ACS Cobham International School

The Surrey flagship of ACS International Schools, founded 1967 and set on 128 acres outside London. Around 1,400 pupils across ages 2 to 18, IB Diploma plus AP and a US high school diploma route.

Two co-ed boarding houses, Field House for Years 8 to 10 and Woodlands for Years 11 and 12, alongside a much larger day cohort drawn from the Surrey commuter belt. Curriculum sits across IB, AP and the American diploma. IB averaged 35 points in 2025 with a 97 percent pass rate, around twenty percent of students at 40-plus.

Families pick Cobham for the facilities and the genuinely international cohort, with roughly a third American, a third British and a third from elsewhere. Sport, performing arts and the IB programme have all been long-standing strengths, and the Lower School operates without homework or uniform. The transient population is real, with around a quarter of the cohort turning over each year, and the wealth gradient inside the parent body is something families on more modest expat packages sometimes mention.

• ACS Cobham sits on a 128-acre site in Surrey, around 1,450 students from 70+ nationalities, running both IB Diploma and AP at senior level on a roughly even three-way US, British and other-international cohort split. Annual fees sit around £30,000 in older parent reports.
• Facilities and lower school draw the most consistent praise. Parents on UK forums describe "nice school, grounds and facilities are amazing," with sport and the early years routinely flagged as standouts. One student described it as "one of the best in the world probably."
• The most repeated reservation is turnover. Parents report a third of each class moving out every year, with near-total turnover across three years, and a corresponding sense that long friendships are hard to build. One parent moved children out citing they "were very behind" academically by UK peers.
• Cohort and culture get mixed reads. The school is described as a wealthy expat community where children outside that bracket can feel excluded, and several voices note transitions in staff and head leadership.
• US curriculum quality is itself debated. One American parent said they would not choose the American curriculum, viewing it as less challenging than the British equivalent. Among teacher voices the school is consistently grouped with TASIS, ASL and the other ACS campuses as a name-brand US/IB London option.
• For families, the strongest signal is fit. Sporty children, families on expat packages and those staying short-term tend to do well. UK-rooted families wanting GCSE and A Level tracks should look at the curriculum mismatch carefully.