How does Denmark choose its IBO team?

Students sit an online school round in November, the best go to a semifinal in January, and a smaller group takes part in a two-part final in April and May that ends with four winners being announced. The national site names those four winners as the team for the International Biology Olympiad.

Who organises the Danish Biologiolympiade?

The national site presents it as one of six national science olympiads under ScienceOlympiaderne, with Danish universities among its partners. The IBO's country page says it is run through the Foreningen af Danske Biologer, with a steering committee. The two sources word this differently.

Students at upper secondary school (gymnasium). The national registration page says every student can enter the school round, but to go further a student must not turn 20 before 1 July of the IBO year. The school registers through a contact teacher.

Is this guide written by a Danish participant?

No. It is an outline of the official picture from published sources, with tips from BiOGuide. We are looking for a Danish olympiad participant or coach to write a firsthand guide and replace this one.

Denmark Biologiolympiade: Official Outline of the Path to IBO

Denmark has sent a team of four students to the International Biology Olympiad (IBO) since 2005, and its national programme is run as an annual cycle that starts in autumn and ends the following spring.¹ The IBO’s country page and the national site agree on the overall shape: a school round, a semifinal and a final. This page outlines that path according to the sources we could read, including the calendar for the 2026 to 2027 cycle. It is a map of the structure, not an insider’s account of what the exams feel like.

Programme: Biologiolympiaden (the IBO lists it as Biologiolympiade, in English the Danish Biology Olympiad)¹
Organiser: Run through the Foreningen af Danske Biologer according to the IBO; presented on the national site as one of the ScienceOlympiaderne^1,4
Who can enter: Upper secondary (gymnasium) students, through their school; students who turn 20 before 1 July of the IBO year cannot advance³
Stages: School round, semifinal, training, final in two parts, IBO team of four
Official website: biologiolympiade.dk
Language: Danish for the national competition; the IBO itself is in English

The path at a glance

Stage	What happens	How sure we are
School round	An online test taken at school in early November; the school registers through a contact teacher	Good, from the 2026 to 2027 calendar and registration page
Semifinal	A one-site event in Aarhus in January with theory and practical parts	Good for the date; format and numbers come from an IBO page and a 2024 news item
Training and final	Training weekends, then a practical final in April and a theory final in early May	Good for the 2026 to 2027 dates
IBO team	Four winners are announced at an award event, then trained before the IBO	Good that there are four; how winners are ranked is not stated

Stage 1: the school round

The first stage is an online test taken at students’ own schools. For the 2026 to 2027 cycle the national calendar puts it in the week of 2 to 6 November 2026, and the registration page asks schools to sign up by 20 October 2026 through a form filled in by a contact teacher at the gymnasium.^2,3 The registration page says every student may take part in this round regardless of age or grade.³ The IBO’s country page describes the round as a multiple choice and true or false test.¹ Participation numbers are given in the box below.

Stage 2: the semifinal

The semifinal for 2027 is listed for 10 to 12 January 2027 at Aarhus University.² The IBO’s country page says the semifinal is made up of one theory test and two practicals,¹ and a news item from Aarhus University’s Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics about the 2024 semifinal gives the number of invited students.⁶ The sources we could read do not say how many students are invited in the current cycle.

Stage 3: training and the final

The national calendar lists training in mid-February 2027 at DTU in Lyngby and from 11 to 13 March 2027 at Videnscenteret in Sorø, with botany on the programme.² The final comes in two parts: a practical part in mid-April 2027 at the University of Southern Denmark in Odense, and a theory part on 1 and 2 May 2027 at Gefion Gymnasium, held together with training led by former IBO participants.² The IBO’s country page also describes a practical and a theory final but does not list the training weekends.¹ The size of the final is covered in the box below.

