IOI History

[ Past Tasks | Past Results | Statistics | Future ]

The idea of initiating international olympiads in informatics for school students was proposed to the 24th General Conference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in Paris by the Bulgarian delegate Professor Sendov in October 1987. This plan was included into the Fifth Main Program of UNESCO for the biennium 1988-1989 (Section 05 215). In May 1989, UNESCO initiated and sponsored the first International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI). [Quoted from the IOI'89 and IOI'92 Report.]

The IOI is one of five international science olympiads. The primary goal of the IOI is to stimulate interest in informatics (computing science) and information technology. Another important goal is to bring together exceptionally talented pupils from various countries and to have them share scientific and cultural experiences.

The IOI is organized annually in and by one of the participating countries. Each participating country typically sends a delegation of four pupils and two accompanying adults. The pupils compete individually and try to maximize their score by solving a set of informatics problems during two competition days. The problems have been algorithmic programming problems to be solved on a personal computer. Cultural and recreational events are organized on the remaining days.

Past IOIs

  1. 1989 - Pravetz, Bulgaria, May 16-19, 1989
  2. 1990 - Minsk, Belarussian Republic, Soviet Union, 15-21 July 1990
  3. 1991 - Athens, Greece, 19-25 May 1991
  4. 1992 - Bonn, Germany, 11-21 July 1992
  5. 1993 - Mendoza, Argentina, 16-25 October 1993
  6. 1994 - Haninge, Sweden, 3-10 July 1994
  7. 1995 - Eindhoven, The Netherlands, 26 June - 3 July 1995
  8. 1996 - Veszprém, Hungary, 25 July - 2 August 1996
  9. 1997 - Cape Town, South Africa, 30 November - 7 December 1997
  10. 1998 - Setúbal, Portugal, 5-12 September 1998
  11. 1999 - Antalya-Belek, Turkey, 9-16 October 1999
  12. 2000 - Beijing, China, 23-30 September 2000
  13. 2001 - Tampere, Finland, 14-21 July 2001
  14. 2002 - Yong-In, Korean Republic, 18-25 August 2002
  15. 2003 - Kenosha, Wisconsin, USA, 16-23 August 2003
  16. 2004 - Athens, Greece, 11-18 September 2004
  17. 2005 - Nowy Sacz, Poland, 18-25 August 2005
  18. 2006 - Mérida, Yucatán, Mexico, 13-20 August 2006
  19. 2007 - Zagreb, Croatia, 15-22 August 2007
Future IOIs are in the making.

On-line database with results for past IOIs


IOI Secretariat / ioi-secretariat@win.tue.nl

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