Online Programs That Deliver: 2026 Scorecard Outcomes

The U.S. Department of Education publishes four hard outcomes for every Title IV-eligible institution: 6-year median earnings, completion rate, median graduation debt, and 3-year cohort default rate. These are the numbers that survive the marketing layer.

This article pulls those four metrics for the 10 online-heavy schools that show up most often in working-adult comparison sets — Western Governors, SNHU, Liberty, Grand Canyon, Capella, Strayer (DC unit), DeVry (IL unit), ASU Online, University of Phoenix, and Purdue Global.

Source is the Scorecard data release dated November 15, 2025, retrieved April 17, 2026. Each figure is sourced verbatim from the Scorecard API or matching public CSV; nothing here is averaged across years or projected forward.

What College Scorecard Actually Measures

The Scorecard sits on top of three federal data sources: IPEDS for enrollment and graduation rates, the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) for debt and default, and a Treasury-Department earnings match against W-2 records for the earnings figures.

The earnings metric the consumer Scorecard UI labels “Median Earnings” is technically MD_EARN_WNE_P6 — the median wages of students who enrolled at the institution, measured six years after their first enrollment date.

The Scorecard data dictionary makes the inclusion rule explicit: every Title IV recipient who enrolled counts, whether they finished a credential or not.

The 6-year window measures enrollees, not graduates

A student who enrolled in 2019, dropped out in 2020 with no degree, and earned $0 in W-2 wages by 2025 lands in the same denominator as a 2019 entrant who graduated in 2023 and earned $80,000 by 2025. The result is a population statistic that bundles completion rate, drop-out earnings, and graduate earnings into a single number.

That is the design choice — ED defends it on the grounds that prospective students need to see the realistic outcome distribution, not a survivorship-biased graduate-only figure. It also means a school can lift its reported earnings either by graduating more students or by attracting higher-baseline earners who enroll with prior credentials.

Completion rates use the 150% rule

The Scorecard completion figure is the IPEDS Graduation Rate Survey value: the share of first-time, full-time, degree-seeking undergraduates who finished within 150% of the standard program length. For a 4-year bachelor’s, that means within 6 years of entry.

Adult-serving and competency-based schools — most of the 10 in this cohort — enroll heavy part-time, transfer-in, and competency-based populations that the first-time-full-time denominator does not capture cleanly. ED reports the number anyway; reading it requires knowing what it excludes.

Default rate reads zero — for a specific reason

The 3-year cohort default rate (CDR3) currently reported on Scorecard is the FY2020 cohort, which entered repayment during the federal student-loan payment pause that ran from March 2020 through August 2023. ED reports CDR3 = 0 for every institution in this dataset, including the 10 schools profiled here.

That figure is not a quality signal for the school — it is a structural artifact of the payment pause. The next CDR release (FY2021 cohort) will be the first post-pause data point and is expected to publish in fall 2026. Source · Federal Student Aid — CDR Guide

The 10-School Cohort — Side-by-Side Scorecard Outcomes

The table below pulls four Scorecard fields for each of the 10 online-heavy schools cached for this analysis. Rows shaded above the cohort median are flagged for that metric only — no row is shaded across all metrics.

UNITID is the IPEDS institutional identifier used by both Scorecard and IPEDS reporting; two schools (Phoenix, Purdue Global) carry legacy IDs in older datasets that no longer resolve.

School	6-yr median earnings	Completion rate	Median grad debt	Avg net price
Western Governors (433387)	$69,572	48%	$11,116	$12,548
ASU Online (483124)	$52,843	43%	$19,500	Suppressed
Capella (413413)	$48,500	30%	$14,968	$17,956
Grand Canyon (104717)	$47,280	45%	$22,114	$22,472
DeVry-Illinois (482477)	$42,178	28%	$24,807	$30,770
SNHU (183026)	$41,945	44%	$21,082	$36,708
Liberty (232557)	$39,707	64%	$24,500	$29,357
Strayer-DC (131803)	$36,582	21%	$40,621	Suppressed
U Phoenix-AZ (484613)	$35,359	28%	$31,553	$13,520
Purdue Global (489779)	$32,973	28%	$26,078	$7,770

School Western Governors (433387)

6-yr median earnings $69,572

Completion rate 48%

Median grad debt $11,116

Avg net price $12,548

School ASU Online (483124)

6-yr median earnings $52,843

Completion rate 43%

Median grad debt $19,500

Avg net price Suppressed

School Capella (413413)

6-yr median earnings $48,500

Completion rate 30%

Median grad debt $14,968

Avg net price $17,956

School Grand Canyon (104717)

6-yr median earnings $47,280

Completion rate 45%

Median grad debt $22,114

Avg net price $22,472

School DeVry-Illinois (482477)

6-yr median earnings $42,178

Completion rate 28%

Median grad debt $24,807

Avg net price $30,770

School SNHU (183026)

6-yr median earnings $41,945

Completion rate 44%

Median grad debt $21,082

Avg net price $36,708

School Liberty (232557)

6-yr median earnings $39,707

Completion rate 64%

Median grad debt $24,500

Avg net price $29,357

School Strayer-DC (131803)

6-yr median earnings $36,582

Completion rate 21%

Median grad debt $40,621

Avg net price Suppressed

School U Phoenix-AZ (484613)

6-yr median earnings $35,359

Completion rate 28%

Median grad debt $31,553

Avg net price $13,520

School Purdue Global (489779)

6-yr median earnings $32,973

Completion rate 28%

Median grad debt $26,078

Avg net price $7,770

The earnings figure is MD_EARN_WNE_P6 from the most recent Scorecard cohort. Completion is the IPEDS 150%-of-normal-time graduation rate.

