What is Emma Watson’s IQ?
No test stands behind the 138; a Brown degree, a year at Oxford and Oxford graduate study point to about 125–140.
Emma Watson has no published IQ test result: the 138 that circulates comes from celebrity-IQ pages that name no test, date or examiner. What is documented is a Brown University degree in English literature (2014), a visiting year at Worcester College, Oxford, Oxford graduate study since 2023 and reported straight As at A level; together they support an estimated IQ of about 125–140.
Emma Watson’s estimated IQ
- Bachelor’s degree in English literature from Brown University, which she entered in 2009 and completed at the commencement of May 25, 2014, as the Associated Press reported and the Dragon School’s alumni page confirms. No honors designation appears in any source we found.
- A year (2011–12) as a visiting student at Worcester College, Oxford, while still enrolled at Brown. Cherwell reported in July 2011 that Worcester takes about 15 visiting students a year and cited an unnamed inside source saying admission rested on academic achievement, not fame.
- Straight As at A level in 2008 in English literature, geography and art (A was the top grade until the A* arrived in 2010), and eight A* and two A at GCSE in 2006. Both are press reports: Wikipedia cites a Telegraph story of August 14, 2008 headlined “A-levels: Harry Potter actress Emma Watson gets straight As”, and we found no school or exam-board record for either set of grades.
- Graduate study at Oxford: the Dragon School’s alumni page says she began a Master’s in creative writing in 2023 and later moved on to a doctorate. No completed Oxford degree has been reported, so this shows continuing academic work rather than a finished record.
Every input is an achievement record, not a test: grades and degrees reflect schooling, tutoring and effort as well as reasoning, and Watson was tutored on set for up to five hours a day while filming. The Brown degree carries no honors we could find, the exam results rest on press reports and no completed Oxford degree has been reported, so the range is deliberately loose.
- Born
- April 15, 1990, Paris, France; raised in Oxfordshire, England
- Name in other scripts
- 艾玛·沃特森 (Chinese), エマ・ワトソン (Japanese), per Wikidata
- Schools and results
- Dragon School (until 2003); Headington School, Oxford; reported GCSEs of eight A* and two A (2006) and straight As at A level (2008)
- Degree
- Brown University, bachelor’s degree in English literature, May 25, 2014
- Oxford
- Visiting student, Worcester College, 2011–12; graduate study from 2023, per the Dragon School
- Known for
- Hermione Granger in eight Harry Potter films (2001–2011); Beauty and the Beast (2017); Little Women (2019)
- Advocacy
- UN Women Goodwill Ambassador (announced July 8, 2014); HeForShe speech, September 20, 2014
- Circulating figure
- 138, unsourced
- Documented IQ test
- None published
What an IQ of 125–140 actually means
Set the claim aside for a moment. If someone genuinely scored in this range, here is what that would represent.
Average is 100 by construction, and about two-thirds of people fall between 85 and 115. Take the test to place your own score on this scale.
| Score range | Classification | Share of people | What it indicates |
|---|---|---|---|
| 85 – 114 | Average | ~68% | The range most people fall into. |
| 115 – 129 | Above average | ~13.6% | Roughly one person in seven. |
| 130 – 144 | Gifted | ~2% | The threshold most high-IQ societies use. |
| Above 144 | Highly gifted | ~0.1% | Figures above this range are extrapolated from the curve rather than measured. |
Percentages are approximate and describe a normal distribution. The same number means different things on tests with different standard deviations.
Thirty questions gives you a measured position on this exact scale — your score, your percentile and the ability breakdown behind it.
Find out in 30 minutes →Who Emma Watson is
Emma Watson was born on April 15, 1990 in Paris, lived in Maisons-Laffitte until she was five and then moved to Oxfordshire in England. She attended the Dragon School in Oxford until 2003, trained at the Oxford branch of Stagecoach Theatre Arts, and went on to Headington School, an independent day and boarding school for girls aged 11 to 18. The Dragon School’s alumni page says her first audition for the Harry Potter films took place in its gymnasium; Wikipedia says she was nine and auditioned eight times in all. She played Hermione Granger in all eight films, from Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (2001) to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 (2011), and was tutored on set for up to five hours a day.
