The Best College Search Engines
I’ve gone through and used each of these college search engines so you don’t have to. These tools can help you navigate the college search process, narrow down your choices, and find the perfect college for you. Let’s see which ones are the best.
Cappex (Rating: 4.5/5)
Features
Favoriting colleges
Schools classified as reach, match, or safety based on your stats (take these with a grain of salt)
Some schools offer digital campus tours
See similar colleges
College match feature lets users “swipe” on colleges, which can be great for discovering schools you had not previously heard of!
Strengths:
Might have the best user interface
Many search filters, good for financial aid
Weaknesses
Only some schools have an “Inside Scoop” that describes a college’s personality
Niche (Rating: 4/5)
Features
Favoriting colleges
Likelihood of acceptance based on your stats (take these with a grain of salt)
Compare colleges
Virtual tours
College reviews
Strengths
Best tool for understanding each college’s personality
Can search by strength of specific academic programs
Weaknesses
College search tool based on rank order, making it more difficult to find new schools
Naviance (Rating: 4/5)
Features
Favoriting colleges
Likelihood of acceptance based on your stats (take these with a grain of salt)
Compare colleges
Saved search/match preferences with SuperMatch
Strengths
Extremely flexible search parameters, including financial aid
Provides a “Fit” score based on your preferences
Easy way to track your college application process
Weaknesses
Can only be used by students in a school that has purchased Naviance
User experience can be overwhelming because of the depth of features
College Board's Big Future (Rating: 3.5/5)
Features:
Favoriting colleges
Schools classified as reach, match, or safety based on your test scores (take these with a grain of salt)
Some schools offer digital campus tours
Search by distance from zip code
Strengths
Easy to use
Decent user interface
Weaknesses
Doesn’t give much perspective on the personality of each college
College Scorecard (3.5/5)
Features
Compare schools - compare multiple schools on popular statistics like graduation rate, tuition price, earnings after graduation, etc.
Search by distance from a zip code
Strengths
Decent data visualization
Great way to measure the ROI of a school
Shows how well schools perform against the median
Flexible search filters
Weaknesses
Can’t save the schools you like
Doesn’t give any perspective on the personality of each college
College Confidential (Rating: 2/5)
Features
Forums - you can search for mentions of a school in the College Confidential Forums
Favoriting colleges
Strengths
Gives some details around colleges’ personalities
Weaknesses
Some information is incorrect/not up to date
Information not presented well, too much text
Search filters aren’t as robust and flexible as other college search tools
Slow website
College Navigator (Rating: 1.5/5)
Features
Compare schools - compare multiple schools on popular statistics like graduation rate, tuition price, earnings after graduation, etc.
Favorite schools
Save session
Search by distance from zip code
Strengths
Flexible search filters
Weaknesses
Worst user experience
Slow website
Doesn’t give any perspective on the personality of each college
To summarize, Cappex, Naviance, and Niche are the best college search tools, though each for different reasons. Cappex has the best user experience, Naviance is the best for finding good “fit” colleges, and Niche is the best for understanding schools’ personalities. Big Future and College Scorecard are great starting points when looking for schools, and are not bad tools by any means. If you are using College Confidential or College Navigator…consider using a different one. It’ll make your life much easier.
