What is Xi Jinping’s IQ?
Xi Jinping IQ: Tsinghua by recommendation, an in-service law doctorate, four decades of office, and no published test.
Xi Jinping’s IQ is not on record: no IQ test result has ever been published for him, and no figure turned up on any page checked for this profile. What is documented is chemical-engineering study at Tsinghua University (1975–1979), an in-service Doctor of Law degree (1998–2002) and more than four decades of party and state office, which together support an estimated IQ of about 115–130.
Xi Jinping’s estimated IQ
- Chemical-engineering study at Tsinghua University from 1975 to 1979, in the Department of Chemical Engineering’s basic organic synthesis program, graduating in 1979 (Xinhua biography, October 25, 2017; Wikipedia; EBSCO Research Starters).
- A Doctor of Law degree from Tsinghua’s School of Humanities and Social Sciences, studied from 1998 to 2002 in the in-service graduate class in Marxist theory and ideological and political education (Xinhua biography).
- A career ladder that Xinhua lists step by step, from Zhengding County (1982–1985) through Xiamen, Ningde and Fuzhou to governor of Fujian (2000–2002), Party secretary of Zhejiang (2002–2007) and Party secretary of Shanghai (2007).
- Vice President of the People’s Republic of China from March 15, 2008, General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party since November 15, 2012 and President since March 14, 2013 — sustained institutional standing, not a test score (Xinhua; USC U.S.-China Institute; Wikipedia).
No IQ test, entrance-exam score, class rank or grade report has been published for Xi Jinping, and the two academic credentials the range leans on say little about relative ability: the engineering course was entered by recommendation, not examination, and the doctorate was studied part-time alongside provincial office. Offices held over four decades reflect effort, judgment and opportunity as well as reasoning ability, so this Xi Jinping IQ estimate is a judgment from a public record, not a measurement.
- Born
- June 15, 1953, Beijing
- Education
- Tsinghua University: chemical engineering, basic organic synthesis program (1975–1979); in-service graduate class in Marxist theory and ideological and political education (1998–2002), Doctor of Law
- Admission
- Entered Tsinghua in 1975 as a “worker-peasant-soldier student” by recommendation; no entrance-exam score on record
- Regional career
- Zhengding County (1982–1985); Xiamen (1985–1988); Ningde (1988–1990); Fuzhou (1990–1996); governor of Fujian (2000–2002); Party secretary of Zhejiang (2002–2007) and of Shanghai (2007)
- National offices
- Vice President of the People’s Republic of China, 2008–2013; General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party since November 15, 2012; President of the People’s Republic of China since March 14, 2013 (as of October 2026)
- Test on record
- No IQ test, entrance-exam score, class rank or grade report published in the sources checked
- Estimated range here
- 115–130 (achievement and academic record)
What an IQ of 115–130 actually means
Set the claim aside for a moment. If someone genuinely scored in this range, here is what that would represent.
| 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 Xi Jinping is
Xi Jinping’s education is documented in outline by the Xinhua biography and in more detail by Wikipedia. He was born on June 15, 1953, in Beijing. From 1969 to 1975 he lived in Liangjiahe, a village in Yanchuan County, Shaanxi, as a sent-down youth and Party branch secretary, and he joined the Chinese Communist Party in January 1974. In 1975 he entered the Department of Chemical Engineering at Tsinghua University, in its basic organic synthesis program, and he graduated in April 1979. Xinhua records those years as study and names only the doctorate as his degree, while Wikipedia’s infobox lists a B.S. and EBSCO’s research starter says he graduated with a degree in chemical engineering; the sources checked do not settle whether a bachelor’s degree was formally conferred (for how majors compare in general, see average IQ by college major). Xinhua records the next three years as secretary posts in the General Offices of the State Council and the Central Military Commission, from 1979 to 1982.