Her school results were reported at the time and are still repeated by fan sites and tabloids. Her GCSEs in 2006 were reported as eight A* and two A across ten subjects, and her A levels in 2008 as straight As in English literature, geography and art. Wikipedia’s article on her cites a Telegraph report of August 14, 2008 headlined “A-levels: Harry Potter actress Emma Watson gets straight As”. Riot IQ calls these reports plausible but unconfirmed by any primary source, and we found no school or exam-board record either, so they appear here as reported, not established. A was the top A-level grade in 2008, because the A* was first awarded in 2010, and exam grades measure achievement, which is not the same thing as an IQ score (see achievement tests and IQ tests).
She entered Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, in 2009 and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English literature on May 25, 2014, one of about 2,000 graduates, the Associated Press reported. The AP noted that she released both Deathly Hallows films, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, This Is the End and Noah while a student. In July 2011 NewsCore quoted her saying she was still a Brown student and would spend her third year abroad at Oxford; Cherwell, the Oxford student newspaper, reported that she would attend Worcester College as a visiting student, one of about 15 the college takes each year, and planned to return to Brown for her final year; Wikipedia dates the year at Worcester to 2011–12. In February 2016 she and Benedict Cumberbatch, who studied drama at Manchester and acting at LAMDA rather than at Oxford, were both named visiting fellows of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford.
The Dragon School’s alumni page says she began a Master’s in creative writing at Oxford in 2023 and later moved on to a doctorate. No completed Oxford degree has been reported, so this profile treats it as work in progress. Outside acting, UN Women announced her as a Goodwill Ambassador on July 8, 2014, weeks after her Brown commencement, to work on the empowerment of young women and the HeForShe campaign, and on September 20, 2014 she spoke at the launch of HeForShe at United Nations Headquarters in New York, an appeal to men and boys to act for gender equality. Later screen work includes Beauty and the Beast (2017) and Little Women (2019). A bookish role, an Ivy League degree and study at Oxford make a tidy story, and a tidy story is what an unsourced number needs in order to sound plausible; for what typical scores at selective universities imply, see our piece on the average IQ of MIT, Oxford and Yale students.
By Elora Mercer, Celebrity Research WriterFigures checked by Leon Falkner, Data & Research AnalystReviewed by Aarav Vardhan, Editor-in-Chief · Last reviewed October 2026
Emma Watson: the documented record
The estimate above rests on this record. Every entry here is a matter of public fact, which is more than can be said for the number itself.
- 1990Born in Paris on April 15.
- 2001Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone opens; she plays Hermione Granger in all eight films, the last of which follows in 2011.
- 2006–08GCSE results are reported as eight A* and two A across ten subjects (2006); A-level results as straight As in English literature, geography and art (2008; The Telegraph, August 14).
- 2009Enters Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.
- 2011Begins the 2011–12 academic year as a visiting student at Worcester College, Oxford, while still enrolled at Brown.
- 2014Graduates from Brown on May 25 with a bachelor’s degree in English literature.
- 2014UN Women announces her as a Goodwill Ambassador on July 8; she speaks at the HeForShe launch at United Nations Headquarters on September 20.
- 2016Named a visiting fellow at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, in February, alongside Benedict Cumberbatch.
- 2023Begins graduate study at Oxford: a Master’s in creative writing, per the Dragon School.
Where the 138 figure came from
Following a claim back to its first appearance is the part almost nobody does — and it is what most people are actually asking.
What is the IQ of Emma Watson? The pages that answer say 138, and the trail behind it runs out quickly. The earliest dated page we found is iqtestprep.com, from May 30, 2022, which says it is estimated that she has an IQ of 138 and names no test. TheThings, updated on April 7, 2024, says she reportedly has it and links that sentence to a celebanswers.com page titled “What Is Emma Watson’s IQ?”; that page returns a not-found error, so what it cites, if anything, cannot be checked. Every other page that carries the number gives no first source either (see where celebrity IQ numbers come from). We found no Emma Watson IQ test result published by her, a testing body or a psychologist, and Riot IQ reports that “There is no credible record of Emma Watson being a Mensa member.”
