The Ten Best Colleges and Universities in Illinois for 2024

Picking an institution for higher learning after high school is tough.

Graduating seniors spend hours considering this and that to find the perfect fit.

What if I told you, here in Illinois, there are so many good "fits" for high school grads that you'd think they're spoiled for choice?

That's because U.S. News & World Report just released their 2024 Best Colleges in America list and 17 different schools in Illinois made the list.

Trinity International University in Deerfield and National Louis University in Chicago were both ranked between #395 and #435 on the list and came in at 17th and 16th in Illinois.

Roosevelt University in Chicago was 390th and 15th in Illinois while Southern Illinois University Edwardsville was 332nd and 14th overall.

Aurora University was called 303rd best in America and 13th in the state while the University of St. Francis in Joliet and Southern Illinois University -- Carbondale tied both coming in at 280th and 11th finest schools in Illinois.

For schools 17-11, National Louis University was the cheapest while SIU-Edwardsville had the largest student population at 8,000 according to the report.

Here are the 10 best colleges and universities in Illinois:

10. Northern Illinois University in DeKalb (#269 overall)

9. Illinois State University in Normal (#209 overall)

8. Bradley University in Peoria (#185 overall)

7. DePaul University in Chicago (#151 overall)

6. Loyola University Chicago (#142 overall)

5. Illinois Institue of Technology in Chicago (#98 overall)

4. University of Illinois -- Chicago (#82 overall)

3. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (#35 overall)

2. University of Chicago (#12 overall)

1. Northwestern University in Evanston (#9 overall)

This shouldn't come as much of a surprise but the school on the list with the largest undergraduate enrollment is U of I in Champaign.

However, the most expensive school is Northwestern. They and the University of Chicago will run undergrad students about $65,000 per year for tuition and fees.