International Competitions for High School Students

Participating in an international academic competition is a level beyond what most middle school and high school students have experienced. The events can be eye-opening and inspiring, as well as intense and demanding. Just qualifying for these competitions often requires advancing through several rounds of preliminary tournaments so that, on the day of the final test, students are competing against the best of the best from 50 to 100 countries.

Participating in one of these tournaments also comes with academic advantages, like meeting with and learning from leading scholars and professors. What’s more, performing well in the eyes of these leaders is a prestigious honor that can open doors to exciting post-graduation opportunities, enhancing your college application. These competitions are also great extracurriculars that colleges like to see on applications.

Looking for more opportunities to earn recognition? Have a look at our list of awards for high school students, as well as opportunities to present your academic research at Polygence’s symposium. 

Here is our list of the 8 best international competitions for high schoolers.

Top 8 International Competitions for High School Students

#1 International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO)

Description of the competition: The first International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) took place in Romania in 1959, and the contest has been held every year since then (except for 1980). In recent years, more than 100 countries have participated in the competition. The test questions tend to be extremely difficult, requiring extensive knowledge of algebra, complex geometry, and combinatorics. Interestingly, despite also branching out into number theory and functional equations, the competition ensures that calculus is never required to solve the problems—although it is permissible and often helpful. The 2025 edition of the competition will take place in Australia, then Shanghai will host the event in 2026.

Entry requirements and judging criteria: In order to qualify for the IMO, students must first be selected by their home country to join their national team. The selection process varies from country to country. In the United States, the top scorers in the United States of America Mathematical Olympiad (USAMO) form the team for the IMO. Just qualifying for the USAMO, however, is extremely challenging and requires advancing through several rounds of tests.

At the IMO, the test contains only six questions, each worth up to seven points. The test is split into two days, with three questions per day. Competitors have four and a half hours to complete the three questions. Past problems are available for download (in multiple languages). Here is the first problem from last year’s test:

Awards and recognition: Participants in the IMO may earn gold, silver, or bronze medals depending on their performance. The exact cutoffs are not determined until after the tests have been completed. However, on average, participants scoring in the top 48% may receive a bronze medal, in the top 24% a silver medal, and the top 8% a gold medal.

#2 Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF)

Overview of the program and its objectives: The Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) is the highest level of competition organized by the Society for Science. This final event hosts more than 1600 participants for a week of scientific presentations each May. The goal of the program is to encourage high school students to conduct research and share their findings with the scientific community. Society for Science is based in the U.S., but welcomes participants from around the world. 

How to participate and what to expect: ISEF participants qualify for the event by presenting their science projects at smaller fairs around the country and around the world. Many regional fairs are associated with the Society for Science, and accept both scientific research and engineering design projects. At all levels, including ISEF, judges award points based on a number of factors related to the project presentation board. For science projects, those factors are:

• Importance and testability of the research question

• Experimental design

• Data collection, analysis, and interpretation

• Creativity of the project

• Clarity of the presentation

For engineering projects, the judges examine:

• Practicality and explanation of the research problem

• Design and methodology

• Construction and testing

• Creativity of the project

• Clarity of the presentation

In addition, judges visit the presentation boards to ask participants clarifying questions about their projects. This is called the interview, and it is also factored into the judges’ scores. ISEF’s complete scoring guidelines, the Grand Award Judging Criteria, include key items to consider for evaluation both before and after the interview.

For more tips, check out Polygence’s complete guide to winning ISEF!

Opportunities and benefits: The top prize at ISEF is a $75,000 cash award. Other awards and scholarships are also available for top scorers in the 22 categories, such as biomedical and health sciences, physics and astronomy, and more.

#3 The Queen's Commonwealth Essay Competition

Explanation of the competition and its goals: The Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition is designed to encourage literacy and a passion for writing throughout the Commonwealth countries and territories. It was first held in 1883 and in recent years, has received about 10,000 to 15,000 entries annually. 

Eligibility and competition structure: The competition is open to citizens and residents of Commonwealth nations, plus Hong Kong, Ireland, and Zimbabwe. There are two categories: under 14 years old (junior division) and 14-18 years old (senior division). Each year, the Royal Commonwealth Society (RCS) announces four essay questions that participants in each category may respond to. The questions are usually related to the values of the Royal Commonwealth Society (literacy, equality and inclusion, the environment, and connected communities). For instance, last year’s participants had the option to “Write a speech highlighting what you think is the most challenging issue facing the world today and how Commonwealth values can be used to solve it.” Each participant may only submit one essay, and essays must be submitted between March 15 and May 15.