The other pages repeat the figure under labels of their own. iqtestprep.com files it under “Gifted or very advanced”, sociosite.net under “High intelligence” (adding that it corresponds to 0.561 percent of the population), The Genius Index under “Very Superior” and TheThings under “moderately gifted”, which shows the labels belong to each site and not to a test report (see how IQ classifications differ). The pages also copy each other’s slips. iqtests.com says she took her English literature degree at Oxford, when the degree is from Brown, and The Genius Index places her GCSEs and A levels at “her school, Dragon”, although the Dragon School teaches only to age 13. An August 17, 2026 Riot IQ article by Dr. Russell T. Warne reached the same verdict: no test, no date and no examiner stand behind the 138.
The Emma Watson IQ figure also gets tangled with her best-known role. J. K. Rowling has called Hermione Granger a “borderline genius” in interviews from 1999 and 2000 that Wikipedia cites, and the character is described as an exceptionally talented witch, but that describes fiction: it is Rowling’s description of a character she created, not a test result for anyone. TheThings speculates that Hermione would have scored above 145 while admitting nobody can know, sociosite.net says Hermione is only slightly smarter than the actress, and FilmFolly, which lists Watson under an “IQ 132–138” heading, argues that a top exam result proves nobody else could have played the Hogwarts bookworm. Each slides from a casting decision to a claim about cognition. Playing a brilliant student is not evidence of being one, and a character has no IQ to rank her against: the comparison works only by inventing a number for the character too.
On a 15-point scale a 138 is 2.5 standard deviations above the average of 100, roughly the top 0.6 percent or one person in 177 (see how rare a high IQ score is). Any Emma Watson IQ level has to be inferred from the record, and our range of 125–140 for her estimated IQ puts the 138 just inside its top edge: unlike the 160s and 180s that circulate for other actors, it is not out of reach of the documented facts, only unsupported. The middle of the range, about 132, sits a few points below it, so the error runs in the usual direction, only by far less than for most actors here. Among the other actors, the record places her level with Lisa Kudrow and Benedict Cumberbatch (both 125–140), below Natalie Portman (135–145, a Harvard degree and two peer-reviewed papers) and Jodie Foster (130–145, Yale, magna cum laude), and well below Mayim Bialik (140–155, a completed UCLA doctorate).
Two comparisons by route rather than by rank. Stephen Fry (130–145) read the same subject, English literature, at Queens’ College, Cambridge, and graduated with upper second-class honours in 1981, which makes his the closest degree-level comparison: Watson’s Brown degree is also in English literature and shows no honors designation in any source we found. Tom Holland (105–130) is the nearer match for career shape: another British actor who became the lead of a global franchise young, first appearing as Spider-Man in Captain America: Civil War (2016), and whose range on this site likewise rests on an achievement record rather than a test.
How we read a number →The school’s own profile. It says her first Harry Potter audition took place in the school’s gymnasium, that she graduated from Brown University with a degree in English literature in May 2014, and that she continued at Oxford, having started a Master’s in creative writing in 2023 and later moving on to a doctorate. It says nothing about IQ.
The announcement, dated July 8, 2014, names her Goodwill Ambassador to work on the empowerment of young women and the HeForShe campaign. The speech page is dated September 20, 2014 and places the HeForShe launch at United Nations Headquarters in New York. Neither page mentions IQ.
Report her bachelor’s degree in English literature at Brown’s commencement on Sunday, May 25, 2014, that she started there in 2009 and was among 2,000 graduates, and the films she released while a student. None mentions honors or Oxford.
