by our College Data Analytics Team
College Factual recognizes the best colleges and universities in its annual rankings. These rankings include categories for best overall colleges, best colleges for each major, best value schools, and much more.
South Dakota State University was awarded 147 badges in the 2025 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is agriculture & agriculture operations.
Explore the best ranked schools for the programs you are most interested in.
South Dakota State landed the #425 spot in College Factual's 2025 ranking of best overall colleges in the United States. The higher ed experts analyzed 2,152 colleges and universities across the nation to determine this ranking. This puts it in the top 20% of all schools in the nation.
South Dakota State also holds the #3 spot on the Best Colleges in South Dakota ranking.
South Dakota State University has an acceptance rate of 86%, so it is easier to gain admission to this school than some others. Still, the admissions staff will examine your application closely to make sure you're a good fit for South Dakota State.
About 3% of students accepted to South Dakota State submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 500 and 615. Math scores were between 520 and 630.
The student to faculty ratio is often used to estimate how much interaction there is between professors and their students at a college or university. At South Dakota State University, this ratio is 18 to 1, which is on par with the national average of 15 to 1. That's not bad at all.
In addition to the student to faculty ratio, some people look at what percentage of faculty members are full-time as a sign of how much time professors will be able to spend with their students. This is because part-time teachers may not be be on campus as much as their full-time counterparts.
The full-time faculty percentage at South Dakota State University is 79%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.
The freshmen retention rate of 79% tells us that most first-year, full-time students like South Dakota State University enough to come back for another year. This is a fair bit higher than the national average of 68%. That's certainly something to check off in the good column about the school.
Students are considered to have graduated on time if they finish their studies within four years. At South Dakota State the on-time graduation rate of first-time, full-time students is 41%. That is great when compared to the national average of 33.3%
Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at South Dakota State University.
During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 9,976 undergraduates at South Dakota State with 7,788 being full-time and 2,188 being part-time.
| $0-30 K | $30K-48K | $48-75 | $75-110K | $110K + |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $13,746 | $14,535 | $17,639 | $19,922 | $19,922 |
The net price is calculated by adding tuition, room, board and other costs and subtracting financial aid.Note that the net price is typically less than the published for a school. For more information on the sticker price of South Dakota State, see our tuition and fees and room and board pages.
Almost 66% of college students who graduated with the class of 2018 took out student loans, but that percentage varies from school to school. At South Dakota State, approximately 59% of students took out student loans averaging $7,998 a year. That adds up to $31,992 over four years for those students.
Get more details about paying for South Dakota State University.
See which majors at South Dakota State University make the most money.
Get more details about the location of South Dakota State University.
Contact details for South Dakota State are given below.
| Contact Details | |
|---|---|
| Address: | 1004 Campanile Ave, Brookings, SD 57007-1898 |
| Phone: | 800-952-3541 |
| Website: | https://www.sdstate.edu/ |
| Most Popular Majors | Bachelor’s Degrees | Average Salary of Graduates |
|---|---|---|
| Nursing | 418 | $71,758 |
| Pharmacy/Pharmaceutical Sciences | 142 | NA |
| Animal Science | 133 | $44,844 |
| Mechanical Engineering | 106 | $67,791 |
| General Biology | 104 | $32,940 |
| Liberal Arts General Studies | 93 | $43,563 |
| Business/Managerial Economics | 85 | $45,123 |
| General Psychology | 73 | $35,425 |
| General Agriculture | 69 | $49,781 |
| Human Development & Family Studies | 67 | $37,123 |
Online learning options are becoming more and more popular at American colleges and universities. Online classes are great for students who have busy schedules or for those who just want to study on their own time.
In 2022-2023, 5,678 students took at least one online class at South Dakota State University. This is an increase from the 5,669 students who took online classes the previous year.
| Year | Took at Least One Online Class | Took All Classes Online |
|---|---|---|
| 2022-2023 | 5,678 | 2,128 |
| 2021-2022 | 5,669 | 2,166 |
| 2020-2021 | 8,687 | 2,028 |
| 2018-2019 | 4,562 | 1,570 |
Learn more about online learning at South Dakota State University.
Footnotes
*The racial-ethnic minorities count is calculated by taking the total number of students and subtracting white students, international students, and students whose race/ethnicity was unknown. This number is then divided by the total number of students at the school to obtain the racial-ethnic minorities percentage.
References
More about our data sources and methodologies.