Which Chinese exam should you take, and is it worth it?

Find your exam in four questions

Most readers need just one exam. Answer four questions and the quiz picks the one that fits, with the level to aim for and a free practice PDF:

The quiz follows the rules in the rest of this guide, so read the section for your goal before you pay for a booking.

What is the Chinese proficiency test?

The Chinese proficiency test is the HSK, 汉语水平考试(Hànyǔ Shuǐpíng Kǎoshì). It's China's official exam for people learning Chinese as a second language, run by Chinese Testing International, CTI.

The exam is changing. From 13 December 2026 it has nine levels instead of six, and from HSK 3 you book a speaking paper with the written one. Our HSK exam guide covers the switch date by date, and HSK 3.0 explained covers what changed and why.

For the speaking papers, read our HSK speaking test guide. For one level in depth, there's a study guide for each, from HSK 1 to HSK 6.

You won't wait long for a sitting. CTI's 2027 calendar lists 11 dates for HSK 1 to 6, about one a month. The advanced HSK 7 to 9 runs only twice, in May and November.

Each test centre sets its own fee. CTI says the new HSK 3 to 6, speaking included, costs the same as the old level plus its matching HSKK speaking test. A score report counts as proof of your level for two years.

CTI also says what the certificate is for. Its pilot notice lists four uses:

• Proof of your level as a second-language learner.
• Study and scholarships in China.
• Work in China.
• Jobs and promotion at Chinese companies abroad and at multinationals.

That list is the real test of whether it's worth it, and we check each use against the rules below. If your goal isn't on it, you may not need the HSK at all.

Every Chinese exam, side by side

We grouped the exams into four families. Proficiency tests certify a level for whoever books them, while school exams belong to one country's system or to the IB.

Proficiency tests anyone can book

These tests certify a level, whatever your age or school. Here's who each one is for:

Sources: CTI's HSK, BCT and YCT pages and its 2027 calendar; SC-TOP's TOCFL and CCCC pages; the Shanghai government's CSCA guide; all read 5 November 2026.

If you're not sure which proficiency test you need, it's the HSK, unless Taiwan is in your plans.

US school, college and career tests

US exams are spread across schools, colleges, states and the federal government. Here's what each one is for:

Sources: College Board; the Seal of Biliteracy organisation's state pages; Avant and Language Testing International; BYU; UT Austin's K-16 Education Center; New York's education department; ETS; DLIFLC; all read 5 November 2026.

Two tests you'll still see mentioned are no help for Chinese. College Board ended the SAT Subject Tests in 2021, and CLEP has language exams only in French, German and Spanish.

So most US students need one of these. Take AP if your school offers it, and a Seal of Biliteracy test if it doesn't.

UK and Irish exams

The UK and Ireland run school exams by age, and only the senior ones carry university points. Here's how they line up:

Sources: UCAS 2027 Tariff tables; Pearson, AQA and Cambridge specifications and help pages; CAO's scoring page; all read 5 November 2026.

If you're under 16 in England, it's GCSE. If you're applying to university, the A level, or Scotland's Advanced Higher, is the one that earns UCAS points.

International and Asia-Pacific school exams

The last family is the exams set by the IB and by school boards in Singapore, Australia and New Zealand. Here's what they cover:

Sources: the IB's course pages; SEAB's SEC pages; NESA's eligibility rules and UAC's 2025 scaling report; NZQA's Chinese (Mandarin) page; all read 5 November 2026.

Your school decides most of this for you. What you decide is the level, and that's where your background comes in.

HSK or TOCFL: which should you take?

Take the TOCFL if your plans run through Taiwan, and the HSK if they run through the mainland. Each side's universities and scholarships ask for their own test.

Taiwan is the stricter of the two. Its Ministry of Education Taiwan Scholarship accepts only the TOCFL wherever the local Taiwan office runs it, per SC-TOP's scholarship page. We found no mainland rule that asks for the TOCFL.

