Complete guide to IBDP results

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This document guides you through your IBDP results: when your results will be released, how to access them, how to request re-marks, etc. This document is written with information sourced from official IB documents. Links to sources are provided throughout the document. Any further questions? Post it in IB Students Worldwide or our Reddit partner IBO.

This guide is aimed explicitly towards students enrolled in the IB Diploma Program (IBDP). This guide does NOT take into account the IB Career-related Program (IBCP), IB Middle Years Program (IBMYP) or IB Primary Years Program (IBPYP).

This guide is written by IB Students Worldwide modmins.

Short link to this doc: http://bit.ly/ibresultsguide

Contents

• 1. Timeline
• 2. Navigating your results

• 2.1. Logging on
• 2.2. Navigating results
• 2.3. Detailed results

• 3. Understanding your results

• 3.1. Component marks
• 3.2. Calculation of grades
• 3.3. Passing conditions
• 3.4. Results transcript
• 3.5. Receiving your “Diploma”
• 3.6. Re-take

• 4. Re-marks and other requests

• 4.1. Category 1 (re-mark)

• 4.1.1. Re-mark statistics from IB
• 4.1.2. Re-mark statistics from surveying IB students

• 4.2. Category 2 (return of assessments)
• 4.3. Category 3 (re-moderation of IAs)

• 5. IB Students Worldwide & r/IBO results survey; grade boundary sharing
• 6. Appendix

1. Timeline

Table 1: Timeline

Sources:  A, B, C, D

2. Navigating your results

Refer to the dates in Table 1 above to see when you can access your results on the results website http://candidates.ibo.org.

2.1. Logging on

On http://candidates.ibo.org click on the button corresponding to your exam session (e.g. May 2023) (Figure 1A). You are then asked to log on with your personal code and PIN (Figure 1B). If you do not have this information, contact your coordinator.

Note that the website may crash during the exact time your results are released, as too many students worldwide are also trying to access their results at the same time. You may get the message “Internal server error (500)” when trying to log on. This is usually resolved around an hour later.

2.2. Navigating results

Scroll down a bit on the Results page and you will see your results (Figure 4) (this is the results page of our example candidate whom we will use as an example for the remainder of this guide). You will find the subject grade out of 7 for each subject that you took in the session, along with your EE and TOK grades. At the bottom you will find your total points out of 45, along with an indicator of whether you have been awarded your Diploma (i.e. that you have passed the IB). If you took two Language A subjects then it is a “Bilingual Diploma”. If you have not passed the IB then it will say “Diploma not awarded”.

Some students may choose to complete up to two SL subjects in one exam session, then complete their remaining subjects in a later session. The subjects completed early are called anticipated subjects. If you are completing your anticipated subjects first, your results page will, of course, show only the results of your anticipated subjects. After you complete your remaining subjects in the following exam session, you will have your complete results.

In rare circumstances, some of your subjects may show “Results pending” even after complete results have supposedly been released already. This is normally due to an error in the process of marking your grades. For instance, in May 2019, exam scripts from candidates in a U.S. IB school were lost during their transit to an IB marking center, causing these students’ grades to be delayed. As such, these students had a “Results pending” on their results page in the meantime, until IB finally awarded them their grades via an impromptu grade-awarding method.

Subject component marks (i.e. marks on individual components: Paper 1, Paper 2, IA, etc) are NOT shown on the results website. See Section 3.1 for details on component marks, including how to access them.

Finally, your predicted grades are NOT shown on the results website. Although the IB has access to your predicted grades, only your teachers/coordinator can provide them to you for your reference.

See Section 3.3 for passing conditions.

2.3. Detailed results

Clicking on “Detailed results” on the rightmost column of the Results page yields the following page (Figure 5).

The “Detailed results” page shows you the total percentage scaled mark you scored for a subject, along with the grade boundaries for the grade you received as a result. In Figure 5, our example candidate scored a 61% total scaled mark for Physics SL in the May 2018 session, corresponding to a subject grade of 6. In order to increase their grade to a 7, the total mark must be increased by 1 (see rightmost column) in order to enter the grade boundary for a 7, which, as we can deduce, begins at 62%. Note that the total scaled marks are all measured in whole numbers; the final figures from the mark calculations are rounded to the nearest whole number.

