U.S. News & World Report is an American media company that publishes consumer advice, rankings and analysis. Founded as a news weekly magazine in 1933, U.S. News transitioned to a digital-only publication in 2010. U.S. News is best known today for its influential Best Colleges and Best Hospitals rankings, but it has expanded its content and product offerings in education, health, money, careers, travel, and cars.

The editorial staff of U.S. News & World Report is based in Washington, D.C. Brian Kelly has been the chief content officer since April 2007.

United States News was founded in 1933 by David Lawrence (1888–1973), who also started World Report in 1946. The two magazines initially covered national and international news separately, but Lawrence merged them into U.S. News & World Report in 1948 and subsequently sold the magazine to his employees.

Historically, the magazine tended to be slightly more conservative than its two primary competitors, Time and Newsweek, and focused more on economic, health, and education stories. It also eschewed sports, entertainment, and celebrity news.

Important milestones in the early history of the magazine include the introduction of Washington Whispers in 1934 and the News You Can Use column in 1952. In 1958, the weekly magazine's circulation passed one million and reached two million by 1973.

Since 1983, it has become known primarily for its influential ranking and annual reports of colleges and graduate schools, spanning across most fields and subjects. U.S. News & World Report is America's oldest and best-known ranking of academic institutions, and covers the fields of business, law, medicine, engineering, education, social sciences and public affairs, in addition to many other areas. Its print edition was consistently included in national bestseller lists, augmented by online subscriptions. Additional rankings published by U.S. News & World Report include hospitals, medical specialties and automobiles.

In October 1984, publisher and real estate developer Mortimer B. Zuckerman purchased U.S. News & World Report. Zuckerman is also the owner of the New York Daily News.

In 1993, U.S. News & World Report entered the digital world by providing content to CompuServe and in 1995, the website usnews.com was launched. In 2001, the website won the National Magazine Award for General Excellence Online.

In 2007, U.S. News & World Report published its first list of the nation's best high schools. Its ranking methodology includes state test scores and the success of poor and minority students on these exams, and schools' performance in Advanced Placement tests.

Starting in June 2008, the magazine reduced its publication frequency in three steps. It switched in June 2008 from weekly to biweekly. In November 2008 it decreased to monthly. In November 2010, it was reported that U.S News & World Report would be switched to an online-only format, effective after it published its December issue, with the exception of print publishing special issues on colleges, hospitals, and personal finance. Moving forward, the publication expressed its plans to focus mainly on research and the provision of relevant information to students pursuing higher education. Its rankings and university guide books are available in print at the majority of bookstores and magazine vendors in the United States, selling millions of copies on an annual basis.

In June 2008, citing the decline overall magazine circulation and advertising, U.S. News & World Report announced that it will become a biweekly publication, starting January 2009. It hoped advertisers would be attracted to the schedule, which allowed ads to stay on newsstands a week longer. However, five months later the magazine changed its frequency again, becoming monthly.

In August 2008, U.S. News expanded and revamped its online opinion section. The new version of the opinion page included daily new op-ed content as well as the new Thomas Jefferson Street blog.

An internal memo was sent on November 5, 2010, to the staff of the magazine informing them that the "December issue will be our last print monthly sent to subscribers, whose remaining print and digital replica subscriptions will be filled by other publishers". The memo went on to say that the publication would be moving to a primarily digital format but that it would continue to print special issues such as "the college and grad guides, as well as hospital and personal finance guides."

The company is owned by U.S. News & World Report, L.P., a privately held company based in the Daily News building in New York City. The editorial staff is headquartered in Washington, D.C. The company's move to the Web made it possible for U.S. News & World Report to expand its service journalism with the introduction of several consumer-facing rankings products. The company returned to profitability in 2013.

In 1983, U.S. News & World Report published its first "America's Best Colleges" report. The rankings have been compiled and published annually since 1985 and are the most widely quoted of their kind in the United States.

