The short answer is no, the IB does not routinely issue Diploma Programme students a standard criterion-by-criterion report after results are released. Your results show final grades and core outcomes, while your school can access additional information such as component marks. Neither is normally a detailed explanation of how many marks you received under every assessment criterion.
More detailed evidence may exist in returned externally assessed work, teacher records, or an Enquiry Upon Results (EUR) report, but these are not equivalent to an automatic personalized feedback report. Understanding the distinction between criteria, components, examiner annotations, and EUR services will help you ask your coordinator for the right information.
What students normally receive after IB results
The candidate results website primarily presents your subject grades, total Diploma Programme points, diploma status, and results for theory of knowledge and the extended essay. According to the IB's official assessment FAQ, component marks and component grades are not part of the standard results display.
Some candidates can access a more detailed results view, depending on the access enabled by their coordinator. This may include:
- Your scaled total mark for a subject
- The lower and upper boundaries for your awarded grade
- The number of marks needed to reach the next grade
- Your final subject grade from 1 to 7
This information is valuable when considering a remark, but it still does not explain your performance criterion by criterion.
Your coordinator may also be able to provide a candidate component report or equivalent component-level information available to the school. For example, it may separate your Paper 1, Paper 2, internal assessment, oral, or other component results. A component is an assessed part of a subject; a criterion is a specific quality used to judge work within a component.
|Information|What it tells you|Criterion-by-criterion?| |,|,|,| |Candidate results|Final grades, total points, core outcome and diploma status|No| |Detailed results view|Scaled total and proximity to grade boundaries|No| |Component information|Performance on papers, coursework or oral components|Usually no| |Returned externally assessed work|Your script, marks and any annotations that were recorded|Possibly, depending on the component| |Category 1 report|Information about marking following a Category 1 EUR|Not necessarily a complete criterion table| |Teacher's marking records|Provisional criterion marks and comments used before moderation|Often, but not always final IB marks|
Why a component breakdown is not a criterion report
IB subjects are divided into assessment components. These may include examination papers, internal assessments, individual orals, portfolios, the TOK essay, and other subject-specific tasks. Each component has a weighting, and the weighted results are combined to produce the final subject mark.
Within a component, work may be marked using:
- A question-specific markscheme
- Assessment criteria or analytic rubrics
- Holistic markbands
- A combination of these approaches
A component report might say that you earned a particular mark for an internal assessment. It generally does not show how that total was divided among research design, analysis, evaluation, communication, or any other subject-specific criteria.
This distinction matters because students sometimes ask for a "mark breakdown" when they actually want one of three different things: component marks, individual question marks, or criterion-level judgments. Use the precise term when speaking to your coordinator.
Why the IB does not automatically provide detailed examiner feedback
The IB describes its final external assessments as summative, meaning their central purpose is to determine achievement at the end of the course. They are not designed as formative draft feedback intended to teach an individual candidate how to revise the submitted work.
The official guide to assessment for teachers and coordinators explains that examiners are not required to write comments on externally assessed work. Their responsibility is to mark accurately and consistently, not to produce personalized recommendations.
An examiner may add ticks, short annotations, criterion references, or comments where these support the marking decision. However, the absence of explanatory comments does not mean that the work was not assessed against the applicable markscheme or rubric. It means that written feedback was not required as a separate assessment outcome.
What a Category 2 return can show
Through the Enquiry Upon Results system, a school can request copies of externally assessed material under the applicable Category 2 service. The request must be made by the school through the coordinator; candidates and parents cannot submit it directly.
Returned work may contain:
- Marks entered against individual questions
- Examiner ticks or other marking symbols
- Brief annotations made during marking
- Criterion or markband indicators, where the component uses them
- The submitted response as seen by the examiner
The IB's assessment principles and practices warns that useful comments may be present but are not guaranteed. Consequently, returned coursework might reveal criterion marks in one assessment while another returned script contains little beyond the total and marking symbols.
A Category 2 return is therefore the closest available evidence for students who want to inspect how externally assessed work was marked. It should not be described as a guaranteed criterion-by-criterion report. Current categories, fees, consent requirements, and deadlines should always be confirmed with the coordinator for the relevant examination session.
What a Category 1 report actually is
A Category 1 EUR is a re-mark of eligible externally assessed components in one subject. The work is reviewed using the same assessment standards, and the resulting subject grade may increase, remain unchanged, or decrease.
A Category 1 report is a separate report concerning the marking following that re-mark. It is not an automatic report available to every candidate, and it normally follows a Category 1 EUR rather than replacing one. The IB's general regulations for the Diploma Programme establish that EUR requests must be made by the school on the candidate's behalf.
