PhysicsBowl
- Questions
- 40 multiple choice
- Time allowed
- 45 minutes
- Divisions
- I and IIII is open to anyone
- Regions
- 22Numbered 00 to 21
- Team score
- Top fiveSummed, per school
Competition rules
Everything the paper asks of you.
This page is the reference: format, divisions, what is tested, how scoring works, who may proctor, and the full list of contest regions. It is a plain reading of what AAPT publishes, with nothing added.
Registration — fees, deadlines and which route applies to your school — is a separate matter and lives on the registration page.
The paper
Format
One sitting, one paper, no laboratory component and no written working to submit.
40questions
Multiple choice, every one of them. There is no partial credit and nothing to show your working on.
45minutes
Timed, and short. Nearly every student who runs out of time does so because of decisions, not algebra.
67.5seconds
Derived from 45 minutes across 40 questions. It is an average, not a rule — but it is the number to practise against.
On the “50 questions” you may have read
Some Chinese-language descriptions of this contest describe a 50-item paper in which Division I answers questions 1–40 and Division II answers 11–50. AAPT’s own published description is simpler and is the one to plan against: each student answers 40 questions in 45 minutes. Whatever the two divisions share in the middle, your paper is 40 questions long.
Divisions
Division I and Division II
The division is decided by how much physics you have studied — not by how strong you are, and not by your age.
Division I
Your first physics course
Written for students taking their first course in physics. The level of that course does not matter.
- Written for
- First-course students
- Course level
- IrrelevantAP students have an advantage in depth; non-AP students often have one in breadth, because the paper can reach past the AP syllabus.
- Paper
- 40 questions, 45 minutes
- Awards
- Top 2 students, top 2 schoolsPer region, within this division.
Division II
A second course — or a harder paper
Written for students in their second physics course or beyond, and explicitly open to anyone who wants the harder paper.
- Written for
- Second course and beyond
- Open to
- AnyoneAAPT states plainly that any student may sit Division II as a challenge.
- Paper
- 40 questions, 45 minutes
- Awards
- Top 2 students, top 2 schoolsPer region, within this division.
A school may enter teams in both divisions. Choosing Division II when you are in a first course is permitted and is sometimes the right call — but it is a decision about whether the harder paper will show your ability or bury it, not a shortcut to a better award.
What is tested
Five strands of high school physics
Questions are drawn from the topics of a typical high school physics course. AAPT is explicit that no single student or school is expected to have covered everything on the paper.
| Strand | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Mechanics | Measurement, kinematics, Newton’s laws, momentum and impulse, work and energy, circular motion, fluids. |
| Electromagnetism | Charge and field, potential and potential energy, capacitance, circuits, magnetic fields and induction, waves. |
| Thermodynamics | Temperature and heat transfer, molecular motion, internal energy, the gas laws, heat engines. |
| Optics | Reflection and refraction, diffraction and scattering, wave behaviour of light. |
| Modern and atomic | Atomic structure, quanta, wave–particle duality, introductory quantum ideas. |
The range is wide by design: high school students worldwide study anything from conceptual physics through AP Physics to some modern physics, and the paper is built to have something for all of them. Working through released past papers is the most reliable way to find where your own course stops and the contest keeps going — see past papers.
Scoring and awards
How a result is arrived at
Individually and, if your school enters enough students, as a team.
Individual score
Your own mark out of 40. In the 2026 cycle an unusually large number of students scored highly, and AAPT recognised every student scoring 38, 39 or 40 in either division on its Global Top Scores list — more than a hundred students per division — rather than publishing a top-100 ranking.
Team score
A school’s team score is the sum of its five best individual scores in a given region and division. Five students are needed to qualify for the team competition. A school may enter fewer, but a short team simply has less to add together and correspondingly less chance.
Awards
Awards change from year to year, but each year they go to the top two students and the top two schools in each region, within each division. Because they are awarded per region and per division, the field you are compared against is much smaller than the global entry — which is why knowing your region matters.
Region 00 is different
Test preparation centres and educational services compete in their own region, Region 00, and are eligible for student awards only — not school or team awards. If you are sitting the exam through a training centre rather than through your own school, this changes what you can win. Check which applies to you before you set expectations.
Supervision
Proctoring requirements
The exam must be proctored. These conditions are AAPT’s, and they exist to keep the result worth something.
| Requirement | Detail |
|---|---|
| Supervision | Required. The exam may not be taken unsupervised. |
| Who may not proctor | Parents, relatives, and close friends or acquaintances of any student sitting the exam. |
| Qualification | At least a two-year degree. It does not need to be in physics. |
| Venue | The student’s own school is expected and preferred; elsewhere is permitted where necessary. |
| Contact address | An official school email address, ideally tied to a district or an accredited private school. Personal addresses are not acceptable; without one, further verification of the organisation is required. |
| Homeschooled students | Should approach a community college, university or library for proctoring. A parent may register a child but may not proctor, and must nominate an independent proctor. |
| Libraries | May proctor publicly, provided they can observe the exam throughout. |
| Testing centres | Must declare their status as a testing centre and supply a web address for verification. |
Reference
Contest regions, 00 to 21
Awards are given per region and per division, so your region decides who you are ranked against. Find yours before you register.
| Code | Region | Awards |
|---|---|---|
| 00 | Test preparation centres and educational services | Students only |
| 01 | Specialised schools of science, mathematics and technology | Students and schools |
| 02 | Canadian provinces and territories | Students and schools |
| 03 | Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont | Students and schools |
| 04 | New Jersey | Students and schools |
| 05 | New York, Maryland | Students and schools |
| 06 | Ohio, Pennsylvania | Students and schools |
| 07 | Delaware, District of Columbia, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Virginia, West Virginia | Students and schools |
| 08 | Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Wisconsin | Students and schools |
| 09 | Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Puerto Rico, South Carolina, Trinidad and Tobago, Virgin Islands | Students and schools |
| 10 | Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Tennessee | Students and schools |
| 11 | Texas | Students and schools |
| 12 | California, zip codes 92500 and below | Students and schools |
| 13 | California, zip codes above 92500 | Students and schools |
| 14 | Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, Wyoming, and all other countries except China | Students and schools |
| 15–19 | China — five contest regions | Students and schools |
| North China: Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Shandong, Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning | ||
| South China: Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian, Hainan, Hong Kong, Macau | ||
| East China: Shanghai, Zhejiang, Jiangsu | ||
| Central China: Hunan, Hubei, Anhui, Jiangxi, Henan | ||
| West China: Chongqing, Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou, Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, Tibet, Xinjiang, Ningxia | ||
| 20 | Asia, outside China | Students and schools |
| 21 | Middle East | Students and schools |
On the five China codes
Codes 15 to 19 cover the five China regions, but AAPT publishes the grouping rather than a public mapping of which number belongs to which region. Confirm the exact code for your centre when you register, and do not accept a guess about it — including one from this site.
Regions 15 to 21 are the seven AAPT established for Asia and the Middle East, covering China, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Japan, Korea, India, Pakistan, Dubai, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Schools in those regions register through a different route — see registration.