← Back to the rankingGreat Grace International School
Budapest, Hungary · est. 1991 · Private
Illustration · Budapest
Great Grace International School (GGIS) is a private Christian international school teaching in English in Budapest's 12th district, from Preparatory 1 to Grade 12. It was founded in 1991 by missionaries of Grace Church as Greater Grace Christian Academy for the children of more than 60 international missionaries in Hungary; in 1992 the Ministry of Education recognised it as an American international school, and in 2004 it took its present name. Today about 200 students from 29 countries and diverse faiths attend. The curriculum is American, with a daily 30-minute Bible class and weekly chapel; the school's three core values are morality, discipline and respect. Graduates receive an American high school diploma; AP courses are offered in the upper grades, and the school is an SAT and AP testing centre. The language of instruction is English: the mission states directly that education is in English, and a fee-paying EAL programme supports non-English speakers. The school reports Middle States Association and ACSI accreditation received in 2016.
Key facts
Tuition
≈ $15 553–23 481 a year
5.1–7.6 million HUF
Programmes
AP · American programme
Admits from
5 years · Pre-School
Languages of instruction
English
Class size
no more than 20 students
About the fees Annual tuition for 2026-2027: Preparatory 1 5057000 forints, Grades 1-6 6495000 forints, Grades 7-8 7085000 forints, Grades 9-10 7450000 forints, Grades 11-12 7635000 forints. Tuition includes books, most field trips and school-wide testing; it excludes the registration fee, EAL programme fees, lunch, uniform, clubs, sports event fees and TOEFL and AP tests. Tuition is charged twice a year. Siblings from self-paying families receive a 10% discount.
Admissions Applications are accepted through OpenApply year-round from the beginning of January; applications for the current school year are considered only before 1 February, and if a grade is full the student may be waitlisted. Applying is free; required are reports for the last three years in English or Hungarian (otherwise a certified translation), the student's ID, immunisation records and a reference from the previous school. Applicants to Grades 6-12 take English (12000 forints) and Math or MAP Growth (20000 forints) tests, younger children an informal screening by a teacher; then a family interview at school, where parents who do not speak English must bring a translator. Preparatory 1 requires age 5 by 1 October, Grade 1 age 6. Grade 9 requires English at B1, Grades 10 and 11 at B2, and no new students are accepted into Grade 12; a limited number of students without English are accepted into Grade 7, and with A2 into Grade 8. Preparatory 1 and Grade 1 have no English limits, while in Grades 2-6 students without English are capped at 25% of a grade. The school may decline students with significant learning or behavioural needs. The school accepts foreign students: children from many countries attend, and registration requires a Hungarian address card or confirmation that a residence permit is in process.
Stages and year groups Grades Prep 1, 1-12. American curriculum: Lower School covers Preparatory 1 (full day, from age 5) and Grades 1-6, Upper School Grades 7-8 and high school Grades 9-12. Graduates earn an American high school diploma (4 years of English, 3 years each of social studies, math and science, Bible every year, two years of a foreign language). AP courses: Chemistry and Physics every other year, Statistics, Macroeconomics and Human Geography each year, others online or by independent study. MAP Growth tests in Grades 4-9, PSAT in Grades 9-11. There is no IB, Cambridge or Hungarian programme.
Address Szilágyi Erzsébet fasor 22/b, XII. kerület, 1125 Budapest
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
ACSI · accreditationMSA · accreditationCollege Board · authorised programmeNICS · school is part of the networkThe school is jointly accredited by ACSI and MSA (Middle States Association). The College Board AP Course Ledger lists it for the 2025-2026 school year. It is a NICS network school.
school is in an official registryconfirmed by a school document, by membership or by taking part in a networkclaimed by the school, no confirmation, not counted in the scoreGuide to all organisations → What stands behind each entry
ACSIAssociation of Christian Schools International
An accreditation of Christian schools: the school spends eighteen months to two years on a self-study, and then peers from other Christian schools visit. Faithfulness to the Christian confession is part of the standards, so this is an accreditation with a condition of belief. It often runs jointly with MSA or Cognia, and such a pair is stronger than ACSI alone.
What the badge means for this school. The school has been through this organisation's accreditation. It was judged as a whole: governance, safeguarding, staff, premises, teaching. The entry stands in the organisation's public register - anyone can check it.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →MSAMiddle States Association of Colleges and Schools
One of the oldest American accreditations, working since 1887 in more than a hundred countries and linked to the Office of Overseas Schools of the US State Department. It judges the school as an institution across twelve areas, including finances, governance, premises and student support.
What the badge means for this school. The school has been through this organisation's accreditation. It was judged as a whole: governance, safeguarding, staff, premises, teaching. The entry stands in the organisation's public register - anyone can check it.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →College BoardCollege Board, the AP programme
An American organisation that allows a school to put the letters AP on a pupil's transcript. The permission is granted course by course and tied to a particular teacher, it has to be renewed every year, and College Board reads the course syllabus before granting it.
