How to Convert the Algerian Grading System to a US GPA (2026)

A 13 out of 20 from an Algerian university lands as a B on one commonly cited conversion table and a B+ on another. The disagreement sits exactly in the band most Algerian applicants fall into, and it's made worse by a second, less obvious problem: Algeria doesn't sit inside the regional accreditation system that covers several of its Francophone African neighbors, so a conversion approach built around a country like Senegal or Cameroon doesn't transfer over cleanly. If you're applying to a US, UK, or Canadian graduate program with an Algerian transcript, both of those gaps are worth understanding before you let a single online calculator decide how your record gets read.

The scale: 0 to 20, under the LMD system

Algeria's higher education system runs on the same LMD structure, Licence, Master, Doctorat, used across much of Francophone Africa and inherited from the Bologna-aligned French model. Grades are scored on a 0 to 20 scale, and Nuffic, the Dutch credential-evaluation body whose country-by-country tables are widely cited by other evaluators internationally, lists 10 out of 20 as the pass mark for Algerian higher education. SmartCGPA's own Algeria-specific table confirms the same floor. Below 10/20, a module is generally recorded as failed, consistent with the pattern used across other LMD countries.

Mention bands, and a real disagreement at the top of the scale

Algerian degrees carry a mention, an honors classification attached to your final average, the same way French and other Francophone-system degrees do. Nuffic's table lays out five bands: Passable for 10.00 to 11.99, Assez Bien for 12.00 to 13.99, Bien for 14.00 to 15.99, Très Bien for 16.00 to 17.99, and a separate Excellent band for 18.00 to 20.00, with a note that marks above 18 are uncommon in practice. SmartCGPA's table draws the line differently, treating the entire 16.0 to 20.0 range as a single Très Bien band with no separate Excellent tier at all. Neither table is an Algerian government regulation, so if an application specifically asks you to state your mention, the safer move is checking your own université's règlement des études rather than assuming either public table's band cutoffs apply exactly to your degree.

Where conversion tables actually disagree

The real problem isn't the top of the scale, it's the middle, where most applicants' actual grades sit. SmartCGPA's conversion table maps 15 to 20 out of 20 to a 4.0, 13 to 14.9 to a 3.3, 12 to 12.9 to a 3.0, 11 to 11.9 to a 2.0, and 10 to 10.9 to a 1.0. InCred Evaluations, a separate commonly referenced source, maps 14.0 to 20.0 to an A worth 4.0, 12.0 to 13.9 to a B worth 3.0, and 10.0 to 11.9 to a C worth 2.0, its lowest passing grade. Those two tables visibly disagree across the entire 12 to 14.9 range, exactly where a reasonably strong Algerian transcript tends to land. A grade of 13/20, for instance, reads as roughly a 3.3 on one table and a flat 3.0 on the other. Neither of these is an official WES or Scholaro conversion, they're independently built estimates, and the gap between them is the clearest sign that no single public table should be treated as the final word on what your transcript means abroad.

WES itself publishes its own iGPA Calculator and grade-conversion guidance directly, and that's the authoritative source to use, or the formal evaluation to request, rather than quoting either secondary table as settled fact. WES also has a published policy treating a standard Algerian Licence, a Bologna-aligned degree, as equivalent to a four-year bachelor's for evaluation purposes, which is useful context if a program's instructions seem to assume a shorter credential.

Why Algeria's accreditation path looks different from its Francophone neighbors

If you've read guidance built around a country like Senegal, our Senegalese grading-conversion guide covers the same 0-20 scale, you may expect Algeria to sit inside the same regional recognition system. It doesn't. CAMES, the Conseil Africain et Malgache pour l'Enseignement Supérieur, which recognizes degrees across 19 Francophone African member states, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Madagascar, Mali, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, and Togo, does not include Algeria on its member list. Algeria instead runs its own entirely separate national quality-assurance structure, built around CIAQES (Commission d'Implémentation de l'Assurance Qualité de l'Enseignement Supérieur), established under a 2010 decree and operating under the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research, alongside regional East, West, and Center CIAQES commissions and a National Evaluation Council (CNE). One university source cites a later 2016 "installation" date for CIAQES's practical rollout, a detail we couldn't fully reconcile with the 2010 decree, so treat the exact founding timeline as approximate rather than settled.

