New Zealand vs Peru Grading System

How does the New Zealand grading system work?

New Zealand universities use a 9-point GPA scale where 4 is typically the minimum pass.

How does the Peru grading system work?

Peruvian universities use a 0–20 scale where 11 is the minimum pass — different from France (10) and not a 50% midpoint.

⚠️ Peruvian pass mark is 11/20, not 10/20 as in France. A 17+ is an excellent result.

Do New Zealand and Peru mark to the same standard?

No — and it is the difference in marking culture, not the arithmetic, that makes a direct comparison mislead. Here is how each country actually uses its own scale.

What a good grade means in New Zealand

New Zealand marking sits close to the Australian pattern: an A grade starts around 80% and A+ marks are awarded sparingly, so a B+ average is a solid degree rather than a modest one. Postgraduate entry is generally framed as a B average or better in your final-year courses, and universities describe that as an indication of readiness rather than a hard cut-off — applicants below it are commonly routed through a postgraduate certificate or diploma rather than refused outright.

What a good grade means in Peru

As with every 20-point system, the top of the scale is barely used: a 17 is an excellent result and marks approaching 20 are effectively unavailable, so an aggregate of 14 or 15 represents a solid degree. Peru's added complication is that the pass mark and the descriptor boundaries both vary between universities, which means two Peruvian transcripts showing the same number can describe meaningfully different standings — the grading key is the only reliable way to tell.

Will a grade from New Zealand get you into Peru?

We do not yet hold published entry requirements for Peru, so we do not compare your grade against a bar we cannot cite. The conversion above still tells you how your result reads in Peru terms.

NZ GPA 9 (A+) → 4.0 US GPA. GPA 7 (B+) → approximately 3.3.

What goes wrong converting grades from New Zealand to Peru?

The pass marks differ — 4 in New Zealand against 11.0 in Peru — so the two scales have different usable ranges and the middle of one is not the middle of the other.

Mistakes specific to New Zealand grades

• Reading the nine-point GPA against a 4.0 scale. A New Zealand 7 is a B+, not a near-perfect result, and the difference is large.
• Assuming the whole degree counts. Postgraduate entry usually looks at your final-year or highest-level courses.
• Treating a shortfall as a refusal. A postgraduate certificate or diploma is the normal bridging route into a New Zealand master's.

What should you do next, applying from New Zealand to Peru?

1. Check the course, not the country. Entry requirements are set per programme and revised every cycle. We hold no published national bar for this destination, so the course page is the only figure that binds.
2. Check whether an evaluation is even required. Unlike the US and Canada, Peru universities commonly assess foreign transcripts in-house. Confirm on the course page before paying for a report you may not need.
3. Get your documents moving early. Universities normally require your transcript sent directly by your institution rather than as a copy from you, which takes longer than most applicants expect.
4. Read both systems in full. How New Zealand grading works · How Peru grading works

What do these grading terms mean?

GPA (Grade Point Average)

The US way of expressing an overall grade, on a 0–4.0 scale where 4.0 is the top — so a 4.0 is roughly what a 90–100% or a First Class would be elsewhere.

Honours degree

A bachelor's degree that includes a higher-level final year or research project — in Australia, South Africa and New Zealand it is often an extra year, and master's entry can depend on it.

Percentage scale

A 0–100 marking scale — but the numbers are not comparable across countries: 70% is an outstanding result in the UK and a modest one in India.

Transcript

The official document from your university listing every subject you took and the grade you got — not the same as your degree certificate, and universities abroad want both.

Grade compression

Where a marking culture rarely uses the top of its own scale, so the highest grades anyone actually earns sit well below the theoretical maximum.

Frequently asked questions