This release has been updated with revised data. This means the data now includes late results and reviews of marking, as well as any accepted amendments schools have requested in the autumn checking exercise. Added section on "Attainment in Multi-academy trusts".
Breakdown information added to "national characteristics by school type" data and time series extended in "subject time series" data
This statistical release focuses on the GCSE and vocational and technical qualification (VTQ) results of pupils at the end of Key Stage 4 (KS4) attending state-funded schools in England.
Figures are available at national, regional and local authority level with some lower-level breakdowns such as local authority district and parliamentary constituency. This release includes pupil characteristic breakdowns such as disadvantage status, free school meal status, special educational needs (SEN) status and ethnicity. This includes new crosstabulations by ethnicity, disadvantage, sex and SEN. There are also new breakdowns by young carer status.
The data in this release is revised. It is based on the results data that awarding organisations supply to the department. This includes the vast majority of pupils’ results and includes any amendment requests made by schools during the Autumn checking exercise, and these amendments are also included in the revised secondary school performance tables.
For more information on how we calculate performance measures, and the factors affecting measures for 2024/25, please visit our secondary accountability measures guide (opens in new tab).
Throughout this release, comparisons are made with 2024 and with 2019. We compare to 2024 due to it being last year’s data and to 2019 because it was the last year that summer exams were taken before the COVID-19 pandemic.
Progress measures will not be published for the 2024/25 and 2025/26 academic years as KS4 pupils in these years did not have KS2 assessments due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
All of the underlying data files associated with this publication are now available in our new Application Programming Interface (API), which allows users to connect to data directly from data manipulation and visualisation tools such as PowerBI, Python and R. View the available data products in the data catalogue or read our API documentation (opens in new tab).
View tables that we have built for you, or create your own tables from open data using our table tool
Browse and download open data files from this release in our data catalogue
Learn more about the data files used in this release using our online guidance
Download all data available in this release as a compressed ZIP file
All supporting files from this release are listed for individual download below:
The statistics in this release are based on the grades received by pupils as announced on 21 August 2025. The exam grades have been matched to pupils to enable pupil level analyses.
Breakdowns of the grades achieved in summer 2025 were also published on results day by the Joint Council for Qualifications (JCQ ) (opens in new tab) and Ofqual (opens in new tab). Those statistics were at exam entry level for those age 16, whereas the statistics in this release are at pupil level for those at the end of Key Stage 4.
This release summarises GCSE entries and grades awarded to pupils at the end of KS4 in summer 2025. Figures are published at national, regional, and local authority level with some lower-level breakdowns such as local authority district and parliamentary constituency. Information relating to school-level data, covering a similar summary of attainment measures and pupil breakdowns, can be found on the performance tables (opens in new tab) website.
The KS4 statistics reported in this release have been affected by the following factors:
The 2024/25 KS4 school and college checking exercises ran in June 2025 and Autumn 2025. This release is based on revised data, meaning that any approved result amendments that schools may have requested have now been applied when aggregations have been calculated.
Where time series data is presented, final data is used for all historic years except 2019/20 and 2020/21 when only one release of data was published. Final data includes small amounts of pupils' exam results from the winter series of exams as well as any late changes from schools.
We welcome feedback on any aspect of this document at Attainment.STATISTICS@education.gov.uk. We are particularly interested in user views on the data tables that accompany this release, as well as the new Application Programming Interface (API).
This release provides additional context to the school level data published on the performance tables (opens in new tab) website by reporting on the following Key Stage 4 headline measures at a national and regional level:
The KS4 measures are designed by the Department to encourage schools to offer a broad and balanced curriculum with a focus on an academic core.
It is not possible to calculate Progress 8 for academic years 2024/25 and 2025/26. This is because there is no KS2 prior attainment data available to use to calculate Progress 8 when the relevant cohorts reach the end of KS4 as primary tests and assessments were cancelled in academic years 2019/20 and 2020/21 due to COVID-19 disruption.
In April 2024 the previous government announced that there will be no replacement for Progress 8 for 2024/25 and 2025/26.
The EBacc shows how many pupils are entering GCSEs (or AS level qualifications) in core academic subjects at KS4. The EBacc consists of English, maths, science, a language, and history or geography. To count in the EBacc, qualifications must be on the English Baccalaureate list of qualifications (opens in new tab).
This measure looks at the percentage of pupils achieving grade 5 or above in both English and maths GCSEs. To count for this measure a pupil would have to achieve a grade 5 or above in either English literature or English language. There is no requirement to sit both.
