Upcoming contest

About the test

• B2 - C1 level according to the CEFR
• test parts - grammar, reading and listening skills
• time limit 60 minutes
• the student's score appears right after the test
• highest score wins
• great prizes for top 20 students, best one wins 2 weeks in Canada
• patronage of the Ministry of Education of the Czech Republic
• students, schools and teachers will receive a certificate

Why to participate?

1. fully online and all platforms friendly including mobile phones of your students
2. interesting and entertaining online test for students
3. opportunity to compare your students' English language skills with other schools from around the world
4. great experience for students plus an opportunity to compare their English language knowledge between each other
5. great preparation for Cambridge exams
6. motivation for teachers and great way to enhance your lessons
7. after the contest it will be opened to public and can be used in English lessons for all students
8. great PR tool for your school
9. 12 years of experience and great feedback from the students, teachers and school principals - references

Conditions for participation

1. for high school and vocational students, aged 14-20
2. a minimum 10 participating students from each school
3. unlimited maximum number of participating students from one school
4. categories by age, state, region, type of school, etc.
5. the test shall be taken under supervision (offline or online)
6. students need to use headphones
7. schools get access to the test based on a licensed School ID for 65EUR (see below License fee)

BIE Schedule

• December 1, 2023 - Start of the Registration
• November 10, 2024 - Final Contest rules and guidelines
• November 20, 2024 - End of Registration
• November 21, 2024 - TEST (9:00-14:00 CET)
• December 6, 2024 - Final test results

Best In English step by step:

1) Registration:

Schools sign up and receive a unique school ID over email which will be used by their students on the test date.

2) Preparation:

English teachers select the students to represent the school, with a minimum of 10 participants (no maximum, limited only by the size of the computer room and internet speed). Schools can divide students into 2 groups within the timeframe of 9:00-14:00.
Students can practice using previous test versions:
Public test 2023
Public test 2022
Public test 2021
No School ID is required to access these practice tests.

3) License Fee

Schools pay a flat fee of €65 for the school license, regardless of the number of participating students. Payment can be made by card or invoice using our payment platform.
Payment platform and invoice generator.

4) Test Date

On 21 November 2024 students participate online in a timed test. Students participate online in a timed test, which includes multiple-choice and other formats assessing reading comprehension, listening, and grammar skills.

5) Results

Results will be published on December 6, 2024, based on students' individual scores and school performance. Teachers will have access to the results through the Teacher's Portal, where both student and school results are displayed. School results are calculated by their 10 best students.

6) Certificates

By December 20, 2024, certificates will be available for students, schools, and teachers. Teachers can download the certificates directly from the Teacher's Portal.

7) Awards:

Prizes will be awarded to top-performing students. Organizers will visit schools with the best results to present prizes, certificates, and awards.

8) Public version of the 2024 test

In early January 2025, the public version of the BIE 2024 test will be available for anyone who wants to compare their English skills with the best in the competition.

Software conditions

The Test is optimized for the newest version of Google Chrome and also for mobile devices with OS Windows and Android. It was successfully tested on Firefox, Apple devices and macOS Mojave. However, some errors or failures of the system may occur for MS systems, for example Microsoft EDGE featured some problems with the videos if not used with a full screen using F11 on the keyboard. Microsoft Explorer is not supported.
In general, all latest versions of OS are supported. It is quite possible that the Test will work on every device made ever since the year 2000.

Final results

The complete results are available within a month after the date of the contest. Results will be sent to teachers and participants via e-mail and will also be published on the website. Results are anonymous except for the first twenty students and schools, leaving the remaining results invisible for the other visitors of the BIE website and accessible under school ID. In case of equal scores received by two or more students or two or more schools, the winner is determined by the time in which the test was completed. Final results are processed separately for the Czech Republic, Slovakia and other countries.

Results – Students category

Students will have a chance to check their results and to see the correct answers in their respective tests. In order to give more students a chance to win prizes, in the Students category, those who placed within the top three in the previous year of the contest will not have their results included in the chart if participating repeatedly.

Results – School category

The school with the highest average score wins. The highest average score is determined by the results of the 10 best students from a particular school. That is, if a school nominates 50 students, only the results of the 10 best students will be considered to calculate the average score. Each school wishing to participate therefore needs to nominate at least 10 students. The schools which placed within the top three in the previous years of the contest will have their results included in the chart and may place within the top three repeatedly. Statistics will be processed separately for schools from the Czech Republic and other countries.

Result categories

Students will receive their result on a certificate with their ranking within the country, worldwide and age category of the student.

There will be one special category for students who lived in an English speaking country for more than 18 months and/or with an English speaking family background. Students from this category will be evaluated separately and will not be able to compete for top 20 BIE prizes. The reason is derived from the purpose of the contest which is to encourage young students to study the English language. It wouldn’t be fair if they would compete with students with a significant advantage from a multilingual environment.

School categories include the result within the region, state and worldwide.

License Fee Conditions:

This season Best in English comes with a License fee of 65EUR (1500CZK) per school.

Until 2019 the competition had been free of charge and supported only by a limited number of partners and sponsors with no government or EU funds. The main organization bearing the costs of the project has been our company, Czech-us agency. We would like to develop the contest further mainly when it comes to the technical aspects of the competition. This is the main reason why we have introduced the License fee this year. 

We strongly believe this change will contribute to an increased quality of the BIE competition and the test itself. Introducing the License fee will serve for further BIE development.

The License fee includes:

1. unlimited number of students competing for your school
2. complete stats of your students and the school results
3. certificates for the students, school and the teachers of English
4. prizes for the best students within the TOP 20 rankings
5. access to the BIE test for all your students after the contest
6. discounts and extra services provided by our partners for you and your students

Full Refund policy in case:

• your school will not join the test if we are notified 1 week prior to the contest at the latest
• students will not be able to submit the test due to technical problems (less than 10 results will be submitted) 
• more than 40 per cent of the participating students will not receive a result due to technical problems (a list of the respective students needs to be provided on the day of the test)
• not enough students participating in the test due to sickness (less than 10)  - needs to be announced at least 1 week prior to the contest
• the license fee will be paid by a local agency, ministry of education or other entity for the school
• the BIE contest 2024 will be cancelled by the organizer

Form of payment: either wire transfer or online using a debit/credit card.

The license fee will be due after the school registration to the competition. More information will be provided upon registration.

Certificate of participation

All participants (both students and schools) will receive the Best In English participation certificate after the results are published.

Certificate for teachers

The teachers responsible for organizing and coordinating the contest in their school will also receive the Best In English certificate with their name on it.