Cherwell reports a visiting-student place at Worcester College for her third year, notes that Brown requires only four semesters in residence and that Worcester takes about 15 visiting students a year, and cites an unnamed inside source saying admission rested on academic achievement, not fame; a college representative declined to comment on her course. NewsCore quotes Watson saying she remains a Brown student and will spend her third year at Oxford.
Reports that she shared her A-level result: straight As in 2008 in English literature, geography and art. The copy is undated. Wikipedia’s article on Watson cites a Telegraph report of August 14, 2008 headlined “A-levels: Harry Potter actress Emma Watson gets straight As” for the same event.
Second-hand. British Heritage gives eight A* and two A across ten GCSE subjects taken in June 2006, and the August 24, 2006 repost of a BBC Newsround item gives the same grades; British Heritage also gives an A in each of English, geography and art at A level. Study International says she “scored 10 As”, which does not match. Treat the grades as widely reported, not confirmed.
Orientation and cross-checks: birth date and place, schools, the eight-film list, the audition at age nine and eight auditions in all, the 2011–12 Worcester year, the 2016 Lady Margaret Hall fellowship, Rowling’s “borderline genius” description of Hermione with its 1999 and 2000 interview citations, the A* first awarded in 2010, and the education and careers of the actors compared here. Wikidata confirms Q39476 is the actress Emma Watson, born April 15, 1990 in Paris, with no date of death recorded, and lists her Chinese (艾玛·沃特森) and Japanese (エマ・ワトソン) labels.
A separate page that also finds no test, date or examiner behind the 138, says there is no credible record of Mensa membership, and describes the GCSE and A-level reports as plausible but unconfirmed by a primary source. It dates her UN Women appointment to July 2014.
The pages that state a figure: 138 on the first five and an “IQ 132–138” heading covering a group on FilmFolly. None names a test, date or examiner. iqtestprep.com and iqtests.com add disclaimers, TheThings links its figure to a celebanswers.com page that returns a not-found error, and sociosite.net, TheThings and FilmFolly bring in Hermione Granger.
None from Watson, a testing body or a psychologist. Looked for on the pages above, the Dragon School, UN Women, Tatler Asia and Riot IQ pages, Wikipedia and the Associated Press graduation reports; none contains a score. No SAT score or grade point average has been published either.
The sources behind our estimate
The figures that circulate for Emma Watson, what we were able to confirm, and where the two diverge.
Ask what the IQ of Emma Watson is and the pages that answer give 138, usually as an estimate or a “reported” figure. It appears on iqtestprep.com (dated May 30, 2022), TheThings (updated April 7, 2024), iqtests.com (April 18, 2024), sociosite.net and The Genius Index, and FilmFolly (April 4, 2024) lists her under an “IQ 132–138” heading. Several set the number beside her role as Hermione Granger.
No Emma Watson IQ test result has been published, and none of the pages that carry the number names a test, a date or an examiner. iqtestprep.com says it is “estimated” that she has it and adds that its site and tests are for entertainment purposes only. iqtests.com heads its article “IQ Level: 138”, then says any numbers in circulation are guesses without solid proof. TheThings says she “reportedly” has it and links that sentence to a celebanswers.com page that returns a not-found error. The Genius Index calls its figure an “Estimated Cognitive Quotient”, and FilmFolly’s 132–138 heading covers a group of stars rather than her alone. What can be checked is the record: the Associated Press reported her Brown degree on May 25, 2014, and the Dragon School’s alumni page confirms it.
Unlike the 160s and 180s that circulate for several other actors in this section, the 138 sits inside the range her record supports, close to the top. That does not make it sourced: it is a number that fits a plausible biography and has been repeated from page to page, and a good fit is not a measurement.
Want a number that does hold up? Every figure on this page is somebody’s claim. Take the 30-question test and get a percentile you can check rather than a figure you have to trust.
Emma Watson — frequently asked
What is Emma Watson’s IQ?
Emma Watson has no published IQ test result, so her measured IQ is not known. The 138 that circulates comes from celebrity-IQ pages such as iqtestprep.com and iqtests.com that name no test, date or examiner. Her record (a Brown University degree in English literature in 2014, a visiting year at Worcester College, Oxford, and Oxford graduate study from 2023) supports an estimate of about 125–140.