Attainment 8 measures the average achievement of pupils in up to 8 qualifications. This includes: English language; English literature (double weighted providing both English language and English literature are taken); maths (double weighted); three further qualifications that count in the English Baccalaureate (EBacc); and three further qualifications that can be GCSE qualifications (including EBacc subjects) or any other non-GCSE qualifications on the DfE approved list (opens in new tab).
From 2018, Attainment 8 has had a maximum point score of 90, compared to a maximum of 87 in 2017 and 80 in 2016. This is a consequence of the phased introduction of reformed GCSEs graded on the 9-1 scale. These differences should be considered when comparing Attainment 8 scores between 2016-2019.
The EBacc APS measures pupils’ point scores across the five pillars of the EBacc - English, maths, science, a language, and history or geography – with a zero for any missing pillars. The average point score takes into account the attainment of all pupils, not just those at particular grade boundaries, which is why it is used to encourage schools to enter pupils of all abilities.
For more information on these measures and their calculation methodology, see the secondary accountability guidance (opens in new tab).
The time series data for the main KS4 headline measures are shown in Table 1 at the start of this release. The attainment measures have been affected by changes in methodology following the cancellation of GCSE exams for the 2019/20 and 2020/21 academic years and by their replacement with centre assessed grades (CAGs) and teacher assessed grades (TAGs). They have also been impacted by the changes to the 2022 methodology relating to the approach to grading for 2022 exams broadly reflecting a midpoint between results in 2019 and 2021, then a return to pre-pandemic conditions from 2023 onwards.
Therefore, any changes seen in the headline attainment statistics for these years likely reflect the changes in grading approach and the methodology for calculating the measures rather than demonstrating changes in standards.
Whilst it is not possible to compare pupil attainment across years to detect changes in pupil performance, the data can show whether attainment gaps for pupils with particular characteristics have changed between years.
The percentage of pupils entered for all five EBacc components (English, maths, a science, a language, and either history or geography) has risen from 40.0% in 2018/19 and 40.4% in 2023/24 to 40.5% in 2024/25.
Figure 2 shows the EBacc entry rate over the last 15 academic years. After initial increases between 2009/10 and 2013/14, the EBacc entry rate has been broadly stable, at between 38% to 40%, since 2013/14. However, this year’s figure of 40.5% is the highest EBacc entry rate since the measure was introduced in 2010.
The proportion of pupils who were entered for four or more components has decreased slightly in 2024/25; 85.6% compared with 86.0% in 2023/24 (and 86.5% in 2018/19). Of those pupils who entered four out of the five EBacc components in state-funded schools:
Figure 4 shows the time series for pupils entering the science, humanities and language pillars.
From 2011/12 onwards, the percentage of pupils entering sciences and humanities increased considerably but have stabilised since 2018/19, with small decreases in recent years. The percentage of pupils entering languages had steadily decreased from 50.5% in 2013/14 to 44.7% in 2022/23, but has risen for a second consecutive year and is 45.9% in 2024/25.
Further information on the number of entries to GCSEs by subject is available in the download files. For example, the subject time series data can be used to show time series of entries to language GCSEs from 2009/10 to 2024/25. This table is available here: Subject Timeseries Data
The national EBacc APS score has increased by 0.02 points from 4.07 in 2023/24 to 4.09 in 2024/25.
For the individual EBacc pillars, over recent years, attainment has been highest in English, then maths, followed by sciences, humanities and the lowest attainment is in languages. Pupils who do not enter a subject contribute a score of zero for that pillar. For English results to be included in the EBacc APS calculation, pupils must sit both English language and English literature. The better grade counts towards EBacc APS.
In 2024/25, the gap between the EBacc English APS (the highest attainment) and the EBacc Languages APS (the lowest attainment) is 2.51 points (a difference of two and a half grades). This difference has decreased from 2.58 points in 2023/24 and is driven by an increase of 0.07 points in the EBacc Languages APS.
For wider context, in 2024/25, the proportion of pupils who achieved all five components of the EBacc at grades 5 or above was 18.7%. This has risen compared to both 2023/24 (18.0%) and 2018/19 (17.1%). The proportion of pupils who achieved all five components of the EBacc at grades 4 or above was 25.8%. Again, this is up compared to 2023/24 (25.2%) and is also up compared to 2018/19 (24.9%).
Further information is available in the downloadable files that shows the distribution of individual grades and the average attainment (e.g. the percentage of pupils achieving grades 9-4 and equivalents) in specific GCSE subjects over time.
