The British Mathematical Olympiad has been run in its present form since 1965, and the British IMO team since 1967. For sixty years the senior end of the UK mathematics pipeline has been one of the most demanding in any English-speaking country. And yet, from outside Britain, the pipeline is hard to read. The most useful sources are scattered across half a dozen UKMT subdomains, school newsletters, and out-of-print problem anthologies. The eligibility rules are spelled out in three different places and partly in past minutes. The yearly calendar shifts. The Olympiad names — Cayley, Hamilton, Maclaurin, BMO — are not always indexed in a single place.
This site exists to fix that. It is an independent editorial guide to the UKMT competition pathway, compiled for international students preparing for the senior route from outside the United Kingdom — particularly those at international schools and overseas British-curriculum sixth forms. We are not affiliated with the UKMT or the BMO Subtrust. All facts published here are cross-referenced against the UKMT site, the BMO Subtrust site, and the relevant published competition results before publication.
Our editorial standards are set out in full on the Academic Integrity page. In summary: every page is verified against primary sources, written in plain language for parents and students new to the pipeline, and corrected within seven working days of any reported error. We do not publish advertising, we do not represent any tutoring company, and we do not place students in any particular preparation programme.
The site is organised as follows. The Competitions hub indexes all fifteen UKMT competitions across the four stages of the pipeline. Each of the four stages — Primary, Junior, Intermediate, Senior — has its own hub page covering format, eligibility, sample problems, and the route forward. The six written Olympiads carry their own deep-dive pages: JMO, Cayley, Hamilton, Maclaurin, MOG, and most importantly BMO Round 1 and Round 2.
Why we started this project
Three reasons, in order of importance. First, the senior pathway is genuinely demanding and benefits from being written about clearly. From the SMC in October of Year 12 to the BMO Round 2 in late January of Year 13, the senior cohort sits four or five separate written rounds in fifteen weeks. Each round has its own format, its own marking standard, and its own implications for the route forward. International students preparing from outside the UK deserve a single source explaining how the pieces fit together.
Second, the UKMT pipeline itself rewards patient, well-organised preparation more than any individual paper. The strongest BMO Round 2 candidates are typically those who began JMO preparation in Year 7 or Year 8 — three full academic years before BMO Round 1. The standard preparation pattern (around two problems per week of attempted written solution, sustained across multiple academic years) is hard to maintain without a clear understanding of the calendar. This site is an attempt to make that calendar visible.
Third, the senior end of the British pipeline feeds the UK IMO team — six students each summer, selected from the BMO Round 2 cohort via the Trinity College Cambridge training camp at Easter. International students who arrive at UK boarding schools in Year 12 or Year 13 are eligible for BMO Round 1 entry through the school discretionary route. For those students, two to three years of preparation before arrival in the UK can be the difference between a BMO Round 2 invitation and an SMC certificate. We want that preparation to be accessible.
The senior pathway rewards patient, well-organised preparation more than any individual paper.
What you can do next
If you are new to the pipeline, the natural starting point is the UKMT Competitions hub, which explains the four-stage architecture in fifteen events. From there, navigate to your child’s current school year — Year 7–8 students go to Junior, Year 9–11 to Intermediate, Year 12–13 to Senior — and read the stage hub end to end.
If you are a Year 12 student already preparing for BMO Round 1, the BMO deep dive is the canonical reference. It covers format, eligibility, sample problems, and the route from Round 2 through Trinity Camp to the IMO Team UK selection. The preparation reading list on the Resources page is the consensus list among UK Olympiad trainers.
If you have a specific question about your year group, target competition, or eligibility — particularly the BMO Round 1 discretionary entry route for international students at UK schools — the WhatsApp advisor is the fastest way to a real conversation. We respond within one working day in English or Chinese.
This article is the first piece in our News & Updates editorial. Subsequent pieces will cover the year-by-year preparation plan from JMO to BMO, results coverage from the BMO Round 2 / Trinity Camp / IMO Team UK announcements, and editorial analysis of the senior cohort. New articles appear weekly during the competition season; less frequently through the summer break.