What Chemical Engineering Graduates Earn
How much do Chemical Engineering bachelor's graduates earn?
Graduates of bachelor's programs in Chemical Engineering earn a median of $80,780 one year after graduation and $102,595 five years out, across the 158 programs reporting to College Scorecard. The median debt at graduation is $21,500.
Earnings first, debt second, method in the open: the Chemical Engineering page of the degree earnings branch, built from 196 bachelor's programs in the October 2026 Scorecard release.
Updated November 5, 2026
Median earnings at 1, 4, and 5 years (College Scorecard)
The three rows below are the whole earnings story Scorecard can tell about Chemical Engineering: $80,780, then $97,324, then $102,595. Each median is graduate-weighted, built from 158 programs at year one and 162 at year five, and the unweighted program median sits alongside so a reader can see how much the weighting itself is doing.
| Horizon | Median earnings (graduate-weighted) | Median program (unweighted) | Graduates counted | Share earning above the high-school threshold |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 year after graduation | $80,780 | $80,269 | 9,155 | 78.4% |
| 4 years after graduation | $97,324 | $96,798 | 10,808 | n/p |
| 5 years after graduation | $102,595 | $101,538 | 10,744 | 87.5% |
Five years out, the median graduate earns $102,595, which is $21,815 more than the year-one median of $80,780 (27% growth). Set against the median field overall ($45,010 at year one, $65,763 at year five), this field starts above the pack and ends above it.
By Pell status, the year-one medians for Chemical Engineering are $79,773 (received Pell) and $82,329 (did not), $2,556 apart. The split is a reminder that a field median averages over very different starting points; the institution a student picks inside the field moves their personal figure more than the field label does.
Inside its own CIP family, Chemical Engineering ranks 6 of 17 published bachelor's fields by five-year earnings; the family median at that horizon is $97,669. Its closest sibling is Aerospace, Aeronautical, and Astronautical/Space Engineering at $101,725, below this field's $102,595. Family comparisons strip out the broad field effect and leave the specific program choice exposed.
Ranked across all 182 published fields, Chemical Engineering stands number 9 by five-year earnings and number 7 by first-year earnings, and number 108 from the lowest median debt. Those three ranks together are the field's fingerprint: high earn rank with a low debt rank is the combination students are actually shopping for, and this field's spread between them is 99 places.
The debt side of the same degree
The median graduate in this field leaves school owing $21,500 in federal loans, the graduate-weighted median across the 142 programs reporting debt. That is 27% of the first-year median earnings, or about 3.2 months of gross pay at $80,780 a year. On the standard 10-year plan at the 2026-27 undergraduate rate of 6.52%, the payment is $244 a month and interest adds $7,822 over the life of the loan. Price your own borrowing with the student loan payoff calculator, and test the whole degree in the college ROI calculator or the college major ROI calculator.
Where graduates of this field earn the most
Where a student studies inside this field matters at least as much as the field itself. These five programs post the strongest five-year medians in Chemical Engineering among programs with at least 30 graduates in the count, led by Massachusetts Institute of Technology at $140,683, against a national field median of $102,595.
| Institution | Median earnings, 5 years | Median earnings, 1 year | Median debt | Graduates counted (5yr) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Massachusetts Institute of Technology | $140,683 | $103,310 | n/p | 37 |
| Carnegie Mellon University | $130,891 | $82,295 | $21,000 | 52 |
| University of California-Berkeley | $122,455 | $89,950 | $16,167 | 55 |
| Cornell University | $119,923 | $90,501 | $13,500 | 80 |
| Northeastern University | $119,441 | $85,859 | $24,487 | 100 |
A program median describes that program's own graduates in that program's own labor market; Massachusetts Institute of Technology at $140,683 is evidence about a place and a mix of students, not a wage offer. Put the same programs' prices next to these figures with the degree cost calculator and the net price estimator before ranking anything.
Two more facts about the shape of this field: the five highest-paying programs in the table account for only 3.0% of the 10,744 graduates counted at five years, so the top of the table is a thin slice and not the field's center; and the leading program's five-year median of $140,683 sits 37% above the national field median of $102,595. Its graduates' debt figure is not published, one of the gaps this page leaves visible rather than filling.
Frequently asked questions
How much do Chemical Engineering graduates earn?
The national median is $80,780 one year after graduation and $102,595 five years after, across the 158 bachelor's programs reporting 1-year earnings to College Scorecard (October 2026 release), weighted by graduates counted.
How much debt do Chemical Engineering graduates carry?
The median cumulative federal loan debt at graduation is $21,500. On a standard 10-year plan at 6.52% that is $244 a month and $7,822 of interest in total.
How were the Chemical Engineering national figures computed?
Scorecard publishes one median per program; this page takes the median of those program medians weighted by each program's graduates counted (9,155 people at year one), and prints the unweighted median program beside it. The field cleared a publication bar of at least 10 programs reporting at every horizon.
Is a degree in Chemical Engineering worth it?
The inputs are on this page: $102,595 median earnings at year five against $21,500 median debt. The verdict depends on your actual cost, so run your numbers through the college ROI calculator and the college major ROI calculator.