Call for Tasks

The Asia-Pacific Informatics Olympiad (APIO) is an online IOI-like competition for the Asian and Western Pacific region. APIO 2026 will be held on 9-10 May 2026. The host of APIO 2026 invites everyone in the programming competitions community to submit tasks for the APIO 2026 competition. Guidelines for tasks and instructions for submission are given below.

APIO Competition Tasks

APIO tasks are basically similar to the tasks in International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI), which are typically focused on the design of efficient, correct algorithms. Input and output are to be kept as simple as possible. The submission of novel tasks types not yet seen in any recent programming competitions is encouraged. The guidelines of task preparations of IOI should be considered, with no restriction. The documents about submission of IOI tasks, which can be used as reference to create the tasks, can be found on the IOI website. The materials of APIO 2025 can also be found at  https://github.com/apio2025/apio2025_tasks . 

To ensure a fair and interesting competition for all, tasks should satisfy the following conditions:

• The tasks should not have been seen by any potential APIO 2026 competitors.

• The tasks should not have been used in any similar competition.

• The tasks should be solvable by APIO competitors during an APIO competition round.

• The task descriptions should be unambiguous and easy to understand.

• The tasks should be culturally neutral.

• The tasks should be innovative.

What to Submit? 

A task submission must contain: 

• Statement in English, preferably formatted in PDF with required diagrams and pictures included.

• Description of the desired solution (a description of an algorithm which should get full score).

• Contact address (preferably one e-mail address) and background information on the task author(s): affiliation, country, and a description of the author’s role in the APIO or national olympiad, including training duties, over the period from APIO 2025 to APIO 2026.

It is also strongly recommended to contain:

• At least one implementation of the desired solution in C++.

• Analyses of alternative solutions.

• Suggestions for grading.

• Test data or ideas for generating test data.

• The motivation behind the task.

Any comments related to the task are also welcome and would be highly appreciated.
Submitted tasks must be kept in strict confidence until the end of APIO 2026.

NOTES: 

Please note that all material submitted becomes the property of the APIO community, and that by submitting the author is assigning the Copyright and all rights to the submitted materials to the APIO community.

Note that we do not wish to forbid authors of submitted tasks to be involved in other competitions and training, but we do ask them to take all necessary precautions to safeguard confidentiality.

Submitted tasks, including the description and test cases, may be subject to modifications by the scientific committee.

Task Submission

Task materials must be placed together in a single file (use .zip or .tgz for multiple files). 

Email to tasks@apio2026.ntnu.tw with [Task Submission] - <task title> as the subject and attach the task submission.

Task Selection Process

1. Tasks that are not used will be kept secret, and will be returned to their submitter so that they can be used elsewhere.

2. All submitted tasks will be seen only by the host scientific committee, and the shortlisted tasks will be seen by all heads of delegations from the region.

3. Communications among heads of delegations about the APIO tasks should be done mainly by e-mail and secured web.

4. All submitted tasks will be shortlisted by the host of APIO 2026. Then, the shortlisted tasks are distributed to all heads of delegations.

5. If any countries need to translate the task scripts to their languages, the translated script must be submitted to the host up to three days before the competition day.

6. At various moments during the preparation of the APIO 2026 competition, it is possible that submitted tasks are dropped from further consideration. However, it may still be necessary to revert such decisions later.

7. In general, all submitted tasks, whether dropped or not, should be kept secret until the end of competition.

8. Authors of submitted tasks will be recognized on the APIO 2026 website by listing their name, affiliation, and country (unless they specifically decline this).

9. Each task that’s actually used in the competition will be rewarded with USD 400 after the end of the event.