2025 Best Mechanical Engineering Doctor's Degree Schools in New York

Ranked #17 in popularity, mechanical engineering is one of the most sought-after doctor's degree programs in the nation. 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 5 schools in New York to determine which ones were the best for mechanical engineering students pursuing a doctor's degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 111 doctor's degrees in mechanical engineering during the 2022-2023 academic year.

What's on this page: * Our Methodology

• Best Doctor’s Degree Schools List

Choosing a Great Mechanical Engineering School for Your Doctor's Degree

Your choice of mechanical engineering for getting your doctor's degree school matters. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. 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 take this into account we consider a school's overall Best Colleges for a Doctor's Degree ranking which itself looks at a host of different factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.

Early-Career Earnings

One measure we use to determine the quality of a school is to look at the average salary of doctorate graduates during the early years of their career. This is because one of the main reasons people pursue their doctor's degree is to enable themselves to find better-paying positions.

Other Factors We Consider

The metrics below are just some of the other metrics that we use to determine our rankings.

• Major Focus - How much a school focuses on mechanical engineering students vs. other majors.
• Major Demand - How many other mechanical engineering students want to attend this school to pursue a doctor's degree.
• Educational Resources - How many resources are allocated to students. These resources may include educational expenditures per student, number of students per instructor, and graduation rate among other things.
• Student Debt - How much debt mechanical engineering students go into to obtain their doctor'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 full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for mechanical engineering students working on their doctor's degree.

More Ways to Rank Mechanical Engineering Schools

Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best Mechanical Engineering Doctor's Degree Schools in New York list, to help you choose the best school for you.

Best Schools for Doctorate Students to Study Mechanical Engineering in New York

The following list ranks the best colleges and universities for pursuing a doctor's degree in mechanical engineering.

Top New York Schools for a Doctorate in ME

1

Cornell University
Ithaca, NY

23 Annual Graduates

Cornell University is a wonderful decision for individuals pursuing a doctor's degree in mechanical engineering. Located in the small city of Ithaca, Cornell is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.More information about a doctorate in mechanical engineering from Cornell University

2

Columbia University in the City of New York
New York, NY

18 Annual Graduates

Any student pursuing a degree in a doctor's degree in mechanical engineering has to check out Columbia University in the City of New York. Columbia is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the large city of New York.More information about a doctorate in mechanical engineering from Columbia University in the City of New York

3

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Troy, NY

11 Annual Graduates

Every student who is interested in a doctor's degree in mechanical engineering has to look into Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Located in the small city of Troy, RPI is a private not-for-profit school with a medium-sized student population.More information about a doctorate in mechanical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

4

University at Buffalo
Buffalo, NY

13 Annual Graduates

Any student who is interested in a doctor's degree in mechanical engineering needs to take a look at University at Buffalo. University at Buffalo is a fairly large public university located in the large suburb of Buffalo.More information about a doctorate in mechanical engineering from University at Buffalo

5

Syracuse University
Syracuse, NY

10 Annual Graduates

Located in the city of Syracuse, Syracuse is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.More information about a doctorate in mechanical engineering from Syracuse University

Best Mechanical Engineering Colleges in the Middle Atlantic Region

Explore all the Best Mechanical Engineering Schools in the Middle Atlantic Area or other specific states within that region.

State	Colleges	Degrees Awarded
Pennsylvania	176	83
Maryland	119	47
New Jersey	115	33
District of Columbia	81	10
Delaware	53	5

View All Rankings >

Mechanical Engineering Related Rankings by Major

One of 41 majors within the Engineering area of study, Mechanical Engineering has other similar majors worth exploring.

ME Focus Areas

Major	Annual Graduates
General Mechanical Engineering	111

Majors Similar to ME

Related Major	Annual Graduates
Electrical Engineering	135
Biomedical Engineering	91
Chemical Engineering	79
Civil Engineering	67
Materials Engineering	33
Industrial Engineering	27
Operations Research	27
Aerospace & Aeronautical Engineering	15
Engineering Physics	12
Environmental Engineering	12

Notes and References

• 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).
• Credit for the banner image above goes to Michel Villeneuve. More about our data sources and methodologies.