Benefits of participation: All contestants receive a Certificate of Participation. In addition, the authors of the top essays receive gold, silver, or bronze awards. Finally, the winner and runner-up from each category are offered a trip to London (with a guardian), where they participate in educational and cultural events organized by the RCS.

Are you a writer? Check out our complete list of international essay competitions for high schoolers!

#4 International Chemistry Olympiad (IChO)

Description of the IChO and its objectives: The International Chemistry Olympiad (IChO) is an International Science Olympiad for high school/secondary school students. About 80 countries participate in the event annually. The first edition took place in Prague in 1968. The event will be hosted by the United Arab Emirates in 2025 and by Uzbekistan in 2026. The primary goal ​​of the IChO is to encourage and challenge students who are interested in chemistry to develop creative solutions to chemical problems. In addition, the IChO aims to facilitate international cooperation and understanding among young scientists from different nationalities.

Competition structure and entry requirements: Each national team is limited to four students, and different countries have their unique processes for selecting their teams. For example, in the United States, the American Chemical Society (ACS) organizes the U.S. National Chemistry Olympiad, beginning with local competitions each March leading up to the national competition in April. The ACS invites the top 20 students from the national competition to participate in a rigorous, two-week study camp, which will determine the four students who will represent the U.S. at the IChO.

Benefits and prizes: Being selected to participate in the IChO is a prestigious honor. Furthermore, competitors have the opportunity to earn recognition based on their scores: the top 12% of individual participants in the IChO receive gold medals. In contrast, participants between the 13th and 34th percentiles receive silver medals, and students in the 35th to 66th percentiles receive bronze medals.

#5 Conrad Challenge

Introduction to the Conrad Challenge: The Conrad Challenge is an opportunity for high school students to experience a simulated version of the entrepreneurial process. The competition is divided into four stages, each aimed at empowering students to develop creative solutions to real-world problems using STEM tools.

How to join and participate: To join the competition, participants must be between 13 and 18 years old. There is no option to enter solo: students must form teams of 2-5, and must also have a coach or experienced mentor. As mentioned above, the competition takes place over four stages:

• Activation 

• Lean Canvas

• Innovation

• Power Pitch

In the Activation stage, students form groups and find a coach or mentor to accompany the team throughout the Challenge. The Lean Canvas stage is based on the “lean canvas” model in business. In the context of the Conrad Challenge, the goal is to generate several possible ideas for real-world innovations and then evaluate each idea by breaking it down into its most important components. After evaluating each idea, teams choose their best one and move forward with it to the Innovation stage. At this point, teams flesh out the details and begin developing a business plan to bring the product to market. Finally, the competition judges select a handful of teams to participate in the Power Pitch stage, in which the teams pitch their ideas in person.

Opportunities and benefits: In addition to benefiting from a structured format in which to learn about entrepreneurship, finalists are invited to present their pitches at the Conrad Challenge Innovation Summit. The top teams at the Summit receive prizes such as college tuition scholarships, new laptop computers, and more.

If you are a high schooler and interested in business, visit our complete list of entrepreneurship competitions for high school students.

#6 International History Olympiad

Overview of the Olympiad and its objectives: Every two years, history students from around the world meet and compete at the International History Olympiad. Founded in 2015 in Williamsburg, VA, this competition is relatively new compared to the other international olympiads featured on this list. International Academic Competitions (IAC) administers the competition, which aims to celebrate history with high school and secondary school students who are passionate about history. The 2025 edition of the competition will take place in London.

Eligibility and competition format: Students are eligible to compete in one of several competition categories based on their grade level in school. The high school divisions are junior varsity (9th and 10th graders) and varsity (11th and 12th graders). The competition includes a variety of testing formats, including:

• Multiple-choice exams

• Buzzer-type bowls

• Written/historiographical assessments

• History Olympians can also join the “Hexathlon,” a speed round in which competitors must unravel crosswords, maps, and audio clues in under 15 minutes. In addition, the week-long Olympiad also includes a number of exciting field trips and academic events such as historical simulations and symposiums to attend. As with other international olympiads, students wishing to compete in the International History Olympiad must first qualify through the affiliated regional- and national-level events, such as the United States History Bee.

