The purpose of this research was to compare American and Albanian students’ achievement in Algebra 1. The study compared algebraic solving abilities of 219 students in a city of Albania and 242 ninth-grade American students, residents of an American region. Albanian sample did not use calculators on the test. Of the American sample, 97 students used calculators on the test, whereas 145 did not use them. The three research questions addressed: (1) students’ mastering of the overall algebraic achievement, (2) students’ mastering of specific domains of algebraic understanding: knowing, applying, and reasoning, and (3) students’ preference of algebraic strategies for solving word-problems. The study found that Albanian students outperformed American students on the overall achievement. However, American students who used calculators on the test significantly outperformed not only the American group who did not use calculators on the test, but also the entire Albanian sample. In addition, Albanian students scored significantly higher than their American peers both on 2 out of 3 cognitive domains and on using algebraic strategies.