His regional career, as Xinhua lists it, began in Hebei Province: deputy Party secretary of Zhengding County from 1982 and its Party secretary from 1983 to 1985. He then moved to Fujian Province, where he was deputy mayor of Xiamen (1985–1988), Party secretary of Ningde Prefecture (1988–1990), Party secretary of Fuzhou (1990–1996), deputy provincial Party secretary (from 1995), acting governor from 1999 and governor from 2000 to 2002. In 2002 he moved to Zhejiang Province as acting governor and then Party secretary, serving until 2007, and in March 2007 he became Party secretary of Shanghai.
The doctorate sits inside that provincial career. Xinhua records that from 1998 to 2002 he studied in the in-service graduate class of the Marxist theory and ideological and political education program in Tsinghua’s School of Humanities and Social Sciences and obtained a Doctor of Law degree; Wikipedia gives the topic of his dissertation as rural marketization. A part-time doctorate pursued alongside provincial office shows that its holder completed doctoral-level work, not how he ranked; no ranking, grade or honors for it appears in the sources checked.
His national offices follow. In 2007 he joined the Standing Committee of the Politburo and became president of the Central Party School, which he led until 2012; he became Vice President of the People’s Republic of China on March 15, 2008, and Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission in October 2010. He was elected General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee on November 15, 2012, and President of the People’s Republic of China by the National People’s Congress on March 14, 2013. As of October 2026 he holds both offices and chairs the Central Military Commission, according to Xinhua’s English reports of September 30 and October 12, 2026.
By Elora Mercer, Celebrity Research WriterFigures checked by Leon Falkner, Data & Research AnalystReviewed by Aarav Vardhan, Editor-in-Chief · Last reviewed August 2026
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Xi Jinping: 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.
- 1953Born June 15 in Beijing.
- 1969Sent-down youth and Party branch secretary at Liangjiahe, Yanchuan County, Shaanxi (to 1975); joins the Chinese Communist Party in January 1974.
- 1975Reaches the Tsinghua University campus on October 20 as a worker-peasant-soldier student in the Department of Chemical Engineering; graduates in April 1979.
- 1982Becomes deputy Party secretary of Zhengding County, Hebei (Party secretary from 1983), after secretary posts in the State Council and Central Military Commission offices.
- 1985Moves to Fujian as deputy mayor of Xiamen; Party secretary of Ningde from 1988 and of Fuzhou from 1990.
- 1998Begins the in-service graduate class at Tsinghua that leads to a Doctor of Law degree (1998–2002); governor of Fujian from 2000.
- 2002Moves to Zhejiang as acting governor, then Party secretary (to 2007).
- 2007Becomes Party secretary of Shanghai in March and joins the Politburo Standing Committee later in the year; Vice President from March 15, 2008.
- 2012Elected General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee on November 15.
- 2013Elected President of the People’s Republic of China on March 14.
Why no figure circulates
Following a claim back to its first appearance is the part almost nobody does — and it is what most people are actually asking.
No Xi Jinping IQ figure turned up on any page opened for this profile, and no IQ test result has been published for him. What the official biography that Xinhua published on October 25, 2017 does record is a chemical-engineering course at Tsinghua University (1975–1979), a Doctor of Law degree from an in-service graduate class (1998–2002) and a career that runs from deputy Party secretary of a Hebei county in 1982 to General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in 2012, with no test or score of any kind. That record supports an estimated IQ of about 115–130.
The usual place to find a circulating number is an IQ-listing site, and none of the ones opened lists him. The celebrity list on the front page of celebrityiqs.com has no entry for Xi Jinping, the front page of iqtesta.com shows figures for other political leaders and none for him, and five more IQ sites checked give none for him either. A page written around the question stops short too: realiqtest.org’s “What Is Xi Jinping’s IQ?” (March 20, 2024) puts no number on him. People also type “xi jinping iq estimate” and “xi jinping iq reddit”; a forum post that names a number would be a guess, not a test result. Opinions about someone’s intelligence, admiring or dismissive, are not test results either. How unsourced numbers usually arise is covered in where celebrity IQ numbers come from.
