Ranked #36 in popularity, chemistry is one of the most sought-after bachelor's degree programs in the nation. This makes choosing the right school a hard decision.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 24 schools in California to determine which ones were the best for chemistry students pursuing a bachelor's degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 1,686 bachelor's degrees in chemistry during the 2022-2023 academic year.
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Choosing a Great Chemistry School for Your Bachelor's Degree
The chemistry bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
Quality Overall Is Important
The overall quality of a bachelor's degree school is important to ensure a quality education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To take this into account we consider a school's overall Best Colleges ranking which itself looks at a combination of various factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.
Average Earnings
To determine the overall quality of a graduate school, one factor we look at is the average early-career salary of those receiving their bachelor's degree from the school. This is because one of the main reasons people pursue their bachelor'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 many resources a school devotes to chemistry students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - The number of chemistry students who choose to seek a bachelor's degree at the school.
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 chemistry 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 chemistry related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for chemistry 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 Chemistry Bachelor's Degree Schools in California ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.
In addition to College Factual's rankings, you may want to take a look at College Combat, our unique tool that lets you pit your favorite schools head-to-head and compare how they rate on factors that most interest you.
When you have some time, check it out - you may want to bookmark the link so you don't forget it.
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Every student pursuing a degree in a bachelor's degree in chemistry has to check out University of California - Santa Barbara. UCSB is a fairly large public university located in the suburb of Santa Barbara.
Bachelor's recipients from the chemistry degree program at University of California - Santa Barbara earn $3,790 more than the average college grad with the same degree shortly after graduation.
Any student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in chemistry needs to check out University of California - San Diego. Located in the city of La Jolla, UCSD is a public university with a very large student population.
After graduating, chemistry bachelor's recipients typically earn around $45,310 in their early careers.
Every student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in chemistry needs to take a look at University of California - Davis. UC Davis is a fairly large public university located in the small suburb of Davis.
After graduation, chemistry bachelor's recipients generally earn an average of $42,204 in their early careers.
University of California - Irvine is one of the best schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in chemistry. Located in the large city of Irvine, UC Irvine is a public university with a very large student population.
Soon after graduation, chemistry bachelor's recipients usually earn about $43,766 at the beginning of their careers.
Located in the city of Berkeley, UC Berkeley is a public university with a very large student population.
Bachelor's recipients from the chemistry degree program at University of California - Berkeley earn $16,169 more than the standard graduate in this field when they enter the workforce.
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.
The chemistry bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