• The total scaled mark is calculated from the marks scored in the subject’s individual components. See Section 3.1 and Section 3.2 for information on individual component marks as well as how your final grades are calculated, respectively.
• Use this information to determine whether you want to request re-marks, which could possibly increase your grade. See Section 4 for more details on re-marks.

• These grade boundaries are visible only to you when you receive your results, until the IB releases all grade boundaries in your session officially, months later (May session only; November grade boundaries aren’t even released). Thus, we ask that you share the grade boundary information you have with the public; see Section 5 for more details.

Your coordinator has the ability to disable the “Detailed results” page so that students cannot view them. If you are unable to find the “Detailed results” page, your coordinator may have forbidden you from doing so for whatever reason.

3. Understanding your results

3.1. Component marks

On July 7 (May session) / unknown (Nov session) at 12:00 GMT your coordinator receives your subject component marks, which are the marks scored on each component of your subjects, e.g. Paper 1, Paper 2, IA, etc. These component marks are NOT shown on the results website; they are only sent to your coordinator. Whether your coordinator is to share these component marks with you is up to them. Note that they do not take into account re-marks.

Figure 6 is a screenshot from the component marks document which your coordinator will receive and possibly forward to you. (same example candidate from Figure 4 and 5)

All your subjects including TOK and EE are shown; Figure 6 shows the component marks of just Physics SL as an example. Note that due to the IB being lazy, certain useful information is not shown in the component marks document. Refer to Table 2 for an explanation, including what is meant by “raw mark”, “moderated mark” and “scaled mark”.

Table 2: Explanation of component marks document shown in Figure 6

The missing information listed in Table 2 can all be found in the syllabus of the relevant subject. As such, when reading your component marks document, you should have the syllabuses of your subjects ready so that you are familiar with the maximum absolute marks (i.e. what your scored absolute marks are out of) as well as the weightings for each component. IB syllabuses can easily be found online with a quick google search.

3.2. Calculation of grades

The component marks discussed in Section 3.1 help us understand how your final subject grades out of 7 are calculated.

Table 3: Example candidate - Physics SL (May 2018)

From Table 3 we can see how our example candidate’s scored absolute marks from the individual components are scaled accordingly to their respective weightings to yield a total scaled mark of 61.076218%. This is then rounded to the nearest whole number to 61%. As said before, the subject’s weighting and maximum absolute marks can be found in the syllabus of the subject.

Mathematically, the total scaled mark of a subject is calculated with the following formula:

where  is the total scaled mark of the subject, ;

 is the name of the subject component;

 is the component’s scored absolute mark;

 is the component’s maximum absolute mark;

 is the component’s weighting, ;

and  is the total number of components.

As such, this would be the equation for Physics SL (May 2018):

This total scaled mark is then measured against the grade boundaries of the exam session to determine the final subject grade. As seen in “Detailed results” in Section 2.3, only the grade boundaries for the grade you received are available on the results website. Grade boundaries for the remaining grades are not shown.

IB releases the full grade boundaries of all subjects to coordinators in the form of a document sometime around September/October (May session). Nov session grade boundaries are not released. Since most grade boundary documents are leaked shortly after they are released, you should have no trouble finding them online afterwards via a simple Google search.

Grade boundaries are different for every exam session. Grade boundaries are decided by IB’s Final Award Committee based on the total scaled marks of the candidates in the session. The higher the marks, the higher the grade boundaries. This explains why the “most difficult” subjects (i.e. where candidates on average have the lowest total scaled marks) often have the lowest grade boundaries, whereas the “easiest” subjects often have the highest grade boundaries.

Figure 7 shows the May 2018 grade boundaries for Physics SL. The rightmost column shows the total scaled marks required for each subject grade level. Ignore the other three columns; they are irrelevant to calculating the final subject grade. Our example candidate’s total scaled mark of 61% corresponds to a 6, so this candidate received a final subject grade of 6 for this subject.

EE and TOK also have their own grade boundaries for each letter grade from A to E. Your EE / TOK points are calculated based on the following matrix, which has remained unchanged since 2015 (Table 5).

Table 5: EE / TOK matrix from 2015–present (source)

“F” refers to the failing condition; if you are in this position then you will automatically fail regardless of your other grades.

