If you plan on majoring in illustration, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #249 in the country in terms of popularity. As a result, there are many college that offer the degree, making your choice of school a hard one.
For its 2024 ranking, College Factual looked at 4 schools in California to determine which ones were the best for illustration students pursuing a degree. Combined, these schools handed out 315 degrees in illustration to qualified students.
The illustration program you select can have a big impact on your future. That's why we developed our collection of Best Schools for Illustration rankings. For our Best Overall Illustration School rankings, we roll up the results of our degree-level rankings, weighted by the number of degrees awarded at that level.
In order to find the schools that are the best fit for you, you may want to filter to one of the degree levels below.
Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best Illustration Schools in California list, to help you choose the best school for you.
If you'd like to restrict your choices to just one part of the country, you can filter this list by location.
In addition to our rankings, you can take two colleges and compare them based on the criteria that matters most to you in our unique tool, College Combat.
Test it out when you get a chance! You may also want to bookmark the link and share it with others who are trying to make the college decision.
Translate your creative ideas through concept, design and digital media with a bachelor's in graphic design online from Southern New Hampshire University.
If you aren't interested in a particular degree level and want to know which schools are the overall best at delivering an education for the illustration degrees they offer, see the list below.
Art Center College of Design is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a degree in illustration. Art Center College of Design is a small private not-for-profit college located in the city of Pasadena.
There were roughly 170 illustration students who graduated with this degree at Art Center College of Design in the most recent year we have data available.
It's difficult to beat California College of the Arts if you wish to pursue a degree in illustration. Located in the large city of San Francisco, California College of the Arts is a private not-for-profit college with a small student population.
There were roughly 26 illustration students who graduated with this degree at California College of the Arts in the most recent data year.
Laguna College of Art and Design is a good decision for students pursuing a degree in illustration. LCAD is a small private not-for-profit college located in the rural area of Laguna Beach.
There were about 24 illustration students who graduated with this degree at LCAD in the most recent year we have data available.
Academy of Art University is a great choice for students pursuing a degree in illustration. Academy of Art University is a moderately-sized private for-profit university located in the city of San Francisco.
There were about 89 illustration students who graduated with this degree at Academy of Art University in the most recent year we have data available.
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).