Median grad debt is GRAD_DEBT_MDN — the median cumulative federal loan principal at graduation for completers. Net price is NPT4_PUB or NPT4_PRIV depending on control, after grants and scholarships, for full-time first-time undergraduates receiving Title IV aid.

Earnings Side-by-Side — The $69,572 Outlier

Western Governors University reports $69,572 — the only school in the cohort above $60,000. The next-highest is ASU Online at $52,843, followed by Capella ($48,500) and Grand Canyon ($47,280).

The bottom of the distribution sits at Purdue Global ($32,973), University of Phoenix-Arizona ($35,359), and Strayer-DC ($36,582). The spread between top and bottom is $36,599 — roughly a 2.1x ratio.

Why WGU runs high

Three structural facts drive WGU’s $69,572 figure. First, WGU’s median age at entry is 34 — older students typically carry more prior work history into the enrollment cohort, which lifts the earnings denominator regardless of program effect.

Second, WGU enrolls heavily into IT, nursing, and business administration — three categories with higher post-graduation wage floors than the broader online program mix. Third, WGU’s competency-based model lets students complete faster than credit-hour peers, which shifts the timing of when earnings begin to compound within the 6-year window.

None of these explain the figure entirely, but each contributes — and none of them are visible from the Scorecard headline.

ASU Online and the public-R1 premium

ASU Online’s $52,843 sits well above the for-profit and non-profit-online cluster. ASU’s residential campus is a Carnegie R1 research institution, and the online-delivery unit (UNITID 483124, separate from residential ASU-Tempe UNITID 104151) inherits the brand signal in employer-side wage outcomes.

ASU Online is also a Hispanic-Serving Institution under federal designation, which routes additional federal aid programs into the enrollment funnel. The trade-off: Scorecard suppresses the net price figure for the online-delivery unit under ED’s small-cohort and online-unit privacy rules — applicants must request it from the institution’s net price calculator instead.

Completion Rates — A Wider Spread Than the Earnings

Liberty leads the completion table at 64%, driven in part by its hybrid model — Liberty maintains a residential undergraduate population alongside its online enrollment, and the residential cohort feeds the GRS denominator more cleanly.

The 30%-and-below cluster — Capella (30%), DeVry-IL (28%), Phoenix (28%), Purdue Global (28%), Strayer-DC (21%) — is the same group ED has historically flagged in Gainful Employment review cycles for outcome scrutiny.

NCES context for the cohort midpoint

NCES Fast Facts reports the national 6-year graduation rate at 4-year institutions at 64% for full-time first-time bachelor’s-seeking students who began in fall 2016. The 37% cohort median for these 10 online-heavy schools is materially below that benchmark. Source · NCES Fast Facts — Graduation Rates

Three structural factors explain most of the gap: (1) the GRS denominator excludes transfer-in and part-time students, who are the dominant population at online-adult schools; (2) competency-based and continuous-enrollment models do not map to a standard 6-year window; (3) online-adult populations have higher financial-shock attrition rates than residential 18–22 populations.

The 37% figure is the right number to cite, but it is not a like-for-like comparison to the NCES 64% national rate.

Why Strayer-DC reads 21%

Strayer University operates 60+ IPEDS units nationwide. UNITID 131803 is the historical Washington, DC, flagship unit, with 188 total students at the most recent reporting date.

A 21% completion rate at that enrollment size carries small-sample volatility — the cohort the IPEDS GRS evaluates may be in the low double digits. The Strayer system-wide outcomes profile is materially different and would require a multi-UNITID aggregation pass.

For any single Strayer location applicants are considering, the Scorecard page for that specific UNITID is the operative data point — not the DC unit.

Net Price and Debt — What Students Actually Borrow

Net price is the average amount a first-time, full-time, Title IV-receiving undergraduate paid after grant and scholarship aid was applied, for the most recent reporting year. Median graduation debt is the median federal loan principal carried by students who finished a credential.

The two figures track loosely: a school with high net price tends to push students into higher loan principal at graduation, though the relationship is weakened by the share of students who pay out of pocket, use employer reimbursement, or carry private loans that the Scorecard does not measure.

The cohort spread on price is wider than the spread on debt

Net price ranges from $7,770 (Purdue Global) to $36,708 (SNHU) — a 4.7x spread. Median graduation debt ranges from $11,116 (WGU) to $40,621 (Strayer-DC) — a 3.7x spread. The two are not perfectly correlated.

