Two things make the USA different from every other destination on this list: the length of post-study work available to STEM graduates, and the fact that a meaningful number of master's students pay substantially less than the sticker price through assistantships.
STEM OPT: three years, not one
Optional Practical Training gives most graduates twelve months of work authorisation. Graduates of designated STEM programmes can apply to extend that by a further 24 months — three years in total. For a two-year master's, that is three years of US work experience on the back of it.
Whether a programme is STEM-designated is a specific, checkable fact about that programme, not about the subject in general. It is worth confirming before you apply, because two programmes with near-identical names can differ on it. Immigration rules are set by US authorities and change; confirm the current position officially rather than from a consultancy's summary, ours included.
Assistantships change the cost picture
Teaching and research assistantships can cover a substantial share of tuition and carry a stipend. They are competitive, more common in research-heavy programmes than in professional master's, and often awarded by the department rather than the admissions office — which means the application that wins one frequently involves contacting faculty directly.
This is the single most under-used lever for Indian students applying to the USA, and the reason a US master's sometimes costs less in practice than its published tuition suggests.
What we actually list
We publish 36 programmes across 11 US universities, 30 at master's level, concentrated in Computer Science, Data Science, Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering. That is a deliberately small, checked list rather than a directory of every US university. See it at Masters in the USA.
The timeline is longer than you think
A Fall intake is the main one, and the work starts well over a year out. GRE where required, TOEFL or IELTS, recommendation letters that need real lead time from faculty, a statement of purpose that goes through several drafts, and then the visa stage after admission. Spring intakes exist and are smaller.
Our SOP readiness checker is free and worth running before you send a draft to anyone.
Costs
US tuition varies more than in any other destination — public in-state, public out-of-state, and private are three different markets. Living costs vary as widely between cities. Our cost-of-living comparison sets the USA beside the other destinations, and we publish per-programme fees where we have confirmed them against the university's own page.
The I-20, SEVIS and the order things happen in
After you accept an offer and show the university you can fund your first year, it issues an I-20. You then pay the SEVIS fee, complete the visa application and book an interview. Interview slots are a genuine bottleneck in peak season — this is the step that most often decides whether a Fall admit actually starts in Fall.
Nothing in that sequence can be rushed at the end, and every part of it sits after admission. Budget months for it, not weeks.
Do you still need the GRE?
Fewer programmes require it than did a few years ago, and a growing number are test-optional or have dropped it entirely. "Optional" is doing real work in that sentence, though: at a competitive programme, an optional strong score still helps, and an optional absent score is a gap another applicant has filled.
The only reliable answer is the programme's own admissions page for your intake. Where you do need it, our GRE hub has free practice.
Is it worth it?
For a STEM graduate who lands an assistantship and uses the full OPT extension, the US route is hard to beat on earnings. For a student paying full private tuition with no assistantship and no STEM designation, it is the most expensive option here by a wide margin. The gap between those two outcomes is why this destination rewards planning earlier than the others.
Full country guide: Study in the USA.