Funded PhD OR Unfunded MS??

[GeeSa]

Hi all,

I am a 2015 graduate in Electronics and Instrumentation Engineering (allied field of Electrical) and I spent the last few months working in an Optics lab in order to build my profile to get accepted for MS/PhD (open to both) in Applied Physics/ Electrical Engineering/ Optics. Note that in my undergraduate coursework, I've not had any courses related to Optics and it's my field of interest and therefore, I'm open to MS.

So far I've received three offers- one funded PhD in Electrical, one unfunded MS in Applied Physics (2 years course) and a partially funded MS in Optics (1-2 years). All three schools are highly ranked in their respective fields, plus, there is interesting work going on in the research sub-field of my interest. Also, in the first two schools, I have the option of working under any Lab so I could move to a more pure Physics-centric Optics group.

The second and third offers  that I have are great for Optics BUT the tuition fee is a bomb with no other sources of possible funding. My first offer is also really good, but it's under Electrical so I'm guessing the breadth would be a little restrictive.
Would really appreciate some advice on what to do and where to go!!!

[rising_star]

Take the funding and don't look back, unless you're having doubts about doing a PhD.

[GeeSa]

Absolutely no doubts about doing PhD, that's my aim
Thank you for the opinion!