2025 Online MBA Ranking: How Graduates Rated The Degree’s Career Impact

How do alumni from our 2025 ranking of top online MBA programs rank their schools for career impact?

No way around it, most people pursuing an MBA are looking for tangible impacts on their careers. That’s true for the online population as well, the vast majority of whom are working professionals who can start to leverage their program’s lessons and degree promise while still technically a student.

That’s why career outcomes account for one third of the total score in our annual ranking of the best online MBA programs. (See 2025’s full ranking here.)

Each year, we ask recent graduates eight questions about their career results and their satisfaction with the career services and resources offered to them through the online MBA program.

This year, we surveyed alumni from the Class of 2024, those graduating between July 1, 2023 and June 30, 2024. The survey was sent to 7,823 eligible alumni at 57 ranked programs with 1,293 returned surveys. That’s a 17% response rate.

Below, and on the following pages, we show how Class of 2024 alumni from each of the 57 participating schools rated their programs in terms of career impact. Click through each page or go to a particular linked category:

More alumni career data:

You can also see how 2024 alumni rated their programs’ learning experience in this story.

SALARY AND PROMOTION

According to alumni responses, 50% of graduates gained promotions as a result of their degree at 15 of the 57 schools in our 2025 ranking.

University of Michigan Ross School of Business scored the highest in this category, with 75% of its alumni reporting a promotion either during their online MBA program or shortly after. It was third in the category with 65.71% of alumni reporting promotions.

Did you gain a promotion as a result of the online MBA program?
Question Rank	School	Percent ‘Yes’
1	University of Michigan (Ross)	75.00%
2	Santa Clara University (Leavey)	70.00%
3	University of North Texas (Ryan)	66.67%
4	University of Texas at Dallas (Jindal)	62.50%
4	University of Utah (Eccles)	62.50%
6	University of Southern California (Marshall)	61.11%
7	Bryant University	60.00%
8	Rice University (Jones)	58.82%
9	Southern Methodist University (Cox)	57.89%
10	University of Denver (Daniels)	55.56%
10	University of Maryland (Smith)	55.56%
12	William & Mary (Mason)	51.85%
13	Carnegie Mellon University (Tepper)	50.91%
14	University of South Florida (Muma)	50.00%
14	Worcester Polytechnic Institute	50.00%
16	University of California, Davis	47.37%
17	Lehigh University	44.44%
18	Indiana University (Kelley)	44.33%
19	University of Wisconsin MBA Consortium	43.75%
20	Hofstra University (Zarb)	42.86%
20	Kennesaw State University (Coles)	42.86%
22	University of Washington (Foster)	42.31%
23	Jack Welch Management Institute	41.57%
24	Auburn University (Harbert)	40.00%
25	Syracuse University (Whitman)	38.89%
26	Ohio University	36.84%
27	University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler)	35.19%
28	George Mason University (Costello)	33.33%
28	Rogers State University	33.33%
28	San Jose State University (Lucas)	33.33%
28	Texas Tech (Rawls)	33.33%
28	University of Cincinnati (Lindner)	33.33%
33	University of Massachusetts at Amherst (Isenberg)	30.56%
34	Pepperdine University (Graziadio)	30.00%
35	University of Connecticut School of Business	28.57%
35	Villanova University	28.57%
37	University of Florida (Warrington)	28.00%
38	University of Iowa (Tippie)	27.63%
39	North Carolina State University (Poole)	27.27%
39	University of Nebraska-Lincoln	27.27%
41	Fairfield University (Dolan)	26.67%
42	Clemson University	25.00%
42	Louisiana State University (Ourso)	25.00%
44	Florida International University	24.00%
45	University of Massachusetts-Lowell	23.73%
45	University of Delaware (Lerner)	22.73%
47	Baylor University (Hankamer)	20.00%
47	University of Michigan-Dearborn	20.00%
49	Bowling Green State University (Schmidthorst)	19.23%
50	University of Missouri (Trulaske)	18.18%
51	American University (Kogod)	17.65%
52	Seattle University (Albers)	16.67%
52	Wake Forest University	16.67%
54	SUNY Oswego	14.29%
54	University of Tennessee at Chattanooga	14.29%
56	Drexel University (LeBow)	9.09%
57	Creighton University (Heider)	8.33%

Salary increases were even more prevalent, with half or more of the graduates from 30 programs reporting that they received a pay bump as a result of their online MBA degrees.

An impressive 83.33% of alumni of Wake Forest University reported pay raises while 82.35% of Rice University (Jones) graduates did the same.

Did your salary increase as a result of the online MBA program?
Question Rank	School	Percent ‘Yes’
1	Wake Forest University	83.33%
2	Rice University (Jones)	82.35%
3	University of Michigan (Ross)	81.25%
4	Santa Clara University (Leavey)	80.00%
5	University of Southern California (Marshall)	77.78%
6	Southern Methodist University (Cox)	76.32%
7	University of Utah (Eccles)	75.00%
7	Worcester Polytechnic Institute	75.00%
9	Kennesaw State University (Coles)	71.43%
10	University of Maryland (Smith)	66.67%
10	University of North Texas (Ryan)	66.67%
10	William & Mary (Mason)	66.67%
13	University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler)	62.96%
14	University of Texas at Dallas (Jindal)	62.50%
14	University of Wisconsin MBA Consortium	62.50%
16	Bowling Green State University (Schmidthorst)	61.54%
17	University of South Florida (Muma)	61.11%
18	Carnegie Mellon University (Tepper)	58.18%
19	University of Florida (Warrington)	58.00%
20	University of California, Davis	57.89%
21	University of Washington (Foster)	57.69%
22	Hofstra University (Zarb)	57.14%
23	George Mason University (Costello)	55.56%
23	Lehigh University	55.56%
23	University of Denver (Daniels)	55.56%
26	Indiana University (Kelley)	54.64%
27	Jack Welch Management Institute	53.93%
28	Auburn University (Harbert)	53.33%
29	San Jose State University (Lucas)	50.00%
29	University of Massachusetts at Amherst (Isenberg)	50.00%
31	Syracuse University (Whitman)	44.44%
32	Florida International University	44.00%
33	University of Cincinnati (Lindner)	42.86%
33	University of Connecticut School of Business	42.86%
33	Villanova University	42.86%
36	Pepperdine University (Graziadio)	42.50%
37	Ohio University	42.11%
38	Louisiana State University (Ourso)	41.67%
39	American University (Kogod)	41.18%
40	University of Nebraska-Lincoln	40.91%
41	Baylor University (Hankamer)	40.00%
41	Bryant University	40.00%
41	University of Michigan-Dearborn	40.00%
44	University of Iowa (Tippie)	36.84%
45	Rogers State University	33.33%
45	Texas Tech (Rawls)	33.33%
47	University of Massachusetts-Lowell	31.03%
48	University of Missouri (Trulaske)	30.00%
49	SUNY Oswego	28.57%
49	University of Tennessee at Chattanooga	28.57%
51	North Carolina State University (Poole)	27.27%
51	University of Delaware (Lerner)	27.27%
53	Fairfield University (Dolan)	26.67%
54	Clemson University	25.00%
55	Creighton University (Heider)	16.67%
55	Seattle University (Albers)	16.67%
57	Drexel University (LeBow)	9.09%