Average student loan debt has been on the rise in the last decade as families try to keep up with soaring college costs. For the first time in at least 10 years of data that U.S. News has collected, the average total student debt among recent college graduates who borrowed to pay for school exceeded $30,000, setting a new record high.

College graduates from the class of 2019 who took out student loans borrowed $30,062 on average, according to data reported to U.S. News in its annual survey. That's around $6,300 more than borrowers from the class of 2009 had to shoulder – representing a more than 26% increase in the amount students borrow.

Meanwhile, a smaller percentage of students are borrowing money to pay for college. In 2009, about 68% of college graduates took on student loan debt, while in 2019, about 65% of graduates borrowed student loans.

The average total student loan debt, which includes both federal and private loans, jumped more than $1,000 in some years over the last decade, but recent years have brought only small bumps and even a slight decline in the amount borrowed. That average increased slightly to $30,062 for the class of 2019 from $29,843 for the class of 2018 – a less than 1% increase.

Even this small increase in average total debt, however, means getting closer to the maximum amount of federal loans a student can receive, which is $31,000 in subsidized and unsubsidized direct loans, as set by the Department of Education for most undergraduates.

Student loan borrowing is often tied to the cost of college tuition and fees, which, per U.S. News data for the last 20 years, has more than doubled across ranked private and public National Universities – schools that are often research-oriented and offer bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees.

But tuition and fees in 2020-2021 actually cost less on average among all ranked schools than they did in 2019-2020. Some experts say this is evidence of colleges exercising more caution in raising prices in recent years.

"Part of it can be explained by demographics. Between 2010 and 2018, undergraduate enrollment fell by 8%, to 16.6 million students. So that's 1.5 million fewer students, and some private schools, in particular, have to be cautious about raising tuition if they want to remain competitive," Robert Humann, general manager at Credible, a marketplace for private student lenders, wrote in an email to U.S. News.

However, these tuition and debt figures predate the coronavirus pandemic, which is likely to affect both the cost of college and the amount students borrow. Humann predicts colleges may need to raise tuition if state funding for higher education is cut due to the economic effects of the pandemic. He also says the average amount individual students borrow will rise significantly as families feel the financial strains of the pandemic.

Student loans are already a significant burden for many Americans. The national student loan debt reached $1.6 trillion in June 2019, according to the Federal Reserve, which also reports that in 2018, 2 in 10 of those who took on education debt and still owe money are behind on their payments.

And there's a severe racial disparity within student loan default rates: One recent federal study, for example, found that six years after students enrolled in college in 2011-2012, 13% of white borrowers in repayment were in default while default rates were 20% for Hispanic borrowers and 32% for Black borrowers in repayment.

As prospective and returning college students weigh whether to borrow for school, they should also keep in mind that these numbers only tell part of the story.

"The total individual debt number doesn't really get to the heart of what people are experiencing," says Cody Hounanian, program director of nonprofit advocacy group Student Debt Crisis. "We hear from borrowers every day who cannot afford their student loan payments, who cannot put food on the table. The average individual debt is usually somewhere in the $30,000 range, but when you look at the most distressed student loan borrowers who are in default, they are often in the single digits, less than $10,000."