Texas Colleges: Tuition, Debt & Earnings (2026 stats)

Analysis & insights

EDsmart Data aggregates institution-level College Scorecard data for this profile. Highlights below compare local medians to U.S. and regional benchmarks.

Costs & borrowing

Texas median public in-state tuition is $3,555, about -35.5% vs the national median. Versus the Southwest region, tuition is -3.5%.

Median graduate debt is $10,652 (-19.7% below the U.S. median of $13,271, and -3.2% vs the Southwest regional median of $11,004). Low sticker prices do not always mean low borrowing—living costs, time-to-degree, and aid mix matter.

Student debt rank: #11 nationally of 48 (lower debt = better rank); #2 in Southwest of 4 (1 = lowest median debt).

On published in-state tuition, Texas ranks #7 nationally (1 = lowest median sticker among states with data).

Earnings, employment & retention

Among bachelor's-predominant campuses with ≥200 students, median 10-year earnings in Texas are $54,338, about -0.1% vs the U.S. campus median ($54,384).

The median campus reports 89.8% of its 8-year cohort as working and not enrolled—our closest federal proxy to a placement rate. The U.S. campus median is 88.0% (+1.9 pp). Formal job-placement statistics are not published in Scorecard; treat this as a comparative outcome indicator, not a hire guarantee.

First-year, full-time retention at the median campus is 69.6% vs a U.S. median of 76.4%—a leading indicator for completion and time-to-degree.

Loan repayment indicators at the median campus: 2-yr default 6.9% (U.S. 5.0%); 3-yr repayment progress 69.4% (U.S. 73.7%). 3-yr default is omitted when most campuses report suppressed zeros.

Nationally, Texas ranks earnings #24 and employment proxy #22 on these outcome medians (1 = best).

Top employment-outcome campuses in this extract include Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (95.3%), The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (94.8%), East Texas Baptist University (94.1%), West Coast University-Texas (93.6%), Texas A&M University-College Station (93.4%), Schreiner University (93.0%), Texas Lutheran University (92.9%), Texas Christian University (92.9%), Stephen F Austin State University (92.6%), The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (92.5%)—useful anchors for local reporting on where graduates are most often working rather than still enrolled.

Completion & workforce context

Within Texas, sector medians diverge: Private for-profit median 10-yr earnings $40,092 (5 campuses); Private nonprofit median 10-yr earnings $53,958 (44 campuses); Public median 10-yr earnings $55,107 (41 campuses). Public campuses often dominate enrollment while private nonprofits can show higher earnings medians at selective institutions.

Average institution-level completion rate across all sectors in Texas is 45.0% (national institution average about 50.3%).

National Student Clearinghouse data cite roughly 2,642,574 residents with some college but no credential in Texas (YoY change 3.40%). That stock of incomplete credentials sits alongside the completion and employment metrics above.