Is Emma Watson’s IQ 138?
There is no evidence that it is. The Emma Watson IQ score of 138 appears on iqtestprep.com (May 30, 2022), TheThings, iqtests.com and other pages, but none names a test, and several call it an estimate or a guess. A 138 would sit about 2.5 standard deviations above average, roughly one person in 177; for the nearest benchmark, see what an IQ of 135 means.
Is Emma Watson smart?
Her documented record shows sustained academic work, though it is not an IQ number. She took a bachelor’s degree in English literature at Brown University (May 25, 2014), spent 2011–12 as a visiting student at Worcester College, Oxford, and was named a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador on July 8, 2014. How smart she is in IQ terms cannot be read from that record, and nothing in it supports calling her a genius.
Did Emma Watson take an IQ test?
There is no public record that she did. No Emma Watson IQ test has been published by her, a testing body or a psychologist, none of the pages quoting 138 names one, and Riot IQ finds no credible record of Mensa membership. Her documented record is a Brown degree in English literature, reported straight As at A level and study at Oxford.
Is Emma Watson as smart as Hermione Granger?
The two cannot be ranked by IQ. Hermione is a fictional character whom J. K. Rowling called a “borderline genius” in interviews from 1999 and 2000, as Wikipedia’s citations show, while Watson is a real person with a documented academic record. Pages that say Hermione is slightly smarter, or would score above 145, are comparing a character with an estimate, and neither has a test score.
What did Emma Watson study at university?
Watson studied English literature at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, not Harvard. She started there in 2009 and graduated on May 25, 2014, among about 2,000 graduates; the Associated Press noted that she released both Deathly Hallows films, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, This Is the End and Noah while a student. In 2011–12 she was a visiting student at Worcester College, Oxford.
What were Emma Watson’s GCSE and A-level grades?
Press reports give eight A* and two A at GCSE across ten subjects in 2006, and straight As at A level in 2008 in English literature, geography and art. A was the top A-level grade in 2008, because the A* was first awarded in 2010. Wikipedia cites a Telegraph report of August 14, 2008 (“A-levels: Harry Potter actress Emma Watson gets straight As”); no school or exam-board record has been found, so the grades stay reported.
What is Emma Watson’s SAT score or GPA?
No SAT score or grade point average for Emma Watson has been published. She started at Brown University in 2009 and graduated on May 25, 2014, but no source we found gives her marks, and the UK exam grades reported above are the only school results on record. For how an SAT score is read as an IQ estimate, see SAT score to IQ conversion.
Does Emma Watson have a PhD?
Not as of October 2026: no completed doctorate has been reported. The Dragon School says she began a Master’s in creative writing at Oxford in 2023 and later moved on to a doctorate, which Oxford calls a DPhil.
How does Emma Watson’s estimated IQ compare with Natalie Portman’s?
IQ Metrics places Watson’s estimated IQ range of 125–140 below Natalie Portman’s 135–145. Portman holds a Harvard psychology degree from 2003 and co-authored peer-reviewed papers, a stronger checkable record than Watson’s Brown degree and reported exam results. Neither range comes from an IQ test.
How does my IQ compare with Emma Watson?
You can find out in about fifteen minutes. The IQ Metrics assessment is 30 questions, scored on the same 100-mean scale used throughout this page, so your result and the estimate above are at least expressed in the same units — one measured, one inferred. Once you have a number, the leaderboard shows where it would sit, and how we score and norm it explains the benchmarking.
Where does this estimate come from?
From the documented record rather than a test — the method is named above and set out in full under how we read a number. Compare it against the other actors profiles, starting with Natalie Portman.
- Take the 30-question IQ test — get a measured score and percentile of your own
- Average IQ by country — how the scale behaves across populations
- How IQ Metrics scores its assessment — the method behind our own number
- More on how IQ testing works — reliability, error and what a score can and cannot say
- More actors profiles — same field, same method
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