New Zealand’s premier physics competition for senior high school students.
The New Zealand Young Physicists’ Tournament, NZYPT, mimics, as close as possible, the real-world processes of scientific research. It adds real world skills in experimental design and fabrication, data modelling, problem solving, presentation, teamwork and concise communication to classroom theory.
The aim is not to calculate or reach “the correct answer” as there is no such notion here. Students have almost nine months to work on 7 open-ended problems. which are relatively easy to reproduce but present unexpected behaviour. Students have to design and perform experiments, then to draw and defend conclusions from their experimental outcomes.
The competition itself enacts a scientific discussion between teams of three students. Their presentations and conversations are evaluated by a jury of physics teachers, postgraduate students and university lecturers. The highest accumulated score over three competition rounds wins.
The Tournament is organised by NZ Young Physicists’ Trust, registered charity CC62496. The Trust also uses the problems as the basis of a separate competition for individual students that selects a five student NZ Representative team that competes in the International Young Physicists’ Tournament, (IYPT) in July. In July 2026, IYPT will be in Zurich, Switzerland.
December workshops in Auckland, Hamilton and Wellington
The Trust, with the support of our sponsors, Jane Street International and Women In Engineering at the University of Auckland, is holding a series of one day workshops at the end of term 4 for students and teachers to attend together and learn how the Tournaments work. Using previous IYPT “Slinky Spring” problems the workshop will cover “how to get started on an IYPT problem”. It is a great introduction to both the NZ schools’ team and the NZ Rep team selection Competitions.
In Auckland the workshop is on Thursday December 4th at the University of Auckland’s Faculty of Engineering. Venues and dates (all in the first few days of December) for a Wellington and Hamilton event will be announced shortly.
The cost of the workshop is $135 for a team of three students and one teacher, or $40 for individual students and teachers. Registration will open on Friday October 17th. Watch this space!
The 2026 Tournament is underway.
The draft schedule for both the NZYPT 2026 Tournament and the selection of the New Zealand Representative Team for the 39th IYPT in Zurich, Switzerland, is available here.
Please note that this year Rep Team selection will take place BEFORE the schools’ Tournament to maximise team preparation time. Video entries need to be submitted by February 14th 2026. The video entry is free but restructed to NZ residents or citizens attending a MoE recognised high school or who is registered as home schooled.
The schools Tournament will again be in Auckland on March 21st 2026. The fee will be kept at the 2024 level of $135 per team. Despite increasing numbers of schools participating, we don’t yet have the numbers for regional rounds. Instead we have in place an improved schools support programme with;
- the regional workshops for teachers and students in late 2025
- online teacher-to-teacher meetings in February and March to help you coach your students.
TEACHERS please express an interest here in this to be kept up to date with news of NZYPT 2026
The World Cup of Physics is coming to Auckland!
The Trust has won the hosting rights to the 40th International Young Physicists’ Tournament, often called the “World Cup of Physics” . It takes place between the 5th and 12th of July, 2027 in Auckland and will see teams from about 40 couturies compete. We are currently sorting out venues for teh 400 or so overseas participants and will of course keep everyone up to date on progress. Please contact us if you want to help.
Like all world cups, we hope the excitement of the event will raise awareness and participation, while the infrastructurewe put in place will support the school team competition for years afterwards. Our long term goal remains enriching high school physics through the Tournament and other events. Watch this space!
ACCELERATE!
An Unexpected Journey: Science Competition Leads Budding Actor to Space Design
Alumni Luke Roven and his team placed 8th in the International Young Physicists’ Tournament in China 2028, winning bronze medals. Read how IYPT helped Jed find his confidence, change direction and accelerated his career in Rocket sciences.
Congratulations the 2025 New Zealand Rep Team
who won honorable mention medals after a very disrupted travel and final training camp curtesy of the Doha missile strikes. Their 19th place of 35 teams place was only one short of a bronze medal and placed us the ahead of Australia, the UK and the USA.
The team are
Alan Chen – St Kentigern’s College, Auckland
Audrey Kung – Queen Margaret’s College, Wellington
Zhuiuan (Jason) Tao – Westlake Boys High School, Auckland
Yujin (Julia) Sung – St. Cuthbert’s College, Auckland
Kayden Liu – Kristin School, Auckland
Also in the picture are team leaders Daniel Shi (Poland 2019) and Eric Coufmann (Singapore 2017).
Privacy Policy: You can read our Privacy Policy, as it applies to this website, here.