Iowa has 35 private and 3 public 4-year colleges that enroll 19,560 first-year students yearly. The average tuition of public colleges is $23,306 for in-state students and $39,465 for out-of-state and international students.

Private colleges in Iowa charge around $35,674 per year in tuition regardless of residency.

In the 2021-2022 academic year, Iowa provided $11.7 million in financial aid to 2,428 students who enrolled in 4-year colleges for the first time as undergraduates. In addition, the colleges themselves awarded $244.5 million in grants and scholarships to 15,946 students.

Iowa receives less than 1% of the total pell grant the federal government allocates. In the 2021-2022 academic year, 4,790 4-year college first-year undergraduates were awarded a total amount of $22.4 million in pell grant ($4,852 per student on average), and 10,413 students received a total amount of $56.2 million in the form of student loans from the federal government ($6,055 per student on average).