General Information / What’s New for the 2025 Olympiad

  • We have added a 3-day long IAC Journeys pre-Trip to Normandy and Brittany and a week-long post-trip to the South of France. Please see here for details; costs will be posted and the itineraries will be confirmed once registration opens (either in late December 2024 or January 2025). IAC Journeys debuted last summer after the 2024 International Geography Championships with 82 students and family members traveling for a week from Vienna to Berlin. We had an amazing time and look forward to bringing back IAC Journeys for a second summer in Europe!
  • We have added a full-fledged Family and Friends Program (this also debuted successfully last summer at the 2025 International Geography Championships). Please explore the Extended Option in particular which allows participants to compete in many competitions (including all Multiple Choice Exams and Multimedia Bees!) and all field trips.
  • The Elementary Division is now open to students who are in grades 2, 3, or 4 (or birthdate equivalent) in the 2024-2025 academic year, and the Intermediate Division is now open to students in grades 5 or 6 (or birthdate equivalent). We are delighted to welcome younger students to the Olympiad and look forward to providing competitions at an appropriate age and skill level for them.
  • Field Trips will work differently, particularly in terms of the sign up process, as all Parisian museums and sites have highly specific processes in place for group reservations. Further information and details are available here.
  • We have added History Bees in languages other than English! In particular, we’re delighted to add the Chinese Language History Bee (中文历史测验), the Spanish Language History Bee (Quiz de Historia en Idioma Español), the Hindi Language History Bee (हिंदी भाषा में इतिहास प्रश्नोत्तरी), and the French Language History Bee (Quiz Historique en Langue Française) to the program of official medal events.
  • We’re expanding our “trophy events” from the 2023 Olympiad to a separate full slate of Historical Games. These will not be a part of the Official Medals Table, but will have their own separate medals table this coming summer. In particular, when students complete the registration form prior to March, we will ask them which other events they’d like to see on the Historical Games program. A final decision will then be made by April on what to include.
  • We’ve expanded the Historical Simulations to three separate competitions, added a Question Writing Competition, added a Historical Debating Tournament, and have opened the Symposium to the Middle School Division, and adjusted its format from 2023 (most notably, the dinner discussion will count towards the final placement for the medalists). Further details on all of these is available here.
  • There have been some changes to the Multiple Choice Exams. There is a new Australian and Oceanian History Exam, a new North American History Exam, and the Middle East and African History Exam has been split into two separate exams. Caribbean History is now a part of the North American History Exam, and there will be a separate South American History Exam.
  • The International History Bee World Championships will again be considered part of the Overall Olympiad Championship calculation for the Varsity and Junior Varsity Divisions. For these divisions, the International History Bee will be one of four competitions (the others being the Battery Exam, the Historiography Exam, and the Written Exam) which will each have equal weight towards the Overall Olympiad Championship calculation.
  • A separate Medals Table will now be kept for the Family and Friends Program Participants.
  • Beginning with the 2025 International History Olympiad, International Academic Competitions will not consider a participant “registered” and will not add a student to the List of Attending Students until not only we have received their registration, but also their payment. In particular, to be eligible to sign up for field trips and competitions, participants will need to have their payments submitted before they can do that.
  • We are no longer accepting credit card payments. We are only accepting payments by US dollar denominated checks from USA bank accounts, wire transfers, or cash payable in US dollars or Euro equivalent at the 2025 IAC US National Championships, 2025 IAC European Championships, or 2025 IAC Asian Championships.

The 2025 International History Olympiad will be hosted at Ecole Jeannine Manuel, which is the top-ranked high school in France. The school is in a prosperous neighborhood in west central Paris in the 15th arrondissement (i.e. district). The address of the school is 70, rue du Théâtre – 75015 Paris (please use this address, not the one of EJM’s nearby branch campus at Dupleix). The school has ample classroom and assembly space for the event and a beautiful enclosed courtyard with a park-like atmosphere. There are numerous nearby restaurants and accommodation options at all price levels. Note that the nearest Metro stop is Avenue Émile Zola station on Line 10, which is a 4-5 minute walk away. The stop Charles Michels is a 5-6 minute walk in the other direction, and the Commerce stop on Line 8 is about a 10 minute walk. EJM has hosted the History Bee and Bowl of France for years, and it currently has the largest International History Bee and Bowl team in the world with over 100 participating students. Several of EJM’s teachers have staffed our past summer world championship level events and will help to ensure the success of the event.

A list of suggest hotels is available here.

