Maastricht University’s School of Business and Economics (SBE) runs the Netherlands’ top-ranked Master in Management: its MSc International Business placed #65 worldwide on the Financial Times Masters in Management 2025 — #1 in the Netherlands and #10 globally for value for money — and reports a 100% employment rate at three months, all at a statutory EU tuition under €2,700.¹
A quick clarification first, because the naming trips people up: the FT-ranked Maastricht MiM is this programme — the MSc International Business at SBE — not the separately-run “Master in Management” offered by Maastricht School of Management, which is a different product with different fees and admissions. This guide is about the FT-ranked MSc International Business. It lays out what SBE actually requires, what each component is testing, and where the real selection happens. It is built from Maastricht’s own admission pages and our full Maastricht MSc International Business profile; where a detail varies by cycle or isn’t published clearly, we say so rather than invent a figure.
Who is eligible — and how the board reads your file
Maastricht admits to the MSc International Business through an admissions board that reads the whole file rather than applying a single cut-off. The board weighs your **GPA, your level of mathematics and statistics, how closely your bachelor’s degree corresponds to the master’s, your motivation, and your relevant work and international experience.**² So eligibility is less a checklist than a judgement about fit and academic readiness.
There is a fast lane: if your bachelor’s is on Maastricht’s list of directly-relevant, accredited programmes, the assessment is lighter — often just a transcript and CV — because the degree correspondence is already established.² If your degree is further from the master’s, the board looks harder at the quantitative content and the rest of the file. Like its peers, the MSc International Business is a pre-experience, one-year master built for recent graduates; work and international experience strengthen a file but are not a formal requirement. The programme is taught through Maastricht’s signature Problem-Based Learning model, which the board has in mind when it assesses readiness for an intensive, discussion-led format.
The admission test — and the broad waiver
A GMAT or GRE is required — unless you qualify for an exemption, and Maastricht’s exemptions are unusually wide:²
- Holders of a Dutch/Flemish NVAO-accredited bachelor’s, or
- a bachelor’s from any AACSB- or EQUIS-accredited institution
can submit “proof of academic capabilities” instead of a test. Because a large share of international applicants hold a degree from an AACSB- or EQUIS-accredited school, many never sit the GMAT at all — so the first thing to check is whether your bachelor’s qualifies for the waiver.
If you do need to test, the minimum is a GMAT Focus total of 515 (or 550 on the format administered until early 2024), with a **GRE conversion accepted.**² Two procedural points matter: scoring below the minimum is an automatic reject, and the official score report must be sent directly by the test centre — a self-reported number won’t do. The 515 is a genuine floor, not a target. For the wider context of where tests matter across Europe, see what GMAT score you need for a European MiM.
English proficiency
The MSc International Business is taught entirely in English, so non-native speakers must prove English proficiency to a Dutch master’s standard. Maastricht does not publish the exact minimum in a form we could verify cleanly, so rather than quote a figure that might be out of date, confirm the current IELTS/TOEFL requirement on UM’s admission page before you apply — and budget time to sit the test, since the score is part of a complete file.
The application file
For the MSc International Business, the documented file is lean and **decided by the board, not an interview:**²
- Your bachelor’s transcript (and degree certificate, or proof of expected completion).
- A CV.
- A motivation letter — about one to two pages, explaining your reasons for the programme and your fit. With a holistic, board-read file, this is where you make the human case.
- Your GMAT/GRE score, or the proof-of-academic-capabilities waiver described above.
Two honest caveats. Reference letters are not listed among the standard required documents for this track, and no candidate interview is published as a routine step — Maastricht’s MSc International Business is primarily a file-based admission. Because UM does not publish every component in a machine-readable form, treat this as the documented shape and confirm the exact required-documents list — including any references or interview — in the live application. For the written component, see our Maastricht MiM essays guide; and on references generally, our MiM letters of recommendation guide.