Awards and recognition: The IAC awards gold, silver, and bronze medals to the top scorers in each event throughout the Olympiad.

Learn more about history research for budding high school historians! 

#7 International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI)

Description of the competition: The International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI) is an annual programming competition for high school and secondary school students. The first competition took place in 1989 in Bulgaria. The competition has grown to include more than 80 countries in recent years. The 2024 competition will take place in Egypt, followed by Bolivia and Uzbekistan in 2025 and 2026, respectively.

How to participate and what to expect: In order to qualify for the IOI, students must be in grades 9-12 and be selected by their home country to compete at the international level. For student programmers in the United States, that means finishing within the top four at the USA Computing Olympiad (USACO). 

The IOI takes place over two days of competition. Each day, participants have five hours to solve three complex programming problems. The majority of IOI competitors use C++ as their programming language of choice. The questions tend to focus on mathematical concepts, such as number theory and statistics, while challenging the competitor’s ability to produce problem-solving algorithms. Sample problems from the USACO are available online. 

Awards and recognition: Competitors who score in the top 50% of the IOI field receive bronze medals, those who crack the top 25% earn silver medals, and only the top 8% of participants are awarded gold medals.

#8 The International Geography Olympiad (iGeo)

Overview of iGeo and its objectives: The International Geography Olympiad (iGeo) is an opportunity for students to showcase and earn recognition for excellence in the field of geography. The 2025 edition of the competition will be held in Bangkok, followed by Istanbul in 2026 (Turkey was supposed to host the event in 2021, but the organizers moved the competition online due to the COVID-19 pandemic). 

Eligibility and competition format: The competition is open to students aged 15-19 who have qualified through their respective national tournaments — in the U.S., the affiliated tournament is the United States Geography Championships. The competition tests participants through fieldwork and written examinations. During the fieldwork portion of the competition, participants explore the local area in the vicinity of the host city. The competition supplies them with resources such as topographical and transport maps, and participants must answer technical questions as they follow the designated route. For instance, the 2023 competition took place in Bandung (Indonesia). As part of the field assignment, competitors were tasked with assessing road quality (conditions, number of lanes, etc.) as well as land use (commercial, residential, agricultural, etc.). 

The other section of the test requires students to compose short responses based on geographical information from around the world. For the first portion of the written exam in 2023, students were provided with a printout of a map of central Asia to answer the following prompt: 

Describe the drainage pattern surrounding the Aral Sea and name any appropriate technical term(s) that apply to this sort of basin.

Benefits and recognition: Students who finish in the top 50% of the competition are awarded gold, silver, and bronze medals (the exact distribution is decided after the test has been completed).

Curious about geography? Check out our article on exciting opportunities for geography majors!

How to Prepare for International Competitions

Successfully preparing for international competitions is a rigorous process requiring time, focus, and above all, help from mentors. Several of the competitions listed above actually have built-in preparation processes for finalists. The American Chemical Society, as mentioned above, trains the top 20 finalists with materials specifically designed to help them perform at their best when representing the U.S. at the International Chemistry Olympiad. This typically includes reviewing topics that the test writers focus on, as well as going over strategies for approaching the IChO’s test format. How well students synthesize information and perform on practice exams during and following this training camp determines the four international team members.

However, there is no built-in training available for students wishing to qualify for the national finals in any of these global competitions. Up to that point, participants are typically working closely with their own school teachers and other mentors to maximize their test performance. Finding and working closely with a dedicated and experienced one-on-one mentor can play a huge role in how far students advance in international competitions and how much they get out of the experience personally and intellectually.

Next Steps with Polygence

Polygence specializes in matching students with mentors for international competitions, independent research projects, and more. Our goal is to empower students to go farther with their academic goals by connecting them with accomplished experts who know the ins and outs of every aspect of their field. Our program is built around one-on-one mentorship, giving students the time and resources they need to explore and ask the questions that are important to them.

Participating in international competitions allows students to connect with other ambitious young scholars from around the world while earning recognition for their academic excellence and openness to challenge. If you are looking for a mentor to help you prepare for and benefit as much as possible from your chosen international competition, apply for Polygence’s Core Program today!