What the badge means for this school. The school is allowed to run advanced AP courses - not the school as a whole, but one by one: by subject and by teacher. Governance, safeguarding and the primary years are not part of that check. Which subjects are actually approved is visible in the ledger. The entry stands in the organisation's public register - anyone can check it. Authorisation here runs a year at a time: the register lists the school for the 2025-2026 school year.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →AP
Advanced Placement: American advanced courses for the senior years. The exam for a course is set and marked by the College Board, not by the school. A good result is counted by American universities as a first-year course already passed, which saves a student time and money.
What this means for this school. A school does not get to call a course AP automatically: the College Board reads the course syllabus and approves it separately for every subject and every teacher, and the permission has to be renewed each year. Every approved school in the world is listed in the open AP Course Ledger, and this school's entry there stands as a line in the accreditation block above. How many courses a school is approved for, and in which subjects, the ledger does not show in its general listing. AP has no leaving certificate of its own: it sits on top of the school's main programme rather than being a separate system.
American programme
The American school programme, with the High School Diploma at the end. It usually comes together with AP courses, which the College Board stands behind, and with an American accreditation - MSA, NEASC or Cognia.
What this means for this school. The diploma is written out by the school itself: the American programme has no common leaving exam, and the content of the senior years is set by the school. Outside checking therefore rests on two things here - the accreditation of the school, and the AP exams if the school runs them.
NICSschool network
Network of International Christian Schools - an American non-profit organisation with 501c3 status, head office in Southaven, Mississippi. The first school was founded by Joe Hale in 1983 in Uijeongbu in South Korea. The size is named differently on the site: the section on the schools speaks of 13 schools in 11 countries, the history and head office sections of 14 schools in 12 countries. The head office is described as the service centre of the network: recruitment and placement of teachers, personnel, leadership development, oversight of the quality of teaching and financial supervision.
What this means for this school. The network owns or operates the school. Its accreditation and programme authorisation the school obtains separately, in its own name.
Exams and destinations from the school's official website
The school publishes nothing about where its leavers go: no share going on to university, no exam results, no list of universities.
Facilities from the school's official website
·Swimming poolnot stated on the website
✓Sports hall
·Laboratoriesnot stated on the website
·Theatre or assembly hallnot stated on the website
✓Library
✓Catering
·School transportnot stated on the website
·Boardingnot stated on the website
Campus: The school is in Budapest's 12th district, on Szilágyi Erzsébet fasor. There is a library with a librarian and PE in the gym; school lunch is provided by a third-party supplier. Students wear a compulsory school uniform. The building is open from 8:00 to 16:30, and classes run from 8:20 to 15:15. There is no boarding.
Clubs and activities: Art · Drama · Photography · Yearbook · College Prep · Elementary Choir · Korean Drum Jang-Gu · Flute class
Teaching staff from the school's official website
·Teachers listed by namenot published
✓Teacher qualifications
·Number of teachersthe school does not say
✓Students per teacher or class sizein the key facts above
What the listings show: all lead classroom teachers are certified or certifiable
The school publishes its full staff list: lower and upper school teachers, music, art, PE and EAL teachers, a librarian, a school psychologist, a school nurse, a college counsellor and a chaplain. The school stresses that its teachers serve students out of a Christian calling.
Safety and wellbeing from the school's official website
·CCTVnot stated on the website
·Security staffnot stated on the website
·Access controlnot stated on the website
✓Nurse or medical room
✓Counsellor
✓Child protection policy
·Staff trainingnot stated on the website
·Anti-bullying policynot stated on the website
The school has a Safeguarding Team and Safeguarding Policy, a Visitor's Policy and response procedures; it refers to the Child Safety and Protection Network (CSPN) and provides QR codes for raising concerns. Staff include a school psychologist and a school nurse.
Reviews
No reviews yet. The community rating counts towards the score once a school has five verified reviews - until then we do not show a zero, so as not to mislead.
Criteria breakdown criterion weight in brackets
Academics and programmes (16%)75 Community rating (16%)no dataparent reviews are needed: the criterion switches on at the fifth verified one Exams and destinations (12%) scored on disclosed data55 Safety and wellbeing (12%) scored on disclosed data70 Accreditation and verifiability (10%)95 Teaching staff (10%) scored on disclosed data55 Facilities (10%) scored on disclosed data75 Clubs and activities (8%) scored on disclosed data78 "Scored on disclosed data" stands where we count only what the school has written about itself on its own site: exams and destinations, safety and wellbeing, teaching staff, facilities, clubs and activities. A low score here means the school does not write about this, not that the school does not have it: a school with good security and a sparse site will score low. A school can fill in its profile, and the score will be counted again.
The score is counted from 8 of the 9 criteria.Only those with checkable data count: programmes and accreditations from official registers, the fee from a published price list. Where it says "scored on the median", the school has no data and the middle of the list is put in its place, so that a gap gives no advantage. Admissions, teaching staff and reviews come in as their data arrives.
The full methodology → Similar schools in the country