Your total IB points out of 45 is then calculated by summing the final subject grades as well as the EE / TOK points. Refer to Table 6 for an overview of definitions of terms used in this section.

Table 6: Definitions of terms used in Section 3.1 and 3.2

3.3. Passing conditions

In order to pass the IB Diploma Program, ALL of the following conditions must be satisfied (source, p28):

• CAS requirements have been met.
• The candidate’s total points is at least 24.
• There is no “N” grade awarded for any subject including TOK and EE.
• There is no grade “E” awarded for TOK or EE.
• There is no grade 1 awarded for any subject.
• There are no more than two grade 2s awarded.
• There are no more than three grade 3s awarded.
• The candidate has gained at least 12 points for the three HL subjects combined. For candidates taking four HL subjects, the three highest grades count.
• The candidate has gained at least 9 points for SL subjects combined. Candidates taking only two SL subjects must have gained at least 5 points.
• The candidate has not received a penalty for academic misconduct from the Final Award Committee.

If you have failed the IB and wish to re-take in the next exam session, see Section 3.6. If you are wondering whether passing the IB is equivalent to “receiving your Diploma”, see Section 3.5.

3.4. Results transcript

Your results will forever be saved on the results website http://candidates.ibo.org; however, you may also keep them officially on record via a physical or electronic copy of your official IB Diploma transcript sent from the IB. This transcript is a document that recognizes that you have completed the IB Diploma Program. On the transcript your grades for each subject are visible, along with your total IB points and an indication of whether you have passed. The IB sends the transcript to your school, who is then responsible for forwarding it to you as a physical and/or electronic copy. You should contact your school to find out how and when you can receive the transcript. The transcript is generally required for university applications. Note that the IB already has a service that automatically sends your transcript to various University institutions without requiring you to send the transcript by yourself (read more about it here). This should be organized by your coordinator prior to the release of results.

Regardless, it is still strongly recommended that you keep your transcript, since they can be used to apply to future universities as well as employment. When universities (and employers) request your IB grade information as part of your application, they will most definitely require a copy of your transcript and will not accept a screenshot of the results website.

If you apply for re-marks that result in the change of grade in any subject, the IB will produce another transcript to send to your school, so be sure to request the final transcript from your school if re-marks are successful. See Section 4 for more details on re-marks.

Click here for an image of an example of an IB Diploma transcript. Note that your school may also have their own school-personalized transcripts which may perhaps include your school’s logo but with essentially the same information (that is, your final IB grades). Both are generally equally valid when it comes to verifying that you have completed the IB Diploma Program.

If you have lost your copy of your transcript, you may visit https://rrs.ibo.org to purchase a replacement directly from the IB (select “Replacement IB certification”). Certain countries require the legalization of results – you can also visit https://rrs.ibo.org to purchase a legalization service directly from the IB.

3.5. Receiving your “Diploma”

A common phrase in IB is that one “receives their Diploma”. Note that this “Diploma” is not actually a physical thing; it is merely the name of the IB program itself. “Receiving one’s IB Diploma” is simply another way of saying that one has successfully completed and passed the IB Diploma Program (see Section 3.3 for passing conditions). Likewise, to not have “received your Diploma” would mean that you have not passed the IB Diploma Program. Although the actual definition of the word “diploma” is the document that verifies the successful completion of an educational program, and one could argue that the IB results transcript is the “Diploma” (which is NOT what IB intends to be the case – it’s just the name of the program), do NOT get confused by this phrase!

3.6. Re-take

If you have failed to pass the IB Diploma Program or are otherwise dissatisfied with your results, you can choose to re-take the next available exam session, whether it be May or November. Re-takes can be organized through your coordinator, who will then decide on the venue of the exams that you plan to re-take.

You can re-take one or more subjects in the next exam session. Further details are not readily available to us and so you must consult your coordinator for details on re-taking any subjects. Since there may be a deadline for re-take applications, it is suggested that you contact your coordinator as soon as possible.

4. Re-marks and other requests

Re-marks are a type of enquiry upon results (EUR), which refer to requests that a candidate may make regarding their results. Such requests entail a fee and can be made only through your coordinator. The fee is paid by you to your school (unless your school is kind enough to pay it for you), who then forwards it to the IB. You have until September 15 (May session) / March 15 (Nov session) to make these requests.