Pupils are defined as disadvantaged if they are known to have been eligible for free school meals at any point in the past six years (from year 6 to year 11), if they are recorded as having been looked after for at least one day or if they are recorded as having been adopted from care.
The proportion of pupils at the end of Key Stage 4 in state-funded schools recorded as disadvantaged has been stable in recent years but has increased slightly from 26.5% in 2023/24 to 28.2% in 2024/25, likely to be the result of the transitional protections that have been in place during the roll out of Universal Credit. For more information on changes to the disadvantaged cohort please visit our methodology document.
The disadvantage gap index reduced between 2011 and 2014 from 4.07 to 3.74 (indicating that the attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and other pupils was becoming smaller). It then widened slightly in 2015 and 2016 to around 3.8, before narrowing to its joint lowest level at 3.66 in 2017. Before the pandemic, the gap index widened again going from 3.66 to 3.70 between 2017 and 2019. It narrowed slightly in 2020 to 3.66 when CAGs were used to award grades, before widening again in 2021, 2022 and 2023 to 3.94. It decreased slightly in 2024 to 3.93 and has now decreased again in 2025 to 3.92.
The disadvantage gap index summarises the attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and all other pupils
The disadvantage gap index has been created to be a more resilient measure (than the binary category of disadvantage) of changes over time in attainment that may have been affected by, for example, the GCSE reforms introduced in 2017 and associated changes to headline measures (e.g. moving away from 5 or more GCSEs to average Attainment 8 scores).
The disadvantage gap index summarises the relative attainment gap (based on the average grades achieved in English and maths GCSEs) between disadvantaged pupils and all other pupils. The index ranks all pupils in state-funded schools in England and assesses whether disadvantaged pupils typically rank lower than non-disadvantaged pupils. A disadvantage gap of zero would indicate that pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds perform as well as pupils from non-disadvantaged backgrounds. We measure whether the disadvantage gap is getting larger or smaller over time.
Whilst the absolute differences (in English and maths GCSE grades) may differ between years, the gap index measures results in terms of how disadvantaged pupils are ranked in comparison to non-disadvantaged pupils, therefore it offers greater comparability between years.
More details regarding the methodology and the consultation were published in SFR 40/2014 (opens in new tab).
Entry to EBacc and attainment across each headline measure was lower for disadvantaged pupils compared to all other pupils in 2025.
Table 7 shows:
"First language" is the language to which a child was initially exposed to during early development and continues to be exposed to in the home or in the community. Being a pupil whose first language is other than English does not mean that the pupil is necessarily fluent in a language other than English or cannot speak English.
In 2024/25, 19.5% of pupils at the end of KS4 in state-funded schools had a first language other than English (excluding those pupils whose first language is unclassified). In 2023/24, it was 19.0% and in 2018/19 it was 16.7%.
In 2018/19, 2023/24 and 2024/25, pupils with English as an additional language (EAL) have had better attainment than pupils with English as their first language (non-EAL) across the headline measures.
The attainment gaps between EAL and non-EAL pupils have narrowed in 2024/25 - driven by decreases in EAL pupils' attainment - but are still wider than in 2018/19:
The gap in full EBacc entry rate is the only of the four headline measure to have widened between 2023/24 and 2024/25 (from 14.4 percentage points to 14.7 percentage points) having been 11.2 percentage points in 2018/19. EAL pupils saw increased EBacc entry from 2023/24 to 2024/25 whilst non-EAL pupils saw a decrease.
The SEN category indicates whether a pupil has learning difficulties or disabilities that make it harder for them to learn than most children of the same age. Pupils with special educational needs include those with SEN support or an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP). More information on these is given in the methodology document.
In 2024/25, 18.7% of pupils at the end of Key Stage 4 in state-funded schools had a special educational need compared with 17.3% in 2023/24 and 14.2% in 2018/19.
Pupils with an Education, Health, and Care Plan (EHCP) have substantially lower attainment than pupils with SEN Support across all the headline measures.
When comparing 2024/25 data with both 2018/19 and 2023/24, the gaps in attainment between pupils with an EHCP and pupils with SEN Support have shown the following changes:
In 2024/25, pupils from the White major ethnic group made up 70.6% of pupils at the end of Key Stage 4 in state-funded schools (of those where ethnicity data was provided). 13.2% of pupils were from the Asian / Asian British ethnic group, 7.1% were from the Black / African / Caribbean / Black British ethnic group, 6.6% were from the Mixed / multiple ethnic groups and 2.5% were from Other ethnic groups.
