Konkur

Overview

The Konkur (Concours, often written Konkour) is Iran's national university entrance examination, run by Sazman-e Sanjesh, the National Organization for Educational Testing. It is the main route into Iran's public universities and is one of the most competitive entrance exams in the world by applicant volume, with yearly participation in the hundreds of thousands. A seat in a popular public-university programme, especially medicine, dentistry or engineering at a leading university, is scarce relative to the number of candidates, so the Konkur carries major cultural and social weight in Iran: years of after-school preparation, dedicated "Konkur institutes" (cram schools), and family financial commitment are common around it.

This page covers the undergraduate Konkur (Konkur-e Sarasari), taken after the Iran diploma. A separate graduate-level exam, the Konkur-e Karshenasi Arshad ("Konkur Arshad"), is required for admission to master's programmes after a bachelor's degree and is not covered here.

Who can apply

Candidates must normally hold, or be in their final year of, the Iran diploma (Diplom-e Payan-e Tahsilat-e Motevaseteh) or an equivalent recognised secondary credential. This includes diploma holders from the regular academic streams, from Technical-Vocational or Work-and-Knowledge tracks, and private candidates who completed their secondary studies outside the regular school system. Most candidates prepare through their school or through private Konkur-specific coaching institutes, but attending such an institute is not a registration requirement. Each candidate registers for one academic group (branch) and sits only the general and specialized subjects that belong to that group.

Exam pattern

The Konkur is a single-session, multiple-choice exam lasting around four and a half hours, with four options per question and one correct answer. Wrong answers carry a negative-marking penalty (roughly a third of a correct answer's value is deducted), so blind guessing is discouraged. All candidates are tested on a set of general subjects, plus specialized subjects that depend on their chosen branch:

General subjects shared across branches typically include Persian language and literature, Arabic, religious and Quranic studies, and a foreign language (usually English). Some branches also include their own general-subject variations. The exact subject list, number of questions per subject, and time allotted are published by Sazman-e Sanjesh in the registration notice for each year's exam.

Marking and results

The Konkur has no fixed pass/fail threshold. Each candidate's raw answers are converted into a rank (often called a "percentile rank" or, informally, a score "out of ten thousand") within their branch and their quota region, rather than an absolute score. In recent cycles, a candidate's final admission ranking has combined their Konkur performance with their grade 11 and grade 12 academic record from the Iran diploma; the exact weighting between the two has been revised by Iran's Supreme Council for Education Evaluation across different years, so check the current cycle's official weighting rather than assuming a fixed split. Results, including each candidate's rank, are announced by Sazman-e Sanjesh some weeks after the exam.

Important dates

The main Konkur sitting is typically held in summer, in the early part of the Iranian month of Tir (late June to early July), with separate sittings scheduled on different days for the different branches. Registration opens some months earlier, usually around Bahman to Esfand (roughly January to March). Exact registration and exam dates are announced and can shift from year to year, so candidates should check the current year's official notice on the Sazman-e Sanjesh site rather than relying on a fixed calendar date.

Fees

Sazman-e Sanjesh sets a registration fee for the Konkur each year, payable in Iranian rial (IRR) during the online registration window. The fee amount and any variation by number of branches or groups selected are published in that year's official registration notice; check the current notice for the exact figure rather than assuming it carries over from a previous year.

How to apply

Registration is done online through the Sazman-e Sanjesh portal during the announced registration window. Candidates create or use an existing Sazman-e Sanjesh account, select their academic branch/group, enter their personal and educational details, upload the required photograph and documents, and pay the registration fee. An admission card with the exam date, time, and venue is issued closer to the exam date through the same portal.

After the exam

After results are announced, candidates submit a ranked preference list of majors and universities through the Sazman-e Sanjesh portal. Seats are then allocated centrally in a single national clearing process that matches each candidate's rank, their preference order, and the quota rules for their region and category (Iran divides the country into quota regions, and also reserves a share of seats for categories such as families of war veterans) against the capacity each university has declared for that year. A candidate who is not allocated a seat, or who turns down their allocated seat, can reapply in a later Konkur cycle. Candidates who go on to a master's degree after their bachelor's will later need to sit the separate Konkur Arshad exam.

Preparation tips

• Confirm your branch's exact general and specialized subject list, and the number of questions per subject, from the current year's official registration notice rather than a previous year's pattern.

• Practise under exam timing, since the whole exam is multiple-choice with negative marking for wrong answers; a steady pace with selective guessing matters as much as raw subject knowledge.

• Treat your grade 11 and grade 12 diploma coursework seriously, since the diploma record feeds into the final admission ranking alongside the Konkur score.

• Work through recent years' past papers for your branch, since specialized subjects tend to follow a consistent style and difficulty from year to year.

FAQs