The good news is that one study plan serves both. Our TOCFL exam guide matched the two official word lists and found 83% of TOCFL's words on the HSK lists.

The scripts differ more than the words. In Taiwan, the TOCFL is printed in Traditional characters only. Abroad you can choose Simplified, but the paper keeps Taiwan's words, so a taxi is still 计程车(jìchéngchē).

So pick by destination. If you might need both, start with the one your first application names.

Many school-exam candidates grew up with Chinese

In school Chinese exams, top grades are common, because many candidates grew up speaking Chinese at home. That changes what a grade tells a university, and which exam suits you.

We put the latest official grade statistics side by side. Here's the share of candidates who earned the top grade in each exam, with GCSE French for comparison:

Sources: Cambridge's June 2026 IGCSE results statistics; Pearson's and AQA's provisional June 2026 grade statistics; College Board's AP score distributions; the IB's May 2025 statistical bulletin. AP's "standard group" is College Board's: students whose Chinese comes mostly from US school classes, who don't regularly hear or speak it outside class and haven't spent a month where it's spoken.

Most boards don't record who grew up with Chinese. College Board is the exception, and in 2025 nine in ten of its top scores went to students outside its standard group.

Other evidence points the same way. A UCL evaluation of England's Mandarin programme found that nearly 40% of GCSE Chinese candidates were community learners of Cantonese.

Three things follow for you:

• If you didn't grow up with Chinese, pick the exam built for you. IB ab initio is for beginners, and Cambridge's 0547 is for learners who meet Mandarin only in lessons.
• If you did, pick the syllabus for your background. Cambridge points home speakers to 0523 or 0509, and Edexcel's GCSE lets you speak Cantonese or Mandarin.
• Expect universities to read the grade in context. A Cambridge study found no single UK policy on native-speaker language A levels, and practice that's "wide and unsystematic".

The fairness question has teeth. In December 2025 Ofqual fined Pearson £505,000 because its A level Chinese papers were pitched towards what native speakers would know, disadvantaging non-native speakers. Our heritage speakers guide covers how to rebuild Chinese you grew up with.

Is a Chinese certificate worth it?

A certificate is worth the fee when someone with a say over your next step asks for one. That's usually a university, a scholarship office, a college credit office, a work-permit office or an employer.

When nobody asks, a certificate is a milestone. It can still motivate you, but a free mock test measures the same skills.

The next six sections take each goal in turn: a degree in China, study in Taiwan, US college credit, UK university entry, work, and your own goal. Each one ends with what to book.

For a degree in China, aim for HSK 5

China's national rule sets HSK 4 as the floor for degrees taught in Chinese. Many universities ask for more, so HSK 5 is the safer target.

The floor comes from the Ministry of Education's 2018 quality standard for international students. Programmes taught in Chinese admit students at level 4 of China's Chinese proficiency standard, which CTI's HSK 4 guide matches to HSK 4. The same rule expects level 5 by graduation.

We read the 2026 and 2027 admissions pages of eight universities. Here's the lowest level each accepts for a bachelor's degree taught in Chinese:

Sources: each university's own admissions page or catalogue, read 5 November 2026; Peking's figure is from its Chinese Government Scholarship notes, and self-funded applicants can instead sit its own written exam in Chinese, English and maths. Scores are on the old 300-point scale. Zhejiang: 34 of the 41 minimums in its 2026 catalogue are HSK 5 and 7 are HSK 6, by our count.

Notice where the HSK 4 rows come from. Two of the three are language degrees at language-focused programmes, so for most subjects HSK 4 gets you through fewer doors.

Scholarships follow a similar line. In the Chinese Government Scholarship call for 2027/28 posted by China's embassy in Indonesia, master's and doctoral degrees taught in Chinese need HSK 4. General scholars need HSK 3, and each country's call sets its own deadline.

For a bachelor's degree, there's a new step. From the 2026/27 intake, applicants to Chinese Government Scholarship universities also take the CSCA, the China Scholastic Competency Assessment.

