Warren Bei: Canada's Perfect Score
In the world of competition mathematics, a perfect score at the International Mathematical Olympiad is the four-minute mile — six problems, two days, four and a half hours each day, against the most gifted teenagers on the planet. In July 2025, Warren Bei of West Vancouver ran it: 42 out of 42, gold medal, not a single point dropped. In Canada's 45 years at the IMO, only six of its competitors have ever done it.
The Grade 9 Champion
Bei announced himself in 2021, when as a Grade 9 student at Rockridge Secondary School he won the Canadian Mathematical Olympiad outright — a competition dominated, in the normal run of things, by seniors with years of additional training. It was the kind of result that national programs reorganize themselves around. He would win the CMO again and again, taking his fourth title in 2025 with the country's top score of 27 out of 35, the CMO Cup, and a cash prize.
Five Medals and a Hall of Fame
Across five appearances for Math Team Canada, Bei collected three gold and two silver medals. The 2025 perfect score sealed his place: second in Canada's all-time IMO hall of fame, and tied for ninth in the global IMO hall of fame — a list that includes Fields Medalists and some of the most celebrated mathematical minds of the modern era. The names ahead of him are vanishingly few.
What Comes After Perfection
Bei earned early admission to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the traditional next stop for North America's olympiad elite — the same pipeline that has carried IMO stars into research mathematics, theoretical computer science and beyond. In an interview with the Canadian Mathematical Society after one of his CMO victories, Bei came across the way the greats often do: less interested in the trophy than in the problems themselves.
Why This Matters
Olympiad mathematics is the most unforgiving meritocracy in the intellectual world: no reputation, no résumé, just six problems nobody has seen before. To win a national olympiad in Grade 9 and to finish with a perfect IMO score is the signature of a generational talent. The history of mathematics suggests we will be hearing the name Warren Bei for decades.
Achievements
- Won the Canadian Mathematical Olympiad four times, first in 2021 as a Grade 9 student, and again in 2024 and 2025 — taking the CMO Cup with the top national score of 27/35 in 2025.
- Earned a perfect score of 42/42 and a gold medal at the 2025 International Mathematical Olympiad — only the sixth perfect score by a Canadian in the country's 45 years at the IMO.
- Accumulated three gold and two silver IMO medals, ranking second in Canada's all-time IMO hall of fame and tied for ninth in the global IMO hall of fame.
- Gained early admission to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