Fees, value and timing
Maastricht is a public university, so tuition splits sharply by nationality: EU/EEA students pay the Dutch statutory fee — about €2,694 for 2026/27 — while non-EU/EEA students pay the institutional rate of roughly €21,500 a year (it varies slightly by specialisation).¹ ² As a one-year master, that single year is the full programme cost. For EU students in particular, the statutory fee is what earns Maastricht its #10-in-the-world value-for-money standing on the FT table — a top-100 MiM for the price of a public master’s. Non-EU applicants should budget for the institutional rate and look at scholarships.
The MSc International Business has two starts a year — September and February — with fixed, nationality-split deadlines: for September, 1 May (non-EU/EEA) and 1 June (EU/EEA); for February, 1 November and 1 December respectively.¹ ² Non-EU applicants should target the earlier date to leave time for the Dutch entry and housing process, and everyone benefits from applying early, since places and Maastricht housing are limited. Map your dates against the rest of your list on our deadline tracker.
How to read your odds
Maastricht does not publish an explicit acceptance rate, and as the Netherlands’ top-ranked, exceptionally good-value MiM it draws a strong international pool, so the MSc International Business is selective on fit and readiness even where the test is waived. The honest read of what gets a competitive file across the line:
- Establish degree fit and quantitative readiness. Because the board weighs how closely your bachelor’s corresponds to the master’s and your level of maths and statistics, a relevant, quantitatively-credible degree does the heavy lifting — and the waiver removes the test only if your degree is accredited.
- A strong transcript, and a test score clear of the 515 floor if you can’t be waived. The academic file is the spine of a board-read application.
- A focused one-to-two-page motivation letter. With no interview and a file-based process, the motivation letter is your one substantive chance to argue fit — make it specific to Maastricht and to PBL.
A relevant, quantitatively-sound degree is the entry ticket; on a holistic, board-read process, it is the coherence of transcript, test-or-waiver and motivation letter that decides it.
Confirm before you apply
Maastricht keeps the live application components, the exact fees and the required-documents list inside its own admission pages and updates them each cycle — so use this guide for the structure and the strategy and verify every hard number against the source before you submit. Weigh Maastricht against the wider field on our best MiM in the Netherlands guide, the Netherlands MiM hub and the composite rankings; compare the routes in Germany vs the Netherlands for a MiM and Netherlands vs the UK for a MiM; and if you are still deciding whether the degree itself is worth it, start with is a MiM worth it in 2026, how to build a MiM profile and MiM vs MBA.
Sources (retrieved June 2026): Maastricht University SBE’s official admission materials for the MSc International Business — the GMAT/GRE requirement & exemptions page for the GMAT Focus 515 (550 older) minimum, the GRE conversion, the “below-minimum is an automatic reject” rule and the NVAO / AACSB / EQUIS “proof of academic capabilities” waiver, and the programme’s admission-requirements pages for the board’s holistic criteria (GPA, mathematics-and-statistics level, bachelor’s correspondence, motivation, work and international experience), the one-to-two-page motivation letter, and the relevant-bachelor’s fast lane; the 2026/27 tuition guidance for the €2,694 statutory EU/EEA and ~€21,500 institutional non-EU/EEA fees; UM’s FT MiM 2025 news page for #1 in the Netherlands, top-100, #10 value-for-money; and our own Maastricht MSc International Business profile for the FT #65 placement, the September/February deadlines (1 May / 1 June; 1 November / 1 December) and the 100% three-month employment figure. UM’s master programme pages are JavaScript-rendered and several fields (the exact English-test minimum, any reference requirement, any interview, an application fee) could not be cleanly verified from a machine-readable source — this guide flags those rather than asserting them, and they should be confirmed in the live application. The MSc International Business (SBE) is the FT-ranked Maastricht MiM and is distinct from the separately-run MSM “Master in Management”. No figures or process steps are invented.
¹ Maastricht University — FT Masters in Management 2025 news page; MSc International Business profile. ² Maastricht University SBE — GMAT/GRE requirement & MSc International Business admission pages; 2026/27 tuition-fee guide.