The usual proxy for an estimate, an entrance-exam score, is missing too. Xi Jinping’s education begins with an admission that did not run through an examination: in 1975 he entered Tsinghua as a “worker-peasant-soldier student”, a category that Chinese universities admitted by recommendation between 1970 and 1976, after the national entrance examination was canceled in 1966 and before it resumed in late 1977; press accounts compiled by Facts and Details say he was recommended for a Tsinghua place in 1975, when there was no national college entrance exam. So there is no score from that admission to convert into an IQ estimate, the way an SAT result can be, however crudely (how SAT scores convert to IQ estimates), and no class rank, grade report or honors for his Tsinghua years appears in the sources checked. His doctorate was an in-service program, and no admission score or class rank is published for it either.
Among this site’s politics profiles, the record puts the Xi Jinping IQ level in the same 115–130 band as Vladimir Putin and below the 138–155 given to Angela Merkel, who also trained in the physical sciences but whose documented doctorate (quantum chemistry, 1986) was in a quantitative field. A score in the mid-120s is what an IQ of 125 means: well above the population average of 100. But degrees and offices are achievement records, not IQ tests: they show sustained work and opportunity as much as reasoning ability, and the same record would fit scores a little above and below this band.
How we read a number →Official biography. Gives the month of birth only (1953年6月); records Tsinghua chemical engineering, basic organic synthesis program, 1975–1979, as study (学习); in a parenthesis, the 1998–2002 in-service graduate class (在职研究生班) in Marxist theory and ideological and political education at Tsinghua’s School of Humanities and Social Sciences, leading to a Doctor of Law degree (法学博士学位); and the career list from 1969 to 2013, with no test score.
The 2013 dispatch (datelined Beijing, March 14) says he was elected president “Thursday morning” at the 12th National People’s Congress session. The 2026 reports are used only for his titles as of October 2026: Chinese President; general secretary of the CPC Central Committee; chairman of the Central Military Commission.
Speech transcript; the text says the plenary “elected me as the CPC General Secretary”, and the page title carries the date, November 15, 2012.
Born June 15, 1953 in Beijing; “From 1975 to 1979, Xi studied chemical engineering at Tsinghua University as a worker-peasant-soldier student in Beijing”; recommended by the Yanchuan County Party committee; on campus October 20, 1975, graduated April 1979; office dates (Vice President March 15, 2008, General Secretary November 15, 2012, President March 14, 2013); the infobox lists a B.S. and the thesis topic, rural marketization. Wikidata Q15031 is the human Xi Jinping, born 1953-06-15, no date of death.
Chinese Wikipedia: he entered Tsinghua through the worker-peasant-soldier student recommendation system (工农兵学员推荐制) and obtained the Doctor of Law through the in-service graduate class; the 工农兵学员 article dates recommendation-based admission from 1970 through 1976, with the examination restored in 1977. Gaokao: the examination was canceled in July 1966, students were chosen without formal academic scores until September 1976, and it resumed in late 1977.
EBSCO: “born in Beijing in June 1953”; entered Tsinghua’s chemical engineering department in 1975, graduated in 1979 “with a degree in chemical engineering”; elected president on March 14, 2013. CIDOB: “Nacimiento: 15 Junio 1953 Beijing”, and “La biografía oficial no precisa si obtuvo el título de ingeniero”, the gap noted in the text. Facts and Details compiles press accounts that he was recommended for a Tsinghua place in 1975, when there was no national college entrance exam.
Title, journal, volume and pages checked in the Crossref record. The title confines the study to 42 U.S. chief executives, so it gives no figure for Xi Jinping.
“Merkel obtained a doctorate in quantum chemistry in 1986 and worked as a research scientist until 1989”; she had studied physics at Leipzig. Used only for the comparison in the text.
Opened for this profile; none gives Xi Jinping a figure. The iqtesta.com front page shows figures for other political leaders; realiqtest.org says no reliable public record shows him releasing a professionally administered full-scale IQ score.
Looked for an IQ, entrance-exam, class-rank or grade figure for Xi Jinping in the biographies above, on the front pages of riotiq.com, lifescoretest.com, check-iq.org, scientific.place and sociosite.net, and in web searches for “xi jinping iq”, “what is xi jinping’s iq”, “xi jinping iq reddit” and “is xi jinping smart”. None gives a score or names a test.
