The University of Michigan is once again recognized as a top destination for graduate education in the nation, according to the 2026 edition of U.S. News & World Report’s Best Graduate Schools released April 7.

Each year, U.S. News ranks professional school programs in six areas: education, engineering, law, business, medicine and nursing.

It also periodically ranks programs in the sciences, social sciences and humanities, health and other areas. Not all U-M schools and colleges receive a U.S. News & World Report ranking each year.  

U-M schools and colleges included in the top-15 overall rankings for 2026 are:

• LSA’s Ph.D. programs in statistics at No. 6, mathematics at No. 10, earth sciences at No. 11, and chemistry at No. 14.
• The Marsal Family School of Education at No. 2.
• The College of Pharmacy at No. 3.
• The School of Public Health at No. 4, and its biostatistics Ph.D. program at No. 4.
• The Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at No. 5.  
• The School of Nursing’s Doctor of Nursing Practice program at No. 4, and its master’s degree program at No. 6.
• The Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design Master of Fine Arts program at No. 11
• The College of Engineering at No. 12, and computer science at No. 11.
• The Stephen M. Ross School of Business Master of Accounting Program at No. 6, Executive MBA program at No. 13, the Weekend MBA Program at No. 6 and the Full-time MBA program at No. 13.

UM-Dearborn and UM-Flint also received rankings for their part-time MBA programs, 126 and 133, respectively.

The rankings are based on expert opinions about program excellence and statistical indicators that measure the quality of a school’s faculty, research and students. 

In addition to the overall program rankings, U-M received rankings in several specialty areas. The specialties that received rankings this year are:

Business (full-time MBA): management (12), accounting (6), project management (3), marketing (11), production operations (6), international (11), non-profit (7), supply chain (8), entrepreneurship (7), executive MBA (13), finance (13), information systems (18) and analytics (9). 

Computer science: artificial intelligence (11), programming language (17), systems (9) and theory (16). UM-Dearborn ranked 151 overall best computer science doctoral program.

Education: higher education administration (1), secondary teacher education (2), education psychology (1), curriculum and instruction (4), elementary teacher education (3), educational administration (8) and education policy (5).

Engineering: nuclear (1), industrial (2), environmental (2), aerospace (5), mechanical (6), civil (4), electrical (5), computer (7), biomedical (6), chemical (9) and materials (7).

Nursing: midwifery (5), Master’s Nurse Practitioner – family (4), Doctor of Nursing Practice – adult gerontology/acute care (6) and Doctor of Nursing Practice – family (7). 

Public affairs/policy: social policy (2), public policy analysis (1), health policy (3), environmental policy (4), global policy (11) and urban policy (19).

Public health: biostatistics (3), health policy and management (4), social behavior (4), epidemiology (5), environmental health science (6) and healthcare management (4).

Health school specialties: clinical psychology (10).

In addition to the rankings noted above, UM-Flint ranked No. 125 in occupational therapy, No. 87 in physical therapy, and No. 60 in nursing anesthesia.

U-M’s law and medical schools no longer participate in the U.S. News & World Report graduate rankings, however, both schools remain ranked by U.S. News in the 2026 edition.

Since new rankings for 2026 were not released for all programs, the following retain their rankings from prior years:

• The School of Social Work at No. 1.
• The School of Information’s library and information studies program at No. 5.
• Social Sciences & Humanities Doctoral Programs:
  • Economics at No. 12.
  • English at No. 8.
  • History at No. 6.
  • Political Science at No. 5.
  • Psychology at No. 3.
  • Sociology at No. 1.