What Computer Software and Media Applications Graduates Earn

Median earnings at 1, 4, and 5 years (College Scorecard)

The three rows below are the whole earnings story Scorecard can tell about Computer Software and Media Applications: $41,435, then $47,440, then $47,780. Each median is graduate-weighted, built from 64 programs at year one and 57 at year five, and the unweighted program median sits alongside so a reader can see how much the weighting itself is doing.

From $41,435 in the first year to $47,780 in the fifth, earnings grow 15% ($6,345). For scale, the median bachelor's field in the Scorecard file grows from $45,010 to $65,763 over the same span, so this field's early-career slope is gentler than typical.

By Pell status, the year-one medians for Computer Software and Media Applications are $43,388 (received Pell) and $52,355 (did not), $8,967 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, Computer Software and Media Applications ranks 8 of 8 published bachelor's fields by five-year earnings; the family median at that horizon is $82,542. Its closest sibling is Computer Systems Analysis at $77,838, above this field's $47,780. Family comparisons strip out the broad field effect and leave the specific program choice exposed.

Ranked across all 182 published fields, Computer Software and Media Applications stands number 171 by five-year earnings and number 127 by first-year earnings, and number 150 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 21 places.

The debt side of the same degree

Debt first, because earnings get the headlines: $23,611 is the median federal loan balance at graduation in Computer Software and Media Applications, pooled from 55 reporting programs. Against year-one earnings of $41,435 that balance is 57% of a year's gross pay, roughly 6.8 months of it. The standard 10-year repayment at 6.52% (the 2026-27 undergraduate Direct Loan rate) runs $268 a month and $8,590 in total interest. Your own balance and rate belong in the student loan payoff calculator; the degree-level verdict belongs in the college ROI calculator and the college major ROI calculator.

Where graduates of this field earn the most

The national median hides the real spread: inside Computer Software and Media Applications, individual programs post five-year medians far from $47,780 in both directions. Below are the highest, filtered to programs with 30 or more graduates counted at five years; University of Southern California sits first at $152,477.

A median is a middle graduate, not a promise: half of University of Southern California's counted graduates earn less than $152,477. Weigh any program here against its own price using the net price estimator and the degree cost calculator.

Two more facts about the shape of this field: the five highest-paying programs in the table account for only 6.3% of the 4,807 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 $152,477 sits 219% above the national field median of $47,780. Its median debt, $19,968, runs below the field median of $23,611, which is the trade a student at the top of this table is actually being offered.