The CSCA's Professional Chinese paper has 80 questions in 90 minutes, and maths is compulsory, per Shanghai's guide to the test.

One caveat on scores: every figure above is on the old 300-point scale. The new HSK's pass marks weren't published when we checked, so ask your university how it will read a new score report.

So for a degree in China, plan for HSK 5, and the CSCA if it's a bachelor's. Our HSK 5 study guide breaks down the papers and a plan.

In Taiwan, the TOCFL is the one that counts

Taiwan's rules are simpler: almost everything is written in TOCFL levels. Level 2 is the floor for study, and Level 3 is the number to aim for.

Here's what each rule asks for, from SC-TOP's study page and its scholarship page:

• A degree taught in Chinese. The Ministry of Education sets Level 2, CEFR A2, as the lowest entry bar departments may use.
• The Ministry of Education Taiwan Scholarship. Level 3 for programmes not fully taught in English, and only the TOCFL where it's offered locally.
• The Ministry of Foreign Affairs Taiwan Scholarship. Level 2 for degrees taught in Chinese.
• The Huayu Enrichment Scholarship. Holders of nine months or more need Level 3 from the last two years, or must sit it in Taiwan.

That makes Level 3 the safest target, since it covers every scholarship on the list. If you hold an HSK certificate and want Taiwan's scholarship, plan to sit the TOCFL too.

In the US, AP® Chinese is the usual route to credit

At some colleges, an AP® Chinese score can stand in for a year or more of college Chinese. The exam fee is $99 at US schools, and most colleges give credit, placement or both for a qualifying score, College Board says.

What a score buys varies a lot by college. We read four universities' own credit charts:

Sources: the University of California's AP credit chart, the University of Washington's AP policy, UT Austin's Testing and Evaluation Services and Stanford's Language Center, read 5 November 2026. Berkeley and Merced count the UC award as 5.3 semester units.

Read the small print before you count on it. Washington gives no AP credit to native speakers of Chinese, and Stanford rewards only a 5 with units.

If you're already at college, there are two other routes. BYU's FLATS test can earn up to 12 credits for a $50 fee, if your college agrees to put them on your transcript. Your college's own placement test can also move you past first-year classes.

The Seal of Biliteracy is the other prize. Every state and Washington, DC, has an approved state seal, and the bar for Chinese is set state by state. California accepts an AP score of 3 or an IB score of 4, and Illinois requires its public universities to award college credit for the seal.

So if you're in a US high school, take AP Chinese if your school offers it, and claim the seal as well. Our AP Chinese exam guide covers the new 2027 format.

In the UK, only senior exams earn UCAS points

UCAS points come only from qualifications on UCAS's Tariff, and neither GCSEs nor HSK certificates are on it. A levels, the IB and Scotland's Highers are.

We searched every row of UCAS's 2027 Tariff tables. Here's what the top grade in each Chinese qualification is worth:

Source: UCAS, 2027 Tariff tables, read 5 November 2026. GCSE and HSK don't appear in the tables.

A GCSE still matters: Pearson says A level students benefit most if they already hold one. It just doesn't count toward a points offer.

Heritage speakers have one more thing to check. Some universities treat a home-language A level differently, so ask the course before you rely on it.

Universities can still accept a qualification without Tariff points, UCAS notes, so check each course's entry requirements. So in the UK, take GCSE at 16 if you can, and the A level if a university application is next.

At work, a certificate counts most in China

A Chinese certificate has a formal value at work in one place we could document: China's work permits. Elsewhere, your Chinese is usually judged by talking to you.

China's points system gives up to five points for Chinese, out of the 85 that a top Category A permit needs. Here's how the HSK scores on it, as Shanghai's government explains it:

Source: Shanghai Municipal People's Government, "Understanding China's work permit points system", 13 August 2026.

Five points is small next to salary or a degree, which can each add 20. Still, for a borderline application, HSK 5 is the level that maxes the item out, and HSK 6 adds nothing.

