About

Applicants must have taken an official AMC 10 or AMC 12 the previous November and apply by the following spring; the organizer then sets score cutoffs for each exam version and invites the top 300 applicants. Invitees sit a 20-problem exam of numerical answers in 2.5 hours, on high school mathematics without calculus. Ten places win cash, from $50,000 for first to $2,000 for tenth, and a separate Youth Prize goes to the top performer in 9th grade or below. Another 25 performers receive Honorable Mention trophies, and the top 35 are invited to a proof-based Math Prize Olympiad.

Because entry depends on AMC scores, the invitation is already a credential, and the prizes then separate a small top tier from the rest. The organizer does not publish the number of applicants or its score cutoffs, so how selective the invitation is cannot be stated. Applying and competing cost nothing, but travel, lodging, and food are paid by the family.

An invitation shows top AMC performance; a prize or Honorable Mention marks a top finish among those invitees.