TL;DR: The New Ivies is a label Forbes has used since 2024 for an annually updated list of twenty universities, ten public and ten private, whose graduates employers rate highly. It is a media ranking based on employer and alumni surveys, not an official designation and not part of the actual Ivy League. Confirmed 2026 private members include Carnegie Mellon, Emory, Georgetown, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Rice, Tufts, Vanderbilt, Washington University in St. Louis, and Case Western (Forbes, 2026).
What are the New Ivies?
The New Ivies is a term popularized by Forbes, which since 2024 has published an annual list of twenty universities, ten public and ten private, that employers say produce especially capable and in-demand graduates. The label is meant to identify schools that deliver Ivy-caliber career outcomes without necessarily carrying the Ivy League name or its lowest-in-the-nation admit rates. It is important to be precise about what this is: a media ranking compiled by a magazine, refreshed each year, not an official designation and not connected to the eight-member athletic conference that defines the real Ivy League.
That distinction matters for how families should use it. Because the list is built from employer and graduate surveys rather than from selectivity, endowment, or tradition, it surfaces schools that a prestige-first view might overlook, which is genuinely useful. But a school’s presence on it reflects current employer perception in a given survey year, not a permanent or universal ranking. Treated as a research prompt rather than a verdict, the New Ivies framing can meaningfully widen and strengthen a college list.
How Forbes builds the New Ivies list
Forbes compiles the list using surveys of hiring managers and recent graduates, asking which institutions produce the most capable, work-ready employees, and combines that perception data with admissions and academic measures. The result is an employer-driven view of value: the schools whose alumni the people doing the hiring rate most highly. Because perception shifts, Forbes updates the roster annually, and schools move on and off it from one year to the next.
The methodology is the key to interpreting the list correctly. A high placement signals strong employer regard for that school’s graduates, not that the school is objectively superior to an Ivy or to any school left off the list. It also means the list rewards fields and institutions that align with current hiring demand, which is why the New Ivies skew toward universities with strong professional, technical, and pre-professional outcomes. Families should read it as a guide to where employer confidence is concentrated, not as a fixed hierarchy.
Which schools are New Ivies?
Forbes names twenty schools each year, evenly split between public and private universities, and the exact roster changes annually. For the current year, well-documented private members include Carnegie Mellon, Emory, Georgetown, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Rice, Tufts, Vanderbilt, Washington University in St. Louis, and Case Western Reserve. The public side of the list features prominent flagship and technical universities widely recognized for strong outcomes, such as the University of California, Berkeley, the University of Michigan, Georgia Tech, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the University of Virginia, among others.
Because the list is Forbes’s proprietary, annually revised ranking, the most reliable way to see the complete and current twenty is to consult Forbes directly. What is useful for applicants is the pattern these schools share: highly regarded academics, strong employer relationships and recruiting pipelines, and career outcomes that rival the Ivy League, often paired with admissions odds that, while still competitive, are more attainable than the Ivies’ low single digits.
How the New Ivies differ from Public Ivies, Hidden Ivies, and the real Ivy League
The various Ivy labels are easy to confuse, but they come from different sources and mean different things. Conflating them is one of the most common mistakes families make when researching these schools.
| Term | Origin | What it describes |
|---|---|---|
| New Ivies | Forbes, annual since 2024 | 20 schools (10 public, 10 private) whose graduates employers rate highly |
| Public Ivies | Richard Moll, 1985 | Public universities offering an Ivy-caliber education |
| Hidden Ivies | Howard and Matthew Greene, 2000 | Selective private colleges beyond the Ivy League |
| Little Ivies | Informal, mid-20th century | A group of small, selective Northeastern liberal arts colleges |
| Ivy League | Athletic conference, 1954 | The eight original members: Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Penn, Princeton, Yale |
The practical point is that only the eight-member Ivy League is an actual, fixed group, an athletic conference whose membership has been stable for decades. The Public Ivies, Hidden Ivies, Little Ivies, and New Ivies are all descriptive labels coined by authors or publications to highlight schools that offer comparable quality or outcomes. The New Ivies is simply the newest and most employer-focused of these, and the only one updated on an annual basis.
What the New Ivies mean for your application strategy
For families aiming at elite outcomes, the most valuable use of the New Ivies list is as a tool for building a smarter, broader application list. Several of these schools deliver employer regard comparable to the Ivy League while admitting a meaningfully larger share of applicants, which can improve both the odds of admission and the return on a substantial tuition investment. For a high-income family weighing full-price options, that combination, strong outcomes with somewhat better admissions math, is worth taking seriously.
The caution is not to let a label substitute for fit. A school belongs on a list because it matches the student academically, financially, and personally, and because its specific outcomes in the student’s intended field are strong, not because it appears on a magazine ranking in a given year. Used well, the New Ivies framing expands the set of schools worth genuine consideration; used carelessly, it simply trades one form of prestige-chasing for another. The right approach is to research each school’s actual acceptance rate, cost, and career data, and to treat the list as the beginning of that work rather than the end of it.
Related reading: compare the options in New Ivies vs. the Ivy League, untangle the terminology in New Ivies vs. Hidden Ivies vs. Public Ivies, and see how the ranking is built in the Forbes New Ivies list explained.
Frequently Asked Questions About the New Ivies
No. The New Ivies is a label created by Forbes, which since 2024 has published an annual list of twenty universities, ten public and ten private, whose graduates are rated highly by employers. It is a media ranking based on employer and alumni surveys, not an official category and not affiliated with the actual Ivy League. The list also changes from year to year.
Forbes does, using surveys of hiring managers and recent graduates about which institutions produce the most capable, in-demand workers, combined with admissions and academic data. Because the methodology centers on employer perception rather than selectivity or endowment, the resulting list differs from traditional prestige rankings and shifts as survey results change each year.
No. Because the list is rebuilt each year from employer and graduate surveys, a school can move off it due to shifts in sample, methodology, or relative perception rather than any real decline in quality. The annual churn reflects the volatility of survey-based rankings, which is exactly why the list should inform research rather than serve as a permanent verdict on any school.
The Forbes list reflects that many employers value graduates of these twenty schools highly, in some cases rating them comparably to Ivy League graduates for job readiness. It does not mean employers rank them above Harvard or Yale across the board. The takeaway is that hiring outcomes depend heavily on the field, the employer, and the individual, not on Ivy membership alone.
It can usefully widen a list, but it should not drive it. The value of the New Ivies framing is that it highlights strong outcomes at schools families may have overlooked, which can improve both admissions odds and return on investment. The school should still fit the student academically, financially, and personally; the label is a starting point for research, not a verdict.
Generally yes, though several are still highly selective. Most New Ivies admit a larger share of applicants than the Ivy League’s low single-digit rates, which is part of their appeal: comparable employer regard with more attainable admission. Selectivity varies widely across the list, so each school’s specific acceptance rate and requirements should be checked individually.
It can be, particularly when strong employer outcomes come without the longest-shot admissions odds. For families paying full price, the relevant comparison is the specific school’s career outcomes, net cost, and fit against the alternatives, not the label itself. Some New Ivies are private and full-priced; others are public and far less expensive, which can change the return-on-investment calculation substantially.
Yes. Forbes updates the list annually, and schools move on and off it as survey results and data shift. That is why families should treat any single year’s roster as a snapshot rather than a permanent ranking, and should consult the most current Forbes list directly when using it to inform decisions.
Sources: Forbes New Ivies (annual list), NCES College Navigator, IPEDS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics., IPEDS, College Board BigFuture, IECA
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