AstroSpeedrun

A complete course for the International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics, starting from zero.

Start the courseBegins with 1.1 The celestial sphere, the first section written so far.Take the placement testAbout 20 questions in 25 minutes. It chooses a route and where to start.

Over Tonight, as a time-lapse

The sky over the chosen city tonight, from the star catalogue, the Moon and the planets.

Learn

Chapters that start from what you can see in the sky and build up the physics and the maths, with something to do every few minutes.

2 sections written so far, in 18 planned chapters Practice

Exercises, past IOAA problems with our own step-by-step solutions, and a review queue for everything you miss.

14 exercises and quick checks, 4 olympiad problems Sky

A sky explorer and trainer for the observation round: constellations, bright stars, coordinates and planetarium reasoning.

1,663 stars to magnitude 5, from the HYG catalogue Exams

Timed mock papers in exam conditions, marked automatically, with a list of what to repair afterwards.

No mock papers yet

Two routes

Core route

The topics behind about 88% of the marks in past papers, in the order that earns marks fastest.

Lessons: about 78 h
With review and mocks: about 94 h
At 2 h a day: about 7 weeks

Complete route

Everything in the Core route, then stars, exoplanets, galaxies and the Milky Way.

Lessons: about 95 h
With review and mocks: about 110 h
At 2 h a day: about 8 weeks

How medals work

The medal lines are set from the median score: bronze near the median, silver at 1.3 times it and gold at 1.6 times it, so a bronze means beating about half the room. Contestants without a medal who are above the median in theory, or in the practical rounds, receive an honourable mention.