Nakornpayap International School (NIS).

The campus, and how you actually get there

Address: 240 Moo 6, San Phi Sua, Mueang, Chiang Mai (Second Ring Road)

A leafy 17-acre suburban campus with science and computer laboratories, art and music rooms, a gymnasium, a swimming pool and a full-size football pitch — a conventional, well-equipped suburban school site rather than a rural estate.

Getting there: No urban rail, but NIS is one of the easier runs in the city: the campus sits directly on the Second Ring Road in San Phi Sua, a few kilometres north-east of the centre, which makes it quick from the northern and eastern suburbs and avoids the Old City's one-way system entirely. Expect 15–25 minutes from most of the city core, longer from Hang Dong or Saraphi in the south.

Chiang Mai has no urban rail — no BTS, no MRT, no commuter metro. The city's railway station serves intercity trains to Bangkok, and the long-discussed Chiang Mai light-rail scheme remains unbuilt, so every school run here is a car, a motorbike, a red songthaew, a Grab or the school bus. Read the Chiang Mai getting-around guide and the Chiang Mai area guides before you commit to a neighbourhood.

Smoke-season air quality at this campus

NIS hosts a public IQAir air-quality monitoring station that reports the campus reading publicly, so parents can see the outdoor number at the school rather than a citywide average — genuinely useful during the burning season. Note carefully what this does and does not tell you: a public outdoor monitor is not the same as filtered classrooms, and NIS does not publish the building-by-building filtration detail that Prem and Panyaden do. Ask admissions directly about indoor provision.

Northern Thailand's burning season runs roughly February to April, when agricultural burning and forest fires push Chiang Mai high into the global air-quality rankings — IQAir placed the city among the ten most polluted in the world on 4 March 2026, with AQI above 150 and PM2.5 the dominant pollutant. For a family with young children this is a legitimate school-selection criterion, not a footnote. Our Chiang Mai air-quality guide covers the season in full.

The curriculum pathway

How a child progresses through the school, stage by stage:

• Early Years
• Elementary — US standards-based curriculum
• Middle school
• High school — Grades 9–12 with Advanced Placement (AP) courses

Accreditation & memberships

Accreditation is the closest thing to an objective quality signal in international schooling — it means an outside body has inspected governance, teaching and safeguarding. BAANLYY does not rank schools, so this is what Nakornpayap International School (NIS) and its accrediting bodies publish, not our verdict:

• Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) — first accredited in 2001
• Registered with the Thai Ministry of Education

Boarding and the size of the school

Boarding: A day school — NIS does not operate boarding.

Scale: One of the larger international schools in the city, with a roll of roughly 600-plus students reported across the age range, and a secular, mixed international and Thai-international community. Roll and nationality figures move every year and schools report them differently — treat these as indicative and ask the admissions office for the current numbers.

Who this school tends to suit

Families who want an American curriculum and AP pathway without a faith-based framing — in Chiang Mai that combination narrows the field quickly, and NIS is the longest-established secular option. The ring-road position suits families living north and east of the centre.

This is our editorial read for relocation planning, not a ranking or a recommendation — and no school pays to appear on BAANLYY. Visit shortlisted campuses before you decide.

Living near Nakornpayap International School (NIS)

The northern and eastern suburbs put you on the right side of the ring road. The BAANLYY area guides for this run:

Check the school's bus catchment before you sign. Chiang Mai's international schools cluster in two distinct belts — the northern one around Mae Rim and San Sai, and the far larger southern one through Hang Dong, Mae Hia and Saraphi — and picking a home in the wrong belt turns a fifteen-minute run into a daily hour.

What to confirm directly with the school

BAANLYY deliberately does not publish per-school tuition figures: they change annually, schools publish their own current schedules, and a stale number is worse than none. Take this list to the admissions office:

• Indoor filtration during the smoke season — the public IQAir monitor reports outdoor air, not classroom air.
• Which AP subjects actually run in a given year; AP offerings depend on cohort size and staffing.
• The current fee schedule — tuition, application and registration fees, any refundable deposit or capital/development levy, uniforms, lunches, the bus and trips.
• Whether the year group you need has a place, or a waitlist, for your intended start date.
• Smoke-season provision in detail: which buildings are filtered, whether the sports halls and canteen are included as well as classrooms, whether indoor and outdoor AQI readings are published to parents, and the school's written policy for cancelling outdoor activities. This is the single most important Chiang Mai-specific question a family can ask, and provision varies enormously between campuses.
• School bus routes, catchment zones and pick-up times for the specific neighbourhood you are considering — several Chiang Mai schools sit well outside the ring roads, and a home ten minutes further out but on the route can be the easier morning.
• Entry requirements: assessments, interviews, English-language support and the school reports or transcripts you must supply.
• How far the school takes your child, and on which exam pathway — Chiang Mai mixes American/AP, Cambridge IGCSE and A-level, and IB Diploma routes, and switching between them mid-secondary is disruptive.

Visit the official Nakornpayap International School (NIS) website →

Sources & References

• Ministry of Education, Thailand

Primary and official sources are cited above. Government rules, fees and procedures in Thailand change over time and vary by office; always confirm current requirements with the relevant authority before relying on them. BAANLYY never takes paid placement in editorial content.