Most importantly, the phrase "Category 1 report" should not be interpreted as "criterion-by-criterion score report." Its purpose concerns the marking of the EUR. The detail provided depends on the assessment and the issues considered during the review.
If you are considering this route, first obtain your total and component information. The RevisionDojo guide to IB remarks explains why proximity to a grade boundary and the nature of the assessed component should inform the decision.
Internal assessments and moderation
An internal assessment (IA) is initially marked by your teacher using the applicable IB criteria. The IB then moderates a sample to determine whether the school's marking standard is consistent with the global standard. Moderation may leave the school's marks unchanged or adjust them upward or downward.
Your teacher may have a criterion-level marking sheet, annotations, or comments from the original assessment. These are useful records, but they represent the teacher's marking and feedback. If moderation changes the school's marks, there may not be a new individualized IB criterion table showing exactly how every adjusted mark was redistributed.
The IA feedback made available to schools is primarily intended to inform the school's future assessment practice. It can address task suitability, application of standards, or administrative issues, rather than provide every student with personalized criterion feedback.
For this reason, ask two separate questions:
- "Can I see the criterion marks and feedback my teacher recorded for my IA?"
- "Can I see my final moderated component mark?"
The answers may be different. The first concerns your school's assessment records; the second concerns the mark used in the final IB result.
The MYP is different
In the Middle Years Programme, criterion-related assessment is central to school reporting. Schools must regularly communicate student progress against prescribed subject-group criteria, although the precise report-card format can vary by school.
An MYP student may therefore receive criterion achievement levels such as A, B, C, and D through normal school reports. The IB's material on using MYP assessment criteria confirms that schools report progress toward MYP objectives using the relevant criteria.
This should not be confused with the post-results system for externally assessed DP work. A criterion-based MYP school report exists because the school is reporting ongoing achievement; it does not prove that the IB issues every DP candidate an examiner-generated criterion report after final results.
What to ask your coordinator
Start with a precise, neutral request. For example:
Could you please tell me what component-level information is available for my result, and whether my externally assessed work can be returned through the current EUR service? I would also like to know whether any criterion marks or examiner annotations are available.
Then ask for the following in order:
- Your scaled total mark and final grade boundary
- Your component marks and grades, where the school can share them
- Your teacher's original criterion breakdown for internally assessed coursework
- The current options for returning externally assessed material
- The conditions for a Category 1 EUR and subsequent report
Do not assume that a criterion breakdown shown by your teacher is the final examiner record. Equally, do not assume that a returned script will include explanatory comments. The coordinator can check the records and services available for your session.
The RevisionDojo grade calculator can help you model how component outcomes contribute to an overall result, while its explanation of IB grade boundaries clarifies why a small change matters most near a boundary.
How to obtain useful criterion feedback before submission
Because official post-results feedback is limited, criterion-by-criterion analysis is most useful while your work can still be revised. Use the correct subject guide and rubric version, since assessment criteria can change between syllabus cycles.
A productive process is to:
- Annotate where your draft supplies evidence for each descriptor
- Ask your teacher which criterion currently limits the work
- Distinguish missing evidence from weak explanation
- Compare the draft with authenticated exemplars
- Revise the argument, method, analysis, or evaluation rather than merely adding length
RevisionDojo's IB IA guides explain subject-specific structures and rubric expectations. The IB grading criteria breakdown can help you interpret assessment strands, while the Coursework Grader uses Jojo AI to provide an unofficial criterion-aligned review of IA, EE, and TOK drafts.
Such feedback is a study aid, not an official IB result or a guaranteed prediction. Your teacher, the authorized school process, and ultimately the IB's assessment procedures remain authoritative.
Conclusion
A standard post-results criterion-by-criterion report does not normally exist for IB Diploma Programme candidates. Students receive final results, schools can access additional component information, and returned externally assessed work may contain marks or annotations, but none of these guarantees a complete criterion table with personalized explanations.
Ask your coordinator for component marks, teacher records, returned work options, and the current EUR procedures rather than requesting an undefined "full report." For feedback before submission, RevisionDojo's IA Guides and Coursework Grader can help you organize a rubric-based review, with Jojo AI providing unofficial criterion-aligned suggestions that should be checked against your subject guide and teacher advice.
Sources and referenced URLs
- IB Assessment FAQ
- IB guide to assessment for teachers and coordinators
- IB Assessment Principles and Practices
- IB General Regulations for the Diploma Programme
- IB guidance on using MYP assessment criteria
- RevisionDojo guide to IB remarks
- RevisionDojo IB Grade Calculator
- RevisionDojo guide to IB grade boundaries
- RevisionDojo IB IA Guides
- RevisionDojo IB grading criteria breakdown
- RevisionDojo Coursework Grader