Online MBA students tend to be older than full-time candidates and looking for a career acceleration: they enter the programs with relatively high pay and it generally surges higher still on graduation. The increase can be as high as nearly 50 percent after a few years and the actual salary achieved above $200,000 on average. 

An MBA is traditionally a generalist management degree, giving students a solid theoretical foundation in every aspect of running a business, from marketing and sales to finance and accounting. Increasingly, though, these flagship business degrees are going niche. See the Top 10 Specialized Online MBAs here.