At the 2025 International History Olympiad, the following events will be mandatory for all Elementary, Intermediate, Middle School, Junior Varsity, and Varsity participants:

  • Battery Exam
  • International History Bee World Championships
  • International History Bowl World Championships
  • Hextathlon
  • Written Exam
  • Historiography (Varsity and Junior Varsity students only)

Aside from this, all participants attend both the Opening and Closing Ceremonies. Note that while you are welcome to come with other players from your school (assuming you all have qualified), at the Olympiad, you will be assigned (on the basis of your country/state affiliation, International History Bee World Championship preliminary round results, age division, and other criteria) to a 2- or 3-student team. This may or may not be with other school team members, but in any case, please do not come expecting that you will definitely be competing together with your school teammates. It is not permitted to come just for the History Bowl (or any other event, for that matter).

While only a few events are mandatory, you cannot specifically just come for a portion of the Olympiad unless you gain special dispensation from Olympiad staff due to school attendance requirements or some comparable family event / religious holiday / other suitable reason. Please note that while we will try and be flexible to the extent possible, we are not able to grant partial discounts, and we cannot guarantee partial stays until we have reviewed your situation and seen if it is feasible for a student to attend. If you are interested in a partial stay at the Olympiad, please email olympiad@iacompetitions.com and explain your situation.

The Olympiad’s official language is English. If English is not your mother tongue, you can use an approved bilingual dictionary for all the non-buzzer-based events, though this is subject to a spot check at any point to ensure that it does not contain notes or disallowed information. That said, there are four official medal events which are History Bee events that take place in other languages (Chinese, French, Hindi, Spanish).

For the 2025 International History Olympiad, we will offer five age divisions: Varsity, Junior Varsity, Middle School, Intermediate, and Elementary.

Students from the United States and Canada compete in the following divisions:

  • Varsity – Enrolled in grades 11 or 12 during the 2024-25 academic year.
  • Junior Varsity – Enrolled in grades 9 or 10 during the 2024-25 academic year.
  • Middle School – Enrolled in grades 7 or 8 during the 2024-25 academic year.
  • Intermediate – Enrolled in grades 5 or 6 during the 2024-25 academic year.
  • Elementary – Enrolled in grades 2, 3 or 4 during the 2024-25 academic year.

Students from outside the United States and Canada are assigned to divisions based on

  • Varsity – Born on or before August 31, 2008 who are enrolled in a secondary school (not university-level schooling) on January 1, 2025.
  • Junior Varsity – Students born between September 1, 2008 and August 31, 2010.
  • Middle School – Students born between September 1, 2010 and August 31, 2012.
  • Intermediate – Students born between September 1, 2012 and August 31, 2014.
  • Elementary – Students born between September 1, 2014 and August 31, 2017.

Please note that students may compete in a different division than the one that they qualified in if they qualify in the 2023-24 school year (for example, a student who qualified in grade 8 in the 2023-24 year would have qualified in the Middle School Division, but would compete in the Olympiad after the end of grade 9, and therefore would be competing in the Junior Varsity Division).

At the Olympiad, citizens and residents of the USA will represent their state, while citizens and residents of the rest of the world will represent their country. The state or country that a student plays for is known as their Affiliation. The preliminary rounds of the International History Bee World Championships will be used to determine the composition of National and State teams for the team events at the Olympiad. Normally, the top three students from a country or state will form the A Team for that country of state, the next top three scoring students will form Team B and so on per age group. However, some teams may consist of just two students due to the need for rounding, while solo students will be paired up with students from a different country or state. Solo teams will not be permitted. This schematic outlines how the number of students from each Affiliation in each Age Division determines how many students are on each team from that Affiliation within that Age Division.
Note that solo students are likely to be paired up with other solo students who are from a nearby state or country, or at least with students from a state or country where some geographical coherence can be established. For example, at the 2023 Olympiad, solo students from Arizona, California, and Kansas made up a team called Team US West (which in fact that won the International History Bowl World Championship title for the Varsity Division), while a group of two students from Singapore and the United Arab Emirates made up a team called Team Asia. Team formation is done exclusively by Olympiad staff. If a student is a solo player from their Affiliation within their age division, they cannot request to play with anyone else.

For each division, there will be an individual Overall Olympiad World Champion. For the Elementary, Intermediate, and Middle School Divisions, this is the student with the combined highest position in the International History Bee World Championships, Battery Exam, and Written Exam. For the Junior Varsity and Varsity Divisions, this is the student with the combined highest position in the International History Bee World Championships, Battery Exam, Historiography Exam, and the Written Exam. There will also be a champion country or state based on the highest position in the Medals Table (this is for all divisions combined, though this does not include the Family and Friends Medals Table nor the Historical Games Medals Table).