Purdue Global has the lowest net price in the cohort but the third-highest debt-to-earnings ratio when its $26,078 median graduation debt is set against its $32,973 6-year earnings — roughly 0.79. WGU’s $11,116 median debt against $69,572 earnings is 0.16 — the strongest debt-to-earnings ratio in the cohort by a wide margin.

Debt-to-earnings is the underwriting metric the Scorecard hints at

ED stopped publishing a formal debt-to-earnings (D/E) ratio after the Gainful Employment rule was rescinded in 2019 and reinstated in 2023. The fields are still in the Scorecard, but the consumer UI does not surface a D/E figure directly.

Calculating it from the cached records: WGU 0.16, SNHU 0.50, Liberty 0.62, Capella 0.31, Grand Canyon 0.47, DeVry-IL 0.59, ASU Online 0.37, Phoenix 0.89, Purdue Global 0.79, Strayer-DC 1.11. A ratio above 1.0 means median graduation debt exceeds annual earnings six years post-entry. Strayer-DC is the only school in the cohort that fails that test on these numbers, though the small-cohort caveat applies.

How to Read These Numbers Before Applying

The Scorecard is a comparison tool, not a recommendation engine. The four metrics in the table above are necessary but not sufficient for an online-program decision. Three additional checks belong in any serious comparison.

Program-level data, not institutional data, is the better signal

The institutional-level fields used in this article aggregate across every program a school offers. A nursing degree at SNHU and a creative writing degree at SNHU roll into the same $41,945 6-year earnings figure.

ED publishes program-level Scorecard data (the “Field of Study” file) that breaks earnings, debt, and completion by Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) code. For any specific online program a candidate is considering, the program-level CIP cut is the relevant comparison — not the institutional average.

Nursing (CIP 51.38), business administration (CIP 52.02), and information technology (CIP 11.01) all publish program-specific outcomes for these schools.

Cohort year matters

The Scorecard release used for this article is dated November 15, 2025. The 6-year earnings cohort it reports first enrolled around 2018; the debt cohort graduated around 2022; the default cohort entered repayment in FY2020 (the COVID payment-pause cohort).

Each metric reflects a different point in time, and a school that has materially changed its program mix, pricing, or admission criteria since 2018 may not be accurately represented by these figures. The Scorecard refreshes annually each November, with quarterly delta updates in March and June.

Accreditation, state authorization, and licensure are pre-checks

The Scorecard reports outcomes for accredited Title IV-eligible institutions, but it does not verify state authorization for online delivery or licensure eligibility for programs that lead to credentials (teaching, nursing, social work, counseling).

A student in Texas considering a Florida-based online program needs to confirm both that the program is authorized to enroll Texas residents (NC-SARA membership covers most cases) and that the program meets Texas licensure requirements for the relevant credential. The Scorecard does not flag mismatches.

What This Cohort Tells You About the Wider Online Market

The 10 schools profiled here are not a random sample — they are the schools that show up most often in working-adult online-program comparison shopping, by enrollment and by search volume.

Total enrollment across the cohort exceeds 600,000 students; SNHU and WGU alone account for over 300,000. That concentration makes their Scorecard numbers statistically more reliable than figures from smaller institutions, and it also means the cohort tilts toward schools with the marketing budgets to dominate the consideration set.

The earnings distribution is bimodal

The cohort splits into two clusters. The top cluster — WGU, ASU Online, Capella, Grand Canyon — sits between $47,000 and $70,000 in 6-year earnings, and includes three of the four highest completion rates.

The bottom cluster — Phoenix, Purdue Global, Strayer-DC — sits between $33,000 and $37,000 in earnings, with completion rates between 21% and 28%. SNHU, Liberty, and DeVry-IL sit in the middle. This is not a smooth distribution; it is two populations.

The completion-debt-earnings relationship is consistent

Schools with higher completion rates tend to show higher earnings and lower median graduation debt. WGU and ASU Online occupy the strongest corner of that relationship in this cohort.

The weakest corner — high debt, low completion, low earnings — is occupied by Strayer-DC, University of Phoenix-Arizona, and Purdue Global. The middle is mixed. None of this validates a specific recommendation, but the pattern across 10 schools is consistent enough to anchor further investigation.

These numbers are not predictions for individual applicants

The Scorecard reports population statistics from a cohort that enrolled 6 years ago. They describe what happened to that cohort, not what will happen to a 2026 applicant.

Earnings outcomes for any individual student are driven by program choice, completion, prior work experience, geographic labor market, and post-graduation career decisions — none of which the Scorecard models. Use the figures to compare schools against each other, not to forecast an individual outcome.

Not affiliated with any government agency. College Scorecard data is published by the U.S. Department of Education; figures cited here are sourced verbatim from the Scorecard API or matching public CSV release dated November 15, 2025, retrieved April 17, 2026.

No outcome is guaranteed for any individual student. Results may vary based on individual circumstances.