Mechanical Engineering is of the hottest bachelor's degree programs in the United States, coming in as the #17 most popular major in the country. This means there are lots of options to choose from when you decide to get your degree.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 27 schools in California to determine which ones were the best for mechanical engineering students pursuing a bachelor's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 3,722 bachelor's degrees in mechanical engineering to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great Mechanical Engineering School for Your Bachelor's Degree
The me bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality me program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
A Great Overall School
A school that excels in educating for a particular major and degree level must be a great school overall as well. To make it into this list a school must rank well in our overall Best Colleges ranking. This ranking considered factors such as graduation rates, overall graduate earnings and other educational resources to identify great colleges and universities.
Early-Career Earnings
One measure we use to determine the quality of a school is to look at the average salary of bachelor's graduates during the early years of their career. That is, everyone wants their bachelor's degree to be worth something, and salaries are one measure of determining that.
Other Factors We Consider
In addition to the above, you should consider some of the following factors:
Major Focus - How many resources a school devotes to mechanical engineering students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - How many other mechanical engineering students want to attend this school to pursue a bachelor's degree.
Educational Resources - The amount of money and other resources allocated to students while they are pursuing their degree. These resources include such things as number of students per instructor and education expenditures per student.
Student Debt - How much debt mechanical engineering students go into to obtain their bachelor's degree and how well they are able to pay back that debt.
Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized mechanical engineering related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for mechanical engineering students working on their bachelor's degree.
Since picking the right college can be one of the most important decisions of your life, we've developed the Best Mechanical Engineering Bachelor's Degree Schools in California ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.
In addition to our rankings, you can take two colleges and compare them based on the criteria that matters most to you in our unique tool, College Combat.
Test it out when you get a chance! You may also want to bookmark the link and share it with others who are trying to make the college decision.
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It's hard to beat University of California - Berkeley if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering. UC Berkeley is a very large public university located in the city of Berkeley.
Bachelor's recipients from the mechanical engineering major at University of California - Berkeley get $15,606 above the typical college graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
It's difficult to beat University of California - Davis if you wish to pursue a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering. Located in the suburb of Davis, UC Davis is a public university with a very large student population.
Mechanical Engineering bachelor's degree recipients from University of California - Davis earn a boost of approximately $2,340 over the typical earnings of mechanical engineering majors.
Every student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering needs to look into University of California - Irvine. UC Irvine is a fairly large public university located in the city of Irvine.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the me program state that they receive average early career earnings of $67,633.
USC is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Los Angeles.
Bachelor's recipients from the mechanical engineering major at University of Southern California make $10,465 more than the average college graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
Located in the city of Los Angeles, UCLA is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Mechanical Engineering bachelor's degree recipients from University of California - Los Angeles earn a boost of around $6,125 over the average income of mechanical engineering graduates.
Located in the medium-sized city of Santa Clara, SCU is a private not-for-profit university with a moderately-sized student population.
Mechanical Engineering bachelor's degree recipients from Santa Clara University earn a boost of around $8,974 above the average income of mechanical engineering majors.
Located in the small suburb of San Luis Obispo, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo is a public university with a very large student population.
Those mechanical engineering students who get their bachelor's degree from California Polytechnic State University - San Luis Obispo receive $10,120 more than the standard me graduate.
The bars on the spread charts above show the distribution of the schools on this list +/- one standard deviation from the mean.
The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a branch of the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) serves as the core of the rest of our data about colleges.
Some other college data, including much of the graduate earnings data, comes from the U.S. Department of Education’s (College Scorecard).
The me bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality me program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
