business school, cost is often among the top. College is expensive even if many students don’t pay the actual sticker price thanks to scholarships and grants.

For our annual ranking of the country’s best undergraduate business schools, we collect data that, while not used in the ranking methodology, does offer important insights about the school environments. This includes tuition, fees, and other cost of attendance estimates for students entering the school during the most recent fall term. (For the few schools that did not submit these data points, we estimated the totals based on information found on their websites. For schools that provided this data, the figures represent estimates for the Fall 2024 intake, multiplied to get to an estimated total cost of the degree. If schools did not provide tuition and cost data, figures may represent Fall 2025 intake if they have updated their websites.)

Looking at tuition and fees alone, earning a business degree from a ranked program now costs more than $200,000 at 44 schools. That compares to just 32 schools for our 2024 ranking cycle, though we ranked 104 programs in 2025 and 91 in 2024.

Bucknell University’s Freeman College of Management (ranked 25th overall) reported highest total tuition/fees over the course of a four-year degree at $291,793. University of Southern California Marshall School of Business (ranked No. 3 overall) reported the second highest at $286,588.

The 10 most expensive undergraduate business degrees, based on four years of tuition and fees, are listed below.

BEST VALUE BUSINESS SCHOOLS RANKED BY P&Q

For the best value business degree, students should look at their in-state, public universities first. Tuition for in-state students is often magnitudes cheaper than for out-of-state students at schools that offer such discounts.

Take University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business which ranked No. 11 in our 2025 ranking. While non-resident students will pay $262,614 in tuition/fees over four years, students who have Michigan residency will pay just $84,966.

In fact, 45 public universities in our 2025 ranking (out of 104 total) offer significant savings for in-state students over four years. Savings range from $30,720 at the University of Akron’s College of Business for Ohio students to Michigan Ross’ $177,648 for Michigan students.

There are also several highly ranked universities who offer in-state cost breaks. These include No.2 ranked Cornell University’s Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management which costs $175,451 for in-state students compared to $259,493 for out-of-state as well as No. 4 University of Virginia’s McIntire School of Commerce which costs $96,316 in-state and $243,530 out.

Perhaps the best value for a quality business degree can be nabbed by students living in North Carolina. The Kenan-Flagler Business School at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is ranked No. 9 overall in our 2025 ranking, but in-state students will pay just under $36,000 on a four-year undergraduate degree (compared to $164,810 for out-of-state students). With estimated other expenses – including housing, food, transportation and more – the degree will cost just over $100K. It’s the lowest estimated cost of the Top 30 ranked schools on our ranking.

The table below shows the schools with the biggest savings for in-state students versus those coming from outside state borders. Totals are based on four years worth of tuition and fees.

NEXT PAGE: Total cost to attend a P&Q ranked business school over four years