The 10 most prestigious math competitions for international students

A mathematics result is the hardest credential in school to fake and the easiest for an admissions reader to interpret. It is a number, it is dated, and somebody else awarded it.

The difficulty is that the famous ones are closed. You cannot enter the International Mathematical Olympiad, your country picks you for it. So this list separates the four that need a national team place from the six you can enter yourself, and says plainly which ones need you to get on a plane.

International Mathematical Olympiad

The IMO is the oldest and most recognised of all school science olympiads, and a medal from it is understood everywhere without explanation.

It has grown every year. The 2024 edition in Bath drew 108 countries and 609 contestants. The 2025 edition on Australia's Sunshine Coast had 110 countries and 630 contestants. The 2026 edition was held in Shanghai, with 117 countries and 666 contestants.

Each country sends "a team consisting of up to six contestants", a Leader and a Deputy Leader, and the regulations say those six "should be selected through that Country's national Mathematical Olympiad or equivalent selection programme". That national olympiad is your actual entry point.

To be eligible you must have been born on or after 1 July twenty years before the competition, and have been "normally enrolled in full-time primary or secondary education" on or after 1 December of the previous year.

The medal rules are generous once you are there. The total number of prizes "must not exceed half the total number of Contestants", and gold, silver and bronze are awarded "approximately in the ratio 1:2:3". Half of everyone who competes leaves with a medal, and those who do not can still receive a Certificate of Honourable Mention.

Two rules matter if you have moved country. A contestant should normally be a citizen of the country they represent, but a long-term foreign resident may compete for the country educating them after "at least one full academic year" there, with two years of secondary education there in total. And the IMO is explicit that you may not shop around: "a student may not attempt the final selection examinations of more than one country in a given IMO year."

Mohamed Abdelmeguid went from Egypt to MIT on a full ride to study mathematics. He represented Egypt at the IMO in 2022 and was on the national team for 2022 and 2023, took silver at the Arab Math Olympiad, and won the Kangaroo Math Cup in 2023 against more than 5,000 participants.

His personal statement was about none of it. He wrote about losing someone close to him and deciding to produce happiness for others rather than consume it. The olympiad was the evidence. The essay was about who he had become.

Romanian Masters of Mathematics

The RMM is the hardest mathematics competition for school students in the world, and the least known outside the olympiad community. It exists to give the strongest countries problems harder than the IMO sets.

"Participation in the RMM is by invitation only", and invitations go out at least two months before the contest. Teams are "four students from each invited team", and a country may enter up to six.

Eligibility is the same principle as the IMO: "Students must not have formally enrolled at a university or any other equivalent post-secondary institution."

You do not apply to this one. You get here by being at the top of the country that gets invited, which in practice means your national olympiad first and the IMO team after it.

European Girls' Mathematical Olympiad

The EGMO describes itself as "the premier European mathematics competition, made exclusively for high school female students who enjoy mathematics beyond the regular school curriculum", and it now includes over sixty countries.

Participation is by invitation, with "each country nominating up to four students". The competition runs over two days with three problems each day, and "medals are awarded to about half of the students", the same proportion as the IMO.

The name describes where it started rather than who may compete. Countries outside Europe take part, and the 2024 edition was held in Tskaltubo, Georgia, with Prishtina in Kosovo hosting in 2025.

If you are a girl who does mathematics outside Europe, the question for your national olympiad organisers is whether your country has been invited, and that is worth asking rather than assuming.

Asian Pacific Mathematics Olympiad

The APMO is the one on this list that removes every barrier except the mathematics. There is no travel, no delegation and no selection camp. You sit the paper where you are.

It is held "in the afternoon of the second Monday of March for participating countries in the North and South Americas, and in the morning of the second Tuesday of March for participating countries on the Western Pacific and in Asia". Despite the name it covers the whole Pacific Rim, the Americas included.

The entry rule is unusually open: "Any number of students may sit the exam in each country, but the results of at most 10 of them per country can be sent for official participation." Your school or national organiser can let a whole class try, and send the ten best.

Eligibility matches the IMO. Contestants "should not have formally enrolled at a university" and "must be younger than 20 years of age on the 1st July of the year of the contest".

For a student whose family cannot fund international travel, this is the most prestigious result available without leaving home.

Pan-African Mathematical Olympiad

The PAMO has run every year since 1987 and is organised by the African Mathematical Union. The 2026 edition, the 33rd, was held in Yamoussoukro in Côte d'Ivoire, where 159 students from 26 countries competed and Algeria finished first, ahead of Morocco and Côte d'Ivoire.

Each team is six participants, and since 2015 the composition has been fixed at "3 girls and three boys", alongside a team leader and deputy. The union also runs a separate Pan African Mathematical Olympiad for Girls.

Competitors must be secondary school students "less than twenty (20) years old", and selection runs through each country's national olympiad.