Outside China, two kinds of job name a test:

• US federal and military roles. Most federal agencies rely on the DLPT and the oral proficiency interview, per DLIFLC.
• Teaching Mandarin in US public schools. The Praxis 5665 test is built for future K–12 Mandarin teachers.

In Taiwan, SC-TOP runs a job board of its own, and Level 3 was the most common ask when we counted its listings in October. For business roles in Chinese companies, CTI offers the BCT, scored out of 300.

We found no published data on how often private employers elsewhere ask for a certificate. So for a job in China, book HSK 5. Elsewhere, treat a certificate as a bonus on your CV, and expect to be tested in Chinese in the interview anyway.

For your own goal, a free mock test does the same job

If no one needs to see your certificate, its main value is a deadline. A booked date makes you study, and a pass is a nice thing to show for it.

The fees add up, though. Here's what a few of the tests cost, as their makers list them:

• AP® Chinese: $99 per exam at US schools, $129 elsewhere.
• TOCFL listening and reading in Taiwan: NT$2,000 this year.
• STAMP 4S: $79.90 for a single test.
• BYU FLATS: $50, plus any proctoring fee.
• HSK: set by each centre, with speaking now bundled from HSK 3.

A free mock test measures the same skills. Our practice tests follow each exam's format, so you can see your level before you decide to pay. For the HSK, our guide to free HSK practice tests lists every free paper we found, level by level.

So book the real exam when you'll use the certificate within two years, since that's how long an HSK score report counts as proof. Until then, a mock test on a quiet weekend tells you what you need to know.

How to prepare, whichever exam you pick

Almost every exam above now tests speaking. The new HSK adds it from HSK 3, AP's 2027 exam gives it 35% of the score, and GCSE and IB orals are a quarter of the grade.

That makes speaking the skill to start early, because it's the hardest to practise alone. A good week looks the same for most exams:

• Start with the official samples. CTI, SC-TOP, College Board, Pearson and Cambridge all publish sample papers, and they show the format best.
• Take one timed practice test a month. Mark it honestly, and note the section that cost you most.
• Speak out loud every day. Answer one exam-style question in Chinese, record it, and listen back for pauses.
• Learn the words your exam lists. GCSE, IGCSE, TOCFL and the HSK all publish word lists, so learn those first.

If you learn Simplified characters but need the TOCFL, add Taiwan's everyday words early. If you learn Traditional, check your exam's papers: Edexcel's print both scripts, and Cambridge's 0547 is printed in Simplified only.

Where SayMei fits, and where it doesn't

SayMei is an app for learning Mandarin by speaking with Mei Lin, an AI teacher. For exams, it helps most with the part that's hardest to practise alone: speaking at length, and answering questions out loud.

We also make free practice PDFs for nearly every exam in this guide, from the HSK and TOCFL to AP, GCSE and the Seal of Biliteracy. They're practice tests in each exam's format, written by SayMei, and free with a SayMei account.

Here's where it doesn't fit. Our books aren't official papers, and nothing in SayMei marks your answers against an exam board's mark scheme. SayMei teaches mainland Mandarin in Simplified characters by default. It doesn't teach Taiwan's word choices or zhuyin, and it can't register you or advise on admissions.

SayMei Premium costs $5.99 a month for 200 minutes with Mei Lin. Depending on your country, you start with a free first lesson or a free week that needs a card. We checked our pricing page before publishing.

SayMei isn't affiliated with or endorsed by any exam body in this guide. AP® is a trademark registered by the College Board, and International Baccalaureate® is a registered trademark of the International Baccalaureate Organization; neither is affiliated with this guide or endorses it.

What to do next

• Ask who will read your result. The university, scholarship office, college or employer decides which exam and level count.
• Take the quiz, then read your exam's section. It names the level to aim for and the rule behind it.
• Do a free practice test this week. It shows how far you are from that level.
• Book only when you'll use the certificate. A score report goes stale, so time it to your application.
• Practise speaking from the start. Most of these exams now test it.

Not sure where your Chinese is today? Our free level test takes about five minutes and estimates your HSK level.