Integrity ratings for major US math competitions, based on community discussions (Reddit, AoPS forums), documented incidents, and structural analysis of each competition’s format.
Rating Scale: 1 = rampant cheating / 10 = almost no cheating
| Competition | Integrity Rating | Format | Key Factor |
|---|---|---|---|
| USAMO / USAJMO | 9 | In-person, proof-based, 9 hrs over 2 days | Proofs graded by experts; nearly impossible to fake |
| IMO | 9 | In-person, international; official country teams | Gold standard; centralized proctoring per country |
| RMM | 9 | In-person in Bucharest; elite international | Romanian Master of Mathematics; strict venue control |
| EGMO | 9 | In-person, international; official country teams | European Girls’ Mathematical Olympiad; same integrity as IMO |
| MathCounts National | 9 | In-person, nationally administered | Tight venue, national spotlight, strong proctoring |
| HMMT | 9 | In-person at Harvard/MIT (Feb & Nov) | Strict proctoring, no devices, live guts round |
| CMIMC | 8 | In-person at CMU | Strong proctoring, harsh cheating penalties |
| ARML | 8 | In-person at regional sites | Team format, supervised relay rounds |
| PUMaC | 8 | In-person at Princeton | Controlled university venue |
| DMM | 8 | In-person at Duke | Single-venue university contest, strong proctoring |
| CMM | 8 | In-person at Caltech | Single-venue university contest, strong proctoring |
| MPFG | 8 | In-person at MIT; qualifying exam required | Math Prize for Girls; controlled invite field |
| BMT | 8 | In-person at UC Berkeley | Berkeley Math Tournament; single-venue, strong proctoring |
| BAMO | 8 | In-person, proof-based (Bay Area) | BAMO-8 / BAMO-12; expert-graded proofs |
| MMATHS | 7 | In-person at multiple university sites | Run by undergrads; multi-site adds some variance |
| MathCounts State | 6 | Same questions over 3-week window | Same test given across states on different dates (e.g. Mar 6 - Mar 28); early states can leak to later ones |
| AIME | 4 | In-person, school-proctored | Repeated large-scale leaks (2023-2025); cutoff inflation |
| AMC 10/12 | 3 | In-person, school-proctored | Massive documented leaks; exams sold online days in advance |
Sources: AoPS community forums, Reddit, amcchange.com, Change.org petitions, The Free Press, The Saratoga Falcon, official competition rules and FAQs. Ratings reflect community sentiment and documented evidence as of early 2026.
Disclaimer: This document is an LLM-generated answer using the Anthropic Claude Opus 4.6 model with the prompt: “Please give a integrity rating between 1 and 10 for the following Math contests in US based on discussions on raddit, AoPS forum. AMC 10/12, AIME, USAMO/USJMO, HMMT, PUMAC, MathCounts State, MathCounts National, CMIMC, ARML.” This document was updated by Anthropic Claude Opus 4.6 model on March 6th, 2026 with prompt: “Add the rating for all contests in this database.”. The ratings and analysis should not be treated as authoritative and may not fully reflect the views of the math competition community.