The gender rule is worth knowing if you are a girl in an African country whose national olympiad is dominated by boys. Three of the six places are yours by regulation.

International Mathematical Modeling Challenge

The IM²C calls itself "the world's premier international mathematical modeling competition for secondary school students", and it asks for something different from every olympiad above. Teams take a messy problem from the world and build a model of it, with data analysis and a written report rather than proofs under exam conditions.

It launched in 2014 with 10 countries and now has 54 countries and regions represented. Teams compete first in their own country or region, and a maximum of two teams per country or region go through to the international round.

This suits a different student from the olympiads. If you are strong at mathematics but have never enjoyed sitting a timed paper, this is the competition where that stops mattering.

Harvard-MIT Math Tournament

HMMT is run by students at Harvard and MIT and is open to "high school students around the world". HMMT November is held at Harvard and HMMT February at MIT, with the next editions on 7 November 2026 and 13 February 2027.

November teams are four to six competitors and February teams are six to eight. Registrants must be "under the age of 21" and "enrolled in full-time primary or secondary education". A coach or responsible adult registers on behalf of a school team, a club or an informal group, and a single organisation may send at most five teams and three individuals to November.

Registration is $80 per team application and $10 per individual application.

The honest caveat: the fee is small and the flights are not. You compete in Boston. Entering from Lagos or Lahore means funding international travel for up to eight students, which is why this one sits below competitions you can do from home despite the names attached to it.

Euclid Mathematics Contest

The Euclid Contest is run by the University of Waterloo and is "written annually by over 25 000 participants worldwide". It is aimed at students in their final year of secondary school, and younger students may enter.

You write it at your own school. The 2027 contest is on 6 April for North and South America and 7 April for everywhere else, and entry is $18.00 per participant plus a $5.00 processing fee per order.

Waterloo is direct about what it does and does not do. "Participation in the Euclid Mathematics Contest is not required for admission to the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Waterloo." A strong score can qualify you for the Math Faculty Scholarships.

For a student planning to apply to Canada, this is the cheapest competition on this list that is attached to money.

Australian Mathematics Competition

The AMC is run by the Australian Maths Trust and calls itself "Australia's longest running, largest and most well-known maths competition for school students". It accepts international entries, and it is the gentlest entry point here.

There are five divisions covering Years 3 to 12, from Middle Primary to Senior, so a younger student has somewhere to start. The 2026 competition ran from 4 to 6 August, and entry is AUD $9.30 per student.

The deadlines are earlier for international entrants than for Australian schools, which is the detail that catches people out. Printed papers had to be ordered by 26 June and online entries closed on 31 July.

Alibaba Global Mathematics Competition

The Alibaba Global Mathematics Competition, run by Alibaba's DAMO Academy, is the only one here with no school, no team, no teacher and no national body between you and the paper. "Math enthusiasts from all background can register", with "no entry requirement or admission fee".

Both rounds are taken online. The preliminary round uses problems drawn from the world and the final tests foundational mathematics across five subject areas.

The prize money is unlike anything else on this list. In the 2024 edition the top five scorers received $30,000 each, ten silver winners took $15,000 each and twenty bronze winners $8,000 each.

It is open to adults as well as school students, so you are competing against graduate students and working mathematicians. Reaching the final from a school desk means something precisely because of that.

What a medal does for an application

Dinara Kalikhan went from Kazakhstan to Stanford to study economics and computer science, with first places in the Asia International Mathematical Olympiad, the American Mathematics Competition 12 and Mathematics Without Borders, and second places in two more.

Carlos Sequeira went from Nicaragua to MIT. He describes meeting combinatorics while preparing for mathematics olympiads, not being good at it, and choosing his degree because of the questions it left him with.

Then read Ramina Bebezova, who went from Kyrgyzstan to Tufts. She says she was "never the typical 'spike' student profile", the applicant who spends years on one thing and becomes an expert "like in sports or Olympiads". She was well rounded, she wrote her personal statement about a mental health nonprofit she helped run, and she thinks that is part of why Tufts took her.

Both routes work. A medal is a strong signal and it is not the only one, and a student without one is not behind.

How to choose one

If your country runs a national mathematical olympiad, enter it. It is the gate to the IMO, the EGMO, the RMM and PAMO at the same time, and most students never find out their country has one.

If travel is the obstacle, the APMO is sat in your own country in March, and Euclid and the Australian competition are written at your school for under twenty dollars.

If you have no school support at all, the Alibaba competition needs nothing but a registration and an internet connection.

If timed papers are not your strength, the modelling challenge asks for a report instead.

Enter one and prepare for it properly. A single result from a competition an admissions reader recognises does more than four entries with nothing next to them.

Kai, the Borderless AI college counselor, can find your country's national mathematical olympiad and the deadlines that apply where you live. It's free to use.

Start with Kai, and read the stories from students who turned a mathematics result into an admission.