Stage 4: the IBO team

The four winners are announced at an award event on 3 May 2027, held together with the other science olympiads.² The national site’s list of past olympiads shows four Danish students at the IBO each year, and the calendar names the four winners as the ones who travel.^2,5 Before the IBO the team has a training week, listed for 13 to 17 July 2027 in Copenhagen and Warsaw, ahead of the 38th IBO in Warsaw from 18 to 25 July 2027.² The registration page adds that a school may release advancing students from classes and reimburse travel, but the sources we could read do not say what the rules are for the national finals themselves.³

The national site publishes the Danish team for every year since 2005, including 2024 in Kazakhstan, 2025 in the Philippines and 2026 in Lithuania.⁵ We could not read the official 2026 individual results table reliably enough to state the Danish medal results, so this guide does not give them; the table is published by the IBO.⁷

Points for an Author

If you went through this programme yourself, these are the points we most need you to settle. They are grouped here so that nothing uncertain is buried in the text above.

Where the sources disagree

Who organises it. The IBO’s country page says the programme runs through the Foreningen af Danske Biologer with a steering committee,¹ while the national site’s own “about” page describes six independent national olympiads under ScienceOlympiaderne and names university and publisher partners, without naming the association.⁴ The IBO page is undated and may be out of date.
How many students there are at each stage. The IBO page gives about 2,400 students in the school round, without a year.¹ The 2024 Aarhus news item gives 30 students at the semifinal and 15 at the final,⁶ while the current calendar gives no numbers at all.²
Where training takes place. The IBO page mentions training in Copenhagen and at a research centre,¹ while the current calendar lists DTU, Sorø and Gefion Gymnasium.² These may be different years of the same programme.

Gaps a firsthand author could fill

How the four winners are ranked from the two parts of the final, and whether there is any extra selection after the award event.
How many students are invited to the semifinal and the final in the current cycle.
The syllabus and what the school round, semifinal and final tests are actually like.
Who leads the Danish delegation at the IBO, and what the pre-IBO training week involves.
Whether students from schools far from Aarhus, Lyngby or Odense receive travel support.
Medal results for the Danish team in 2024, 2025 and 2026, which we could not confirm.

Two of these facts, the dates and venues in the calendar and the registration rules, rest on our own translation from Danish. A firsthand author can settle every one of these points. If that could be you, email us or read how it works.

BiOGuide tips for students aiming at this path

These are general tips from BiOGuide, not advice from a Danish participant, and they apply to any student aiming at an IBO team.

Train for the international format early. The IBO papers are in English and test reasoning on data and experiments, not only recall. The IBO preparation guide explains the format, and past IBO papers are in our practice papers.
Build the practical side. The Danish semifinal and final both include practical work, and the IBO has practical exams too. Our notes on practical skills are a place to start.
Cover the main areas. A national olympiad rewards broad cover of cell and molecular biology, genetics, ecology and evolution, among others.
Learn the English terms. Even if you study in Danish, learn the English names of structures, processes and methods, because the IBO papers are written in English.
Use the official channels for anything dated. Registration deadlines and venues change every year. Your contact teacher and the national site decide, not us.

Official links and sources

International Biology Olympiad, country page for the Danish Biologiolympiade (in English, undated). ibo-info.org
Biologiolympiaden, calendar for the 2026 to 2027 cycle (in Danish, official national site). biologiolympiade.dk. The dates and venues in this guide rely on our translation.
Biologiolympiaden, registration page (in Danish, official national site, 2026). biologiolympiade.dk
Biologiolympiaden, “about us” page (in Danish, official national site, 2026). biologiolympiade.dk
Biologiolympiaden, list of earlier olympiads and Danish teams since 2005 (in Danish, official national site, 2026). biologiolympiade.dk
Aarhus University, Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, news item on the semifinal, 16 January 2024, revised 31 October 2025 (in English, university news). mbg.au.dk
International Biology Olympiad, individual results of the 2026 IBO (PDF, in English). ibo-info.org. We could not read the table layout reliably, so we use it only to point readers to the official results.

Two more notes on sources. Every page on the national site is in Danish and every date from it rests on our translation. The IBO’s own list of member countries is at ibo-info.org.

This outline was last checked on 8 October 2026 and will age. Spotted an error or out-of-date detail? Email r6394175@gmail.com.