Xu Haolin scored 699 out of 750 in this year’s gaokao and will enter the Guanghua School of Management, Peking University’s business school, the South China Morning Post reported. Her result placed her in the top 100 in Anhui Province.
Her brother Xu Haotian, 17, scored 688. He was admitted to the School of Physical Sciences at the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei, the capital of their home province.
Both studied at Chizhou No. 1 Middle School in the city of Chizhou, according to local broadcaster Chizhou News.
Peking University ranks 13th globally in the QS World University Rankings 2027 and the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2026. The University of Science and Technology of China sits at 51st in Times Higher ranking and 134th in QS list.
The gaokao is scored out of 750 in most provinces and held in early June. Cutoff scores and university admission quotas are set province by province rather than nationally.
Nationally, 12.9 million candidates registered for the gaokao, 450,000 fewer than in 2025, China’s Ministry of Education said on June 3 in an announcement.
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Students enter a school on the first day of China’s National College Entrance Examination (NCEE) known as “gaokao”, in Beijing on June 7, 2026. Photo by AFP |
Haolin reached the exam two years early by skipping the second and sixth grades in primary school, Chizhou News reported. She did so to join her brother’s year group and to spare their mother two separate school runs.
She entered secondary school alongside him and finished first in their first mid-term exam.
Haotian said, as cited by SCMP, that he remained stunned by his sister’s score. He joked that he would be able to boast at his new university about a sibling two years younger studying at Guanghua.
Their father posted repeatedly about the results, drawing a wave of congratulations.
Social media users labelled Haolin a genius girl, but she rejected the description.
“I am not a genius girl,” she said in a clip published July 29 by Shanghai-based outlet The Paper. “I don’t think my talent and intelligence meet the standard for that title.”
The siblings told Chizhou News that studying efficiently and finding gaps early mattered more than working through large volumes of practice questions. They rested when they needed to, kept a level head under pressure and built their results through steady accumulation.