Complete details on EUR fees can be found in the document Fees and billing information for IB World Schools; however, we do not have access to that document. The closest information we have to fees is the 2015 Handbook of procedures, p157 onwards and the 2017 version summarized on Reddit so the information may be out of date. Nonetheless, they should give a good approximation. Note that your school may charge a higher fee to you due to labor work from their end. This is summarized in Table 7.

Table 7: Enquiry upon results (EUR)

Sources: D, E, F

4.1. Category 1 (re-mark)

Category 1 is the re-marking of externally assessed material for an individual candidate by subject.

• To request a re-mark, contact your coordinator. Do NOT contact IB directly.

• Re-marks are made by subject. You can choose one or more subjects to re-mark.
• The re-mark applies to all externally assessed components of a subject. External components refer to components that are marked entirely by the IB examiners and not your school, i.e. Paper 1, 2, 3, etc. You can also re-mark your EE and TOK essay (both count as individual subjects), since they are both externally assessed.

• You cannot choose to re-mark only a particular component of a subject.
• Internal components are not included in the re-mark. Internal components refer to components marked by your school and then possibly moderated by IB, e.g. your IAs and TOK presentation. If you want your IAs re-moderated, see Category 3.
• Re-marks do not apply to multiple-choice exam papers.

• You must pay a fee to your school for the re-mark. Your school is responsible for informing you of the fee; it is likely to be larger than what the IB requires as indicated in Table 7, as your school may take in a portion of that fee for labor costs.
• After paying your school, your coordinator submits an official re-mark request to IB.

• According to the 2015 Handbook of Procedures (p157), it takes up to 18 days for the re-mark to complete, although it may take as low as a day (depending on the popularity of the subject). Unfortunately, newer versions of the Handbook of Procedures do not indicate the estimated time taken for re-marks to be completed.
• The re-mark is usually completed by a different examiner to the one that originally marked your work. If you choose to re-mark a subject with a very low candidate intake (e.g. Lithuanian A: Literature), the re-mark will likely be completed by the same examiner.

• Your coordinator is responsible for contacting you about updates to your re-mark. The IB will not contact you directly; they will only contact your coordinator.

• Once the re-mark has been completed, your new grade will automatically appear again on the results website http://candidates.ibo.org. On the “Detailed results” page you will also find your new total scaled mark.
• This new grade will be higher, lower, or the same. Whatever this new grade is, it will replace your original grade. You cannot, for whatever reason, recover the original grade. You also cannot request a second re-mark for this same subject.
• The re-mark fee will be refunded entirely from the IB if the re-mark results in a change of grade, higher or lower. The grade refers to the subject grade out of 7, not your total scaled mark. The IB returns the fee to your school; it is your school’s responsibility to return the refund to you. You do not get a refund if there is no change of grade.

• The IB has no limit on the number of subjects for which you can request re-marks; however only one re-mark can be made per subject. This means that if you disagree with the re-mark result for a subject, then you’re shit out of luck.
• You may also request and purchase a Category 1 report, which can again be done through your coordinator. The report provides details about the re-mark, including comments from the examiner who performed the re-mark, if any. Such a request must be made within 30 days of receiving the re-mark, and will take up to 30 days to receive. Your coordinator will receive the report and forward it to you. It is generally not recommended to purchase a report due to the lack of useful information, and not many candidates (or schools) decide to purchase one.

Table 7 depicts how a re-mark works from a grade calculation perspective (see Section 3.2 for more details on grade calculations). It is the same table as Table 3 with an example re-mark added to this subject (Physics SL - May 2018).

Table 7: Example candidate re-mark - Physics SL (May 2018)

In Table 7, note how Paper 1’s mark remains unchanged; as said, Paper 1 of Physics SL is a multiple-choice paper, and multiple-choice papers are not re-marked. The IA is also not re-marked, since it is an internally assessed component, and re-marks apply only to externally assessed components.

Therefore, only Paper 2 and Paper 3 of this subject are re-marked. Paper 2’s re-mark has resulted in the same mark, while Paper 3’s mark has successfully changed. The scored absolute mark has gone from 23 to 25, which consequently changed its scored scaled mark from 13.142867% to 14.285714%, in turn changing the total scaled mark from 61.076218% to 62.2219065%, which is 62% after rounding to the nearest whole number.