These rankings are based upon data that U.S. News & World Report collects from each educational institution from an annual survey sent to each school. The rankings are also based upon opinion surveys of university faculties and administrators who do not belong to the schools.

The popularity of U.S. News & World Report's Best Colleges rankings is reflected in its 2014 release, which brought 2.6 million unique visitors and 18.9 million page views to usnews.com in one day. Traffic came from over 3,000 sites, including Facebook and Google.

U.S. News & World Report continues to publish comprehensive college guides in book form.

Robert Morse created the U.S. News Best Colleges rankings methodology, and continues to oversee its application as chief data strategist at U.S. News. In 2014, the Washington Post featured a profile of Morse, exploring his 30-year career with the publication.

In October 2014, the U.S. News & World Report published its inaugural "Best Global Universities" rankings.[19] Inside Higher Ed noted that the U.S. News is entering into the international college and university rankings area that is already "dominated by three major global university rankings", namely the Times Higher Education World University Rankings, the Academic Ranking of World Universities, and the QS World University Rankings.[20] Robert Morse stated that "it’s natural for U.S. News to get into this space."[20] Morse also noted that the U.S. News "will also be the first American publisher to enter the global rankings space."

Main article: Criticism of college and university rankings (North America)

During the 1990s, several educational institutions in the United States were involved in a movement to boycott the U.S. News & World Report college rankings survey. The first was Reed College, which stopped submitting the survey in 1995. The survey was also criticized by Alma College, Stanford University, and St. John's College during the late 1990s.

SAT scores play a role in The U.S. News & World Report college rankings even though U.S. News is not empowered with the ability to formally verify or recalculate the scores that are represented to them by schools. Since the mid-1990s there have been many instances documented by the popular press wherein schools lied about their SAT scores in order to obtain a higher ranking.

Main article: Criticism of college and university rankings (2007 United States)

On June 19, 2007, during the annual meeting of the Annapolis Group, members discussed the letter to college presidents asking them not to participate in the "reputation survey" section of the U.S. News & World Report survey (this section comprises 25% of the ranking).

As a result, "a majority of the approximately 80 presidents at the meeting said that they did not intend to participate in the U.S. News reputational rankings in the future". The statement also said that its members "have agreed to participate in the development of an alternative common format that presents information about their colleges for students and their families to use in the college search process". This database will be web-based and developed in conjunction with higher-education organizations including the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities and the Council of Independent Colleges.

On June 22, 2007, U.S. News & World Report editor Robert Morse issued a response in which he argued, "in terms of the peer assessment survey, we at U.S. News firmly believe the survey has significant value because it allows us to measure the 'intangibles' of a college that we can't measure through statistical data. Plus, the reputation of a school can help get that all-important first job and plays a key part in which grad school someone will be able to get into. The peer survey is by nature subjective, but the technique of asking industry leaders to rate their competitors is a commonly accepted practice. The results from the peer survey also can act to level the playing field between private and public colleges". In reference to the alternative database discussed by the Annapolis Group, Morse also argued, "It's important to point out that the Annapolis Group's stated goal of presenting college data in a common format has been tried before [...] U.S. News has been supplying this exact college information for many years already. And it appears that NAICU will be doing it with significantly less comparability and functionality. U.S. News first collects all these data (using an agreed-upon set of definitions from the Common Data Set). Then we post the data on our website in easily accessible, comparable tables. In other words, the Annapolis Group and the others in the NAICU initiative actually are following the lead of U.S. News".

Some higher education experts, such as Kevin Carey of Education Sector, have argued that U.S. News and World Report's college rankings system is merely a list of criteria that mirrors the superficial characteristics of elite colleges and universities. According to Carey, the U.S. News ranking system is deeply flawed. Instead of focusing on the fundamental issues of how well colleges and universities educate their students and how well they prepare them to be successful after college, the magazine's rankings are almost entirely a function of three factors: fame, wealth, and exclusivity. He suggests that there are more important characteristics parents and students should research to select colleges, such as how well students are learning and how likely students are to earn a degree.