The sources behind our estimate
The figures that circulate for Xi Jinping, what we were able to confirm, and where the two diverge.
No IQ figure for Xi Jinping was found on any page opened for this profile. The IQ-listing sites checked publish numbers for other leaders but none for him, and web searches for his IQ return biographies and commentary rather than a score.
No published IQ test result exists for Xi Jinping, and none of the pages opened for this profile puts a number on him. The celebrity list on the front page of celebrityiqs.com has no entry for him; the front page of iqtesta.com shows figures for other political leaders and none for him; and five more IQ sites (riotiq.com, lifescoretest.com, check-iq.org, scientific.place, sociosite.net) name none for him either. Pages built around the question do not answer it: realiqtest.org’s “What Is Xi Jinping’s IQ?” (March 20, 2024) says no reliable public record shows him releasing a professionally administered IQ score. The official Xinhua biography records degrees, offices and dates and no score of any kind.
There is no circulating number to weigh against this range. Most profiles on this site show a record pulling a circulating figure down toward earth; this one has no figure to compare against, and without an entrance-exam score the usual route to a test-anchored estimate is closed. The 115–130 Xi Jinping IQ estimate is what his degrees and career support on their own.
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.
Xi Jinping — frequently asked
What is Xi Jinping’s IQ?
No IQ test result has ever been published for Xi Jinping, so his IQ is not on record and no sourced figure circulates. His documented education and career — chemical-engineering study at Tsinghua University (1975–1979), an in-service Doctor of Law degree (1998–2002) and more than four decades of party and state office — support an estimated IQ of about 115–130.
Is there an Xi Jinping IQ estimate anywhere online?
None that cites a source. No IQ-listing page, news article or scholarly study opened for this profile gives Xi Jinping a score, and Dean Keith Simonton’s 2006 study of presidential IQ estimates covers only 42 U.S. chief executives. A forum post or list that names a number would be a guess, not a test result.
Did Xi Jinping take an IQ test?
No IQ test result or IQ score for Xi Jinping appears in any source checked for this profile. His 1975 entry to Tsinghua University came by recommendation, not an entrance examination, so there is no published admission score either; the record holds degrees, offices and dates.
Is Xi Jinping smart?
“Smart” is a judgment, not a measurement, and no test score exists to settle it. What can be documented is a completed chemical-engineering course, an in-service Doctor of Law degree and a career that Xinhua’s biography lists from 1982; on that record this page estimates an IQ of about 115–130.
What is Xi Jinping’s education?
Xi Jinping studied chemical engineering at Tsinghua University from 1975 to 1979. From 1998 to 2002 he studied in Tsinghua’s in-service graduate class in Marxist theory and ideological and political education and obtained a Doctor of Law degree, according to Xinhua’s official biography.
Did Xi Jinping take an entrance exam to get into Tsinghua?
No entrance-exam score is on record. In 1975 he entered as a “worker-peasant-soldier student”, a category admitted by recommendation between 1970 and 1976, when universities did not use the national entrance examination; it resumed in late 1977. Wikipedia says the Yanchuan County Party committee recommended him.
How does Xi Jinping’s estimated IQ compare with Vladimir Putin’s and Angela Merkel’s?
IQ Metrics estimates Xi Jinping at 115–130 from his academic and career record, the same band as Vladimir Putin and below the 138–155 given to Angela Merkel, whose doctorate was in quantum chemistry. All of these figures are estimates from public records, not test scores.
How does my IQ compare with Xi Jinping?
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 politics profiles, starting with Thomas Jefferson.
- 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 politics profiles — same field, same method
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Photograph by the Russian Presidential Press and Information Office, CC BY 4.0. Background removed for the portrait above. · Photograph by Vladimir Smirnov / TASS, CC BY 4.0. Cropped from a wider photograph; background removed for the portrait above. · Photograph by Raimond Spekking, CC BY-SA 4.0. Background removed for the portrait above.
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