The grade boundaries for Physics SL (May 2018) are shown in Figure 7 in Section 3.2; as you can see, the original total scaled mark of 61% corresponds to a subject grade of 6. This new total scaled mark of 62% resulting from the re-mark corresponds to a subject grade of 7, which is a successful grade increase.

Note that you do not receive information on changes to marks of individual components - the above table is merely an illustration. The only information you receive regarding your re-mark is the new total scaled mark and the new subject grade out of 7. Information on mark changes to individual components could possibly be available with the purchase of a Category 1 report (see final bullet point above in this section), but we are not certain.

4.1.1. Re-mark statistics from IB

Before you consider a re-mark, refer to the following statistics of re-marks from previous sessions; these statistics may help you predict how likely your re-mark will result in a successful grade increase. The statistics were taken from a presentation from an IBDP conference from around 2016 (source, from Reddit); no other information is available (Figure 8).

• The subjects with the smallest change in grade are: Biology, Physics, Chemistry, History, Math (all), ESS
• The subjects with an average-sized change in grade are: English LaL, Visual Arts, French B, Geography, English B
• The subjects with the largest change in grade are: Economics, Spanish Ab Initio, Psychology, Business Management, TOK essay

4.1.2. Re-mark statistics from surveying IB students

In May 2019 we surveyed candidates from both IB Students Worldwide and r/IBO about the results of their re-marks. You can view the responses to the surveys which are linked in the final section. Due to low intake and lack of respondents, this survey will not be conducted in any other exam session.

4.2. Category 2 (return of assessments)

Under Category 2, externally assessed work is returned to the school or candidate, along with the comments made by the examiners and the marks awarded.

• Category 2A requests the work of all candidates in the cohort by subject component; it is typically paid for by the school. For instance, your school may decide to purchase only the Paper 1s of a certain subject of all candidates in your cohort, for whatever reason. If you have knowledge that your school has purchased such, you may try contacting them if you would like your work back. It will take up to 20 days (hard copy)/10 days (electronic) for a Category 2A to be fulfilled, and your coordinator is responsible for collecting them.
• Category 2B is the return of externally assessed material by subject for an individual candidate. To request a Category 2B, contact your coordinator. Your coordinator is responsible for receiving the work and sending them to you. Since it is by subject, you will receive all externally moderated components of that subject. Your coordinator will receive your work in electronic format (PDF) and will take up to 10 days.
• Instructions to examiners state that comments are written on a candidate's work only if doing so is helpful to the examiner in the marking process. Therefore, if a candidate's work is returned, it may show only the marks allocated and may not include comments from the examiner.
• A Category 2 enquiry is for the purpose of returning assessment material only and does not constitute a candidate's claim of exclusive copyright in that material. If you want to claim exclusive copyright, a separate request must be sent to the Assessment Division, IB Global Center, Cardiff. This request should be made through your coordinator.

4.3. Category 3 (re-moderation of IAs)

Category 3 refers to the re-moderation of IAs of a certain subject to all candidates in a cohort. This request is the decision of your school and not you as an individual candidate. You cannot request a Category 3 as an individual candidate. If your school decides to make this request, it will take up to 40 days. This re-moderation can result in the same IA grade, or increase in your IA grade. It will not result in a lowered IA grade.

5. IB Students Worldwide & r/IBO results survey; grade boundary sharing

Our Facebook group IB Students Worldwide conducted surveys on IB results for every exam session from May 2018 to May 2022, with respondents from the group as well as from our partner r/IBO. The surveys and their responses are public and can be found in Table 9.

Unfortunately, due to declining group activity, IB Students Worldwide is no longer hosting surveys and grade boundary sharing information after May 2022. We instead redirect you to r/IBO for these services.

Grade boundary information for the subjects that a candidate takes is available to them on the results website. We ask them to share the grade boundary information they have to the public so that other students can know immediately. For May sessions, the IB releases the official grade boundaries during September/October. November session grade boundaries are not released by the IB.

Some of our surveys and grade boundary sharing documents include respondents from our partner r/IBO in addition to IB Students Worldwide.

Table 9: Results survey & grade boundary sharing

Table 10: IB Students Worldwide (IBSW) & r/IBO member statistics

6. Appendix

Table 11: Table of figures

Table 12: Table of tables