It’s not hard finding online schools offering distance and e-learning. What is hard is finding one that is accredited and legitimate. But what’s even harder is figuring out what an online school should cost.

There’s a lot of competition among online schools. And diploma mills–fake colleges that give you a fake diploma–often have low costs so they can scam more people.

On top of that, online schools are aware that they have a better chance of getting you to buy into one of their programs if they don’t talk about the price—especially not on their homepage.

So it’s hard to know what online schools should cost.

So what’s the deal? (and we mean literally).

Online learning is still cheaper than attending a brick and mortar university. You avoid all kinds of hidden college costs like transportation and room & board.

But an online degree doesn’t come cheap either.

Most schools, whether they’re state institutions, private colleges with distant learning programs or pure online schools require somewhere between 120 and 128 credits for any type of undergraduate degree.

A typical fee for an undergraduate credit is somewhere around $175. So according to our math skills, a 120 credit degree would put you in the hole by $21,000. That’s a lot of money—but a lot less than many students are paying for a college degree.