Head of the class

2 Dallas universities shine in new list of top Texas colleges for 2025

Southern Methodist University was surprisingly outranked by cross-town rival Texas Christian University and University of Dallas.

SMU Undergraduate Admission / Facebook

Dallas' prestigious University of Dallas and Southern Methodist University have risen through the ranks among the top 10 best colleges and universities in Texas for 2025, and four other North Texas universities earned spots on the list.

The just-released list, from personal finance website WalletHub, analyzed more than 800 colleges and universities in the United States using 30 metrics to determine their rankings.

The University of Dallas claimed the No. 9 spot in Texas and No. 51 in WalletHub's regional category of best universities in the South. The school also ranked as the No. 262 best college nationwide.

The private university performed the best in the ranking of "Student Selectivity," which covers admission rates, ACT/SAT scores, and the share of freshmen in the top 10 percent of their high school graduating class. UD ranked a respectable No. 190 nationally, with a 54 percent acceptance rate, according to U.S. News and World Report.

University of Dallas ranked No. 9 in Texas for 2025. Photo courtesy of University of Dallas

Tuition and fees at UD cost $53,930 per year, which earned the school No. 632 in the national comparison for "Cost and Financing."

This is how UD fared in the remaining five major categories in the study:

No. 243 – Campus experience rank
No. 282 – Faculty resources rank
No. 352 – Campus safety rank
No. 368 – Education outcomes rank
No. 369 – Career outcomes rank

SMU followed right behind UD to round out the statewide top 10 ranking, took the No. 55 spot for best university in the South, and earned No. 271 in the nationwide ranking.

Surprisingly, SMU's cross-town rival Texas Christian University outranked the Mustangs to rank No. 6 in Texas, and No. 168 nationally.

TCU performed the best in the national ranking of "Education Outcomes," which covers retention and graduation rates, and bachelor's degrees awarded per undergraduate enrollment. The school ranked No. 93 with a 74 percent graduation rate, according to U.S. News, and a 92.9 percent "first-time-in-college student" retention rate.

Like the University of Dallas, TCU fell behind in the national category for cost and financing, ranking No. 774, as tuition and fees add up to $61,740 per year.

TCU's recent accolades add to an ongoing winning streak of high rankings. In September, the university ranked as the No. 6 best Texas college for 2025 by U.S. News, and No. 105 nationally. Education information and review platform Niche also recently ranked TCU the 8th best college in Texas and 163rd best nationwide for 2025.

However, in both of those rankings, SMU outpaced TCU as the Mustangs landed at No. 5 in Texas in both the U.S. News survey and the Niche report. This time, TCU's on top. (No iron skillet involved this time.)

Elsewhere across North Texas, Southwestern Adventist University in Keene - a town about 45 miles southwest of Dallas - ranked No. 13 in Texas, followed by The University of Texas at Dallas (No. 14). The University of North Texas ranked at the bottom of the statewide list in No. 18.

The top five best colleges and universities in the nation are Princeton University (No. 1), Yale University (No. 2), Harvard University (No. 3), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (No. 4), and Dartmouth College (No. 5).

The top 10 colleges and universities in Texas are:

No. 1 – Rice University
No. 2 – The University of Texas at Austin
No. 3 – Trinity University
No. 4 – Texas A&M University-College Station
No. 5 – Southwestern University
No. 6 – Texas Christian University
No. 7 – Austin College
No. 8 – Texas A&M International University
No. 9 – University of Dallas
No. 10 – Southern Methodist University

The full report can be found on wallethub.com.

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Texas shocks as America's No. 3 least safe state in 2026 report

Photo by Hiroshi Kimura on Unsplash

Texas ranks as the 48th "safest" state — out of 50.

While no state is invulnerable, some do more to protect their residents than others. And a new study has declared Texas one of the five least safe states in America.

WalletHub's "Safest States in America (2026)" report examined all 50 states for their emergency preparedness and for residents' personal and residential, financial, workplace, and road safety. Factors that weighed into the rankings include specific crime rates per capita, the share of the population that is uninsured, road quality ratings, workplace injury statistics, and more.

Texas ranked at the bottom of the list as the 48th "safest" state — or the third least safe state. It's joined by several other Southern states, like Mississippi (No. 50), Louisiana (No. 49), Florida (No. 47), and Arkansas (No. 46).

According to WalletHub, Texas specifically ranks third to last in the nationwide "emergency preparedness" category, which was determined based on the prevalence of climate disasters causing $1 billion or more in damages from 1980-2024, and the loss amount resulting from those disasters.

The Lone Star State also ranked 40th (or 10th worst) across three safety categories: personal and residential safety, financial safety, and road safety. The report additionally found that Texas has the highest rate of uninsured residents nationally.

Texas' "workplace safety" was the state's highest-ranking category, landing 30th nationally.

Additional rankings that determined Texas' overall safety include:

No. 30 – Assaults per capita
No. 32 – Fatal occupational injuries per 100,000 full-time workers
No. 32 – Sex offenders per capita
No. 35 – Murders and non-negligent manslaughters per capita
No. 36 – Fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles of travel
No. 41 – Loss amounts from climate disasters per capita

According to the report, the five safest states in America are all located in the Northeast. Vermont leads as the country's safest state in 2026, followed by Massachusetts (No. 2), Maine (No. 3), New Hampshire (No. 4), and Connecticut (No. 5).

Though every state has varying levels of safety, WalletHub analyst Chip Lupo asserted that the safest places in the U.S. categorically invest in protecting their residents. Top-ranking states have low crime rates and diligently maintain their road infrastructure, and other states that prioritize their residents' safety have "strong economies and job markets that prevent people from falling into dangerous financial situations."

"[The safest states in America] have high levels of occupational safety and disaster preparedness, too," Lupo said. "In addition, states are made safer by efforts that individual residents take, such as forming a neighborhood watch or working in firefighting and EMT jobs at high rates."

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