MAB is an organization established for the external evaluation of the quality of Hungarian higher education institutions and their study programmes. It was established temporarily in November 1992, with legal definition in 1994. This paper is a concise chronicle of MAB's 30-year history. It attempts to provide only a few, but perhaps not insignificant, pieces of the mosaic for these 30 years, from the antecedents of the foundation, certain characteristics of the organization and operation, to the international and domestic embeddedness, to the question of MAB's place in Hungarian higher education. After presenting the beginnings, the primary organizing principle of the text is thematic, the historical thread appears within the topics.