IELTS vs TOEFL for German Universities: Minimum Scores

German universities accept both. That settles the part of this question most applicants agonise over, and it leaves the only decision that matters: which format you will score higher in. Unless your bachelor's was taught in English, an English-taught programme in Germany will want a certificate from you. For the German-language side of the requirement, see how much German you actually need.

The scores your programme actually asks for

English-taught bachelor's and master's usually set the bar at IELTS 6.0-7.0 overall or TOEFL iBT 80-100. That range summarises what universities publish; it is not a rule any of them follow. Here is what four of them print on their own admission pages.

Read the table sideways and the point lands. A 6.5 clears TUM and TU Berlin's B2 programmes, misses TU Berlin's C1 programmes, and beats RWTH by half a band. An 88 on TOEFL is exactly TUM's floor and two points short of RWTH's. There is no single German score.

One test, two thresholds: B2 and C1

Most of the confusion comes from treating "the English requirement" as one number. Universities set it per programme against the CEFR level the teaching demands. TU Berlin publishes the clearest version: a B2 track and a C1 track, with a row for every accepted certificate. Move from a B2 programme to a C1 programme at the same university and IELTS rises from 6.5 to 7.0, TOEFL from 87 to 95.

Mannheim does the same without labelling it. Its Data Science master's takes TOEFL 72; Finance, Accounting and Taxation wants 100. Same university, twenty-eight points apart. So when a forum answer says "IELTS 6.5 for Germany", what it means is "IELTS 6.5 for the one programme I applied to".

IELTS or TOEFL: what actually differs

IELTS puts you in a room with a human examiner for the speaking section and uses British spelling. TOEFL is computer-based end to end, records your speaking answers, and leans harder on academic vocabulary. Neither is easier in the abstract. If you talk more freely to a person than to a microphone, that is your answer, and if you type quickly and read dense academic text comfortably, that is your answer too.

MyBest scores and One Skill Retake: two rules that void a valid-looking result

This is where applications quietly fail. ETS calculates a MyBest score by taking your highest section results across several test dates and adding them up. It looks like a TOEFL score, it prints on the same report, and German universities largely refuse it. TUM counts only the Test Date Score. RWTH requires the minimum to be reached in a single sitting. A student who sat TOEFL twice, scored 84 then 86, and submitted a MyBest of 92 has submitted nothing either university will accept.

IELTS One Skill Retake works the other way at TUM, which takes it if you send the complete Test Report Form rather than the retake slip alone. The two policies are not symmetrical, so read your own programme's wording before booking a retake.

The other tests German universities take

PTE Academic is the most widely listed alternative: TUM takes an overall 65, TU Berlin 65 for B2 and 76 for C1. Cambridge appears on nearly every list, usually C1 Advanced at grades A to C, sometimes B2 First at grade B. Mannheim accepts TOEIC at 715 of 990. TU Berlin also lists the Oxford Test of English, UNIcert levels and its own in-house assessments.

Duolingo deserves a warning. Aggregator sites run long lists of German universities that supposedly accept the Duolingo English Test, TUM among them. TUM's own page of recognised English certificates does not include it, and neither does TU Berlin's, which runs to nine certificate types. Find the sentence naming Duolingo on the university's own page before you sit it, or the test will not clear the gate. Then look at the English-taught programmes on offer in Germany to see how wide the field is.

How long your certificate stays valid

There is no national rule, and the spread matters if you tested during your bachelor's.

• TU Berlin: certificates should not be older than three years.
• Uni Mannheim: between two and five years depending on the programme. Degrees and school-leaving qualifications never expire.
• TUM: its page states that older recognised certificates are also accepted, so an expired-looking IELTS is worth asking about rather than replacing on assumption.

Check the date against enrolment, not against the application deadline. That is the version of the rule that catches deferring students.

When you can skip the test

A bachelor's taught fully in English gets the requirement waived at some universities and not others, and the ones that waive it usually want a medium-of-instruction certificate as proof. Mannheim exempts applicants who completed a degree course exclusively in English, and native speakers. TU Berlin publishes no blanket exemption, so it falls to the individual programme's regulations. TUM has moved the other way: for most programmes, English can no longer be proven by school grades at all.

Ask before you pay a test fee. The medium-of-instruction letter is free and the test is not. English-taught bachelor's in Germany covers where the rule applies.

What it costs, and when to book

IELTS Academic in India costs INR 19,000, the same in every test city and for both the paper and computer formats. Moving your date costs INR 4,750. Cancel nine or more days before the test and IDP India refunds the fee minus a 25 percent administrative charge; cancel inside nine days and about a quarter comes back. On the ETS side, rescheduling a TOEFL iBT costs US$69 and each extra score report sent to an institution costs US$29.

Slots in busy cities disappear months ahead of deadline season. Book so the score exists before your earliest deadline, not on it, and budget the fee alongside your other application costs and the 11,904 euros the visa needs. See what applying to German universities costs.

Where the score sits in the decision

Your test result is a pass or fail gate, not a ranking. Once you clear the minimum, the committee moves on to your APS, your module fit and your grades. A 7.5 and a 6.5 are the same document to a programme that asked for 6.5.

So compare the minimum for every test your programme lists, then sit the one whose format you handle best. See the three application routes compared and what grades German master's require.

Once you are admitted

The certificate goes into the visa file too, so keep the original and a scan. See the student visa process and the post-study job-seeker visa.

Sources

• TU Muenchen - recognised language certificates
• TU Berlin - language skills for master's admission
• RWTH Aachen - language requirements
• Uni Mannheim - foreign language requirements
• ETS - TOEFL iBT fees
• IDP India - IELTS test fee
• DAAD

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