Pennsylvania research universities: usability rankings

Usability scores, grades, and the most common failures for 11 Pennsylvania research university websites, from ScanGov homepage scans.

  • Sites: 11
  • Last scan: 11/8/2026

Showing Pennsylvania research university sites. All education sites

R1 and R2 universities in Pennsylvania, public and private together.

D 60

Average usability score of 10 fully scanned Pennsylvania research university sites

13th

of 17 states, ranked by average usability score

10 of 11

Pennsylvania research university sites fully scanned. We couldn't fully scan 1, so they're listed without grades

D 68

Average usability score of all 2,687 fully scanned education sites

How Pennsylvania usability scores are distributed

Smoothed distribution of the 10 fully scanned Pennsylvania research university sites, score 0 to 100. Height shows how many sites score near each value.

  • Pennsylvania average
  • All education average
View the data table
Score rangeSites
0 to 90
10 to 190
20 to 290
30 to 390
40 to 493
50 to 591
60 to 694
70 to 790
80 to 892
90 to 1000

Pennsylvania research universities by usability grade, compared with all education sites

Share of fully scanned sites in each grade band. Pennsylvania research universities: 10 sites. All education: 2687 sites.

  1. Pennsylvania
  2. All education sites
  • A (90 to 100)
  • B to C (70 to 89)
  • D to F (below 70)
View the data table
GroupA (90 to 100)B to C (70 to 89)D to F (below 70)
Pennsylvania0% (0)20% (2)80% (8)
All education sites11% (289)42% (1,124)47% (1,274)

Top 3 Pennsylvania research university sites by usability score

#1 in Pennsylvania · U.S. education rank 9

Drexel University

B 81 usability

  • Accessibility B
  • Botability B
  • Security C
  • Usability B
  • Readability F

#1 in Pennsylvania · U.S. education rank 9

Duquesne University

B 81 usability

  • Accessibility A
  • Botability A
  • Security D
  • Usability B
  • Readability F

#2 in Pennsylvania · U.S. education rank 17

University of Pennsylvania

D 68 usability

  • Accessibility A
  • Botability B
  • Security C
  • Usability D
  • Readability A

Most common usability failures among Pennsylvania research university sites

Share of the 10 fully scanned Pennsylvania research university sites failing each check. A site can fail more than one check. Each check links to the sites failing it, or to its standard when we have no list yet.

  1. Open Graph image alt90%
  2. Open Graph image80%
  3. First Contentful Paint (FCP)60%
  4. Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)60%
  5. Open Graph description60%
View the data table
CheckShare failingSites failing
Open Graph image alt90%9
Open Graph image80%8
First Contentful Paint (FCP)60%6
Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)60%6
Open Graph description60%6

What each check means

  • Open Graph image alt. The social media preview image has alt text for screen readers. Screen readers cannot describe shared images.
  • Open Graph image. The page has a preview image for social media cards. Shared links have no image on social media.
  • First Contentful Paint (FCP). The page starts displaying content within 1.8 seconds. Users see blank screen and think site is broken.
  • Largest Contentful Paint (LCP). The page's main content loads within 2.5 seconds. Users wait too long and leave your page.
  • Open Graph description. The page has a description for social media previews. Shared links have no description on social media.

Every education site with one problem

Research universities in Pennsylvania by usability score

Rank Site Checks passed Grade
1 drexel.edu
Drexel University U.S. rank 9 		13 of 16 checks pass B
1 duq.edu
Duquesne University U.S. rank 9 		13 of 16 checks pass B
2 upenn.edu
University of Pennsylvania U.S. rank 17 		11 of 16 checks pass D
3 psu.edu
Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus U.S. rank 18 		10 of 15 checks pass D
4 www2.lehigh.edu
Lehigh University U.S. rank 20 		10 of 16 checks pass D
5 temple.edu
Temple University U.S. rank 21 		9 of 15 checks pass D
6 jefferson.edu
Thomas Jefferson University U.S. rank 23 		9 of 16 checks pass F
7 cmu.edu
Carnegie Mellon University U.S. rank 27 		7 of 16 checks pass F
8 pitt.edu
University of Pittsburgh-Pittsburgh Campus U.S. rank 29 		6 of 15 checks pass F
8 wcupa.edu
West Chester University of Pennsylvania U.S. rank 29 		6 of 15 checks pass F
iup.edu
Indiana University of Pennsylvania-Main Campus 		Not fully scanned, so not graded. We couldn't scan your site because it showed our bot a captcha or browser check instead of the page. Status 996 -

About this data

ScanGov scans the homepage of each college and university site on our higher education list. Scores come from the checks in the ScanGov standards. Sites were scanned between 10/25/2026 and 11/8/2026. Each site's report shows its own scan date. A site counts as fully scanned when its homepage loaded and sent us its page content. Averages, grade shares, failure rates, and ranks use fully scanned sites only. We could not fully scan 1 sites. They did not respond, blocked the scanner, or sent no page content. They appear in the table without grades, with their scan status, and are left out of every figure. Grades follow the ScanGov grade scale. Rank follows the ScanGov ranking method. The full dataset, with every county's raw results, is in the ScanGov data repository.

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