If there are ties for the top placements within an age division, ties will be broken on the rank points principle through a final tiebreaker. This would consist of 3 History Bee buzzer questions, 1 short answer prompt (6 sentences maximum), 1 document analysis (Varsity and Junior Varsity Divisions only), and 5 multiple choice questions, with all parts having equal weight. If, for example, 2 students each score the same on the multiple choice or History Bee portion, this tie will only be broken if needed (through additional multiple choice or History Bee buzzer questions as necessary) to determine the medal positions (i.e. if two students tie on multiple choice, but then one other students wins both the other parts, then the tie isn’t broken). In the Varsity and Junior Varsity Divisions, if two students split all four sections evenly (i.e. one student wins two parts and the other students wins the other two parts), then the tie is broken further through further iterations of this process until one student wins. Tiebreaks are generally conducted at the beginning of the Closing Ceremonies; the final placements are announced at the end of the Closing Ceremonies.

Eligibility

Qualification is conducted through participation in regional, national, and international qualifying events. You can learn more about how to qualify here.

Yes, International Academic Competitions has provided these many times. If you are qualified to compete and need a visa to attend the 2025 International History Olympiad, you are strongly advised to begin the process of obtaining one as soon as possible. We can also provide these for accompanying family members and teachers or coaches. Please contact Ms. Joan Dietrich at joan@iacompetitions.com if you need a visa letter to attend. Please use this page and other resources if needed to determine whether you need a visa.

Any student who qualified and was born before September 1, 2016 (or who has finished 3rd grade by the end of the 2024-25 academic year) can compete. If you have already qualified but are too young to take part in 2025, you may defer your registration until you are old enough to compete. The Olympiad is open to students attending local schools, international schools, American schools, British schools, public schools, private schools, religious schools, homeschooling, etc.

Unlike other Olympiads, we don’t limit the number of students who can attend per country. There is no field cap to the number of students who might attend. Between 300 and 500 students are likely to attend the 2025 International History Olympiad.

Any student who qualified and is in second grade and older in the 2024-25 school year (for US and Canadian students) or born on or before August 31, 2017 (for students from other countries) can compete. Students competing in the Elementary, Intermediate, and Middle School Divisions are welcome to come if they have qualified but they must come with a parent or guardian. If you have already qualified but are too young to take part in 2025, you may defer your registration until you are old enough to compete.

No, there is no maximum age, as long as you qualified this year or last year for the Olympiad, you can attend, provided you were enrolled in secondary school or a homeschool equivalent on November 1, 2024. Southern Hemisphere students who graduated high school at the end of the 2024 calendar year are eligible to attend.

No, you don’t, and a lot of students will be coming on their own, too. And you won’t feel alone for long, as you will make friends from all around the world, who share the same passion for history!

COVID-19 Policies

Yes, if a pandemic-related cancellation of the Olympiad takes place in advance of it, then participation fees will be reimbursed in full, minus any transaction fees we incur through sending wire transfers. If cancellation needs to take place during the event itself, then registration costs will be refunded on a prorated basis depending on how much of the Olympiad has taken place until then.

Refunds for this reason will be provided in accordance with the Olympiad refund policy; there is not a separate category for refunds stemming from these grounds.

No, for the 2025 International History Olympiad, vaccination against Covid-19 will not be required, barring an unforeseen worldwide resurgence of Covid-19.

Accommodations

Varsity and Junior Varsity Division students will have the option of staying on their own (at a nearby hotel or hostel) under the supervision of Olympiad staff. Middle School, Intermediate, and Elementary Division students are required to attend with a parent or guardian and stay with that parent/guardian.

We will try to accommodate rooming preferences as much as possible but cannot make any guarantees. Students who are staying in IAC-arranged accommodations will be given the opportunity to request roommates in Spring 2025.

A team composed of IAC staff members and teachers will staff the Olympiad and supervise the attending students. All staff members are required to submit to a background check.

Students in the Varsity and Junior Varsity divisions do not need to come with a coach or parent. Olympiad staff members will serve as counselors and chaperones for these students throughout the program. Note that eligible students who are aged 18 or older as of July 20, 2025 are permitted to come and compete and stay on their own independently of Olympiad staff supervision. IAC will not provide travel for these students to and from the host school at the start and end of each day.
Students competing in the Middle School, Intermediate and Elementary divisions must attend with a parent or legal guardian who is responsible for bringing the student to and from the Olympiad each day. Note that the designated guardian can be the parent or family member of a different competing student, but we must receive written confirmation of such an arrangement from both students’ families for this to be valid.

For students who are coming to the Olympiad without a parent or guardian, Olympiad staff can meet them at their point of arrival (either Charles de Gaulle airport, Orly airport or at any of the Paris train stations). IAC does not provide airport or train station pickups for students who are coming to the Olympiad with accompanying adults, but will provide travel instructions from both the airports and train stations to the host school / check-in location.

Yes, all of these people are welcome to attend the Olympiad! Further information for parents and spectators is outlined here.