What this means practically: there's no CAMES-style regional recognition step to point to for an Algerian degree the way there is for a Senegalese or Cameroonian one. A foreign credential evaluator checking an Algerian transcript is working from Algeria's own national CIAQES and CNE framework alone, which makes it worth being able to name your specific institution's accreditation status clearly rather than assuming a regional body will vouch for it.

What this means for your actual application

If a program requires a formal credential evaluation, and most selective graduate programs effectively do for a North African transcript even when a GPA field is marked optional, use a recognized evaluator rather than self-reporting a figure pulled from a public table. Our WES vs. ECE vs. IQAS guide walks through which evaluator fits which destination country and application type. Given that SmartCGPA and InCred disagree by roughly a third of a grade point across the exact range most Algerian transcripts fall into, submitting a self-calculated GPA when a program specifically asked for a formal evaluation risks looking like a shortcut around their actual requirement, not a reasonable stand-in for it.

Where a program genuinely accepts your institution's own scale without a formal evaluation, present your transcript alongside your university's own grading documentation if one is available, rather than a third-party online table the committee has no way of verifying. Your transcript and diploma will also likely need certified translation from French into English or whatever language your destination program requires; our guide to transcript translation requirements covers what counts as an acceptable certified translation.

The doctorat doesn't convert to a GPA figure at all

If you're presenting an Algerian doctoral credential rather than an undergraduate or master's transcript, the 0-20 numeric scale mostly disappears, following the broader Francophone pattern. A thesis defense (soutenance) is judged by a jury that deliberates and assigns a mention rather than a number, and candidates typically need a paper already accepted in an approved journal, tracked through Web of Science, Scopus, or a national list for humanities disciplines, before the defense can happen at all. University council minutes (procès-verbaux) from institutions including UMMTO, Université de Mostaganem, and Université Constantine 1 confirm the jury-approval process and that publication prerequisite in practice. What those minutes don't spell out is Algeria's exact mention terminology in one unified national text, so while the broader honorable and très honorable pattern used elsewhere in the Francophone system is a reasonable expectation, treat it as a strong likelihood rather than a confirmed fact for Algeria specifically, and don't attempt to force a doctoral mention into a GPA-style number either way.

Why the numbers matter less than research fit, either way

Whichever conversion a program ends up applying, a GPA figure rarely decides a funded PhD or master's outcome the way applicants sometimes assume. Professors funding students through their own grants are generally looking for genuine research fit and real evidence you can do the work, not a precise decimal GPA pulled from a disputed conversion table. Our piece on why research fit matters more than GPA goes into why a borderline conversion outcome shouldn't stop you from reaching out to a professor whose current work genuinely overlaps with yours.

Confirm specifics before you rely on them

The 0-20 scale, the 10/20 pass mark, and Algeria's absence from the CAMES member list are consistently reported across the sources checked for this guide. Where sources genuinely disagree, whether the top of the scale splits into Très Bien and a separate Excellent band, the exact GPA figure for a grade in the middle of the scale, and CIAQES's precise founding timeline, treat any single table or date cited here, including ours, as an estimate, and check a recognized credential evaluator or your own institution's documentation for anything an actual application depends on.

Finding a funded path once your transcript is sorted

Once you know how your transcript is likely to read to a foreign admissions committee, the next real question is finding a professor whose current grant can actually fund you, which is a different search than the bilateral scholarship routes our guide to PhD funding for Algerian students abroad covers. GradScoutFunding searches professors by field and country, confirms they're actively publishing, and drafts a personalized first email grounded in their real recent paper for you to review and send yourself, it never sends anything automatically, and it never claims to verify that a professor currently has funding available, only that they're currently active. The free tier gives you 2 credits with no card required, and paid credit packs are one-time purchases that never expire.

Common questions