For the percentage of pupils achieving grades 5 and above in English and math, all major ethnic groups have decreased by 2.9 (Black / African / Caribbean / Black British) , 2.7 (Other ethnic group), 1.9 (Asian / Asian British) ,0.2 (Mixed /multiple ethnic group) and 0 (White) percentage points when comparing 2023/24 and 2024/25.
EBacc entry rates decreased among several ethnic groups between 2023/24 and 2024/25. Pupils in the Black/ African / Caribbean / Black British ethnic group saw a decrease from 45.8% to 44.4%, a decrease of 1.4 percentage points. The Other ethnic group also decreased from 52.5% to 51.4% (a decrease of 1 percentage points), while the Asian / Asian British group dropped slightly from 53.6% to 53.3% (a decrease of 0.3 percentage points).
In contrast, the Mixed / multiple and White ethnic groups increased their EBacc entry rate by 0.6 percentage points and 0.2 percentage points respectively.
For the average Attainment 8 measure, pupils from the White and Mixed / multiple ethnic groups have seen increases of 0.2 and 0.4 points between 2023/24 and 2024/25. In contrast, the Other ethnic group decreased by 0.9 point, the Asian / Asian British group decreased by 0.1, and the Black / African / Caribbean / Black British group by 0.3. However, the Asian / Asian British and Black/ African / Caribbean / Black British ethnic groups have seen increases of 1.0 and 1.3 points compared to 2018/19. Pupils from the Mixed, White and Other categories have all seen decreases compared to 2018/19.
In 2024/25, 48.7% of pupils at the end of Key Stage 4 in state-funded schools were girls and 51.3% were boys. These percentages have remained stable since last year.
As in previous years, more girls enter the full EBacc than boys, and girls continue to do better than boys across all headline attainment measures.
Pupil attainment varies considerably across the country. The variation in EBacc entry and the headline attainment statistics by region is shown in the following table:
Attainment Measure | Minimum Maximum | Range | |
|---|---|---|---|
| % entering EBacc | 33.1% (South West) | 57.1% (Inner London) | 24 percentage points |
| % achieving 5 or above in English and Maths | 41.7% (West Midlands) | 53.8% (Outer London) | 12.1 percentage points |
| Average Attainment 8 score per pupil | 44.1 (North East) | 50.8 (Outer London) | 6.7 points |
| EBacc Average Point Score | 3.85 (North East) | 4.64 (Outer London) | 0.79 points |
The variation in EBacc entry and the headline attainment statistics by local authority is shown in the following table:
Attainment Measure | Minimum Maximum | Range | |
|---|---|---|---|
| % entering EBacc | 13.6% (Isles of Scilly) | 68.4% (Westminster) | 54.8 percentage points |
| % achieving 5 or above in English and Maths | 24.7% (Knowsley) | 69.3% (Kingston upon Thames) | 44.6 percentage points |
| Average Attainment 8 score per pupil | 34.4 (Knowsley) | 59.3 (Sutton) | 24.9 points |
| EBacc Average Point Score | 2.89 (Knowsley) | 5.52 (Kingston upon Thames) | 2.63 points |
Understandably, there is less variance at regional level due to these being made up of a wide range of local authorities performing at different levels. The local authorities with the highest pupil attainment averages tend to be concentrated in London and the South with the majority of the local authorities with the lowest pupil attainment averages located in the Northern and Midland regions (as shown in figures 12 and 13). This is similar to patterns seen in recent years.
Ready Reckoner tools are published to help users, particularly schools and colleges, understand how Progress 8 measures are calculated for their school and pupils.
Transition matrices are a useful tool to help visualise the progression of pupils from Key Stage 2 (KS2) to Key Stage 4 (KS4) based on KS2 prior attainment scores and KS4 achievements.
As no prior attainment data is available for the majority of pupils at the end of Key Stage 4 in 2024/25 (due to them having not sat key stage 2 tests during the COVID-19 pandemic), these tools have not been updated for 2024/25. Data relating to 2023/24 can be found at the following links:
| School level figures | The school level data for the 2024/25 academic year is the latest available data and can be found in the Compare School and College Performance. |
|---|---|
| Characteristic breakdowns | Characteristic breakdowns are included in this release. |
| Previously published figures | All previous similar statistical releases can be found via the Gov.UK collections page Statistics: GCSEs (key stage 4) - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) |
| Attainment for other Key stages | Data on other Key Stages can be found at the following links: Early years foundation stage profile |
| Destination measures | Figures for young people who went into education, employment or training destinations the year after they completed Key Stage 4 or 16 to 18 study can be found at the following link: |
| Attainment in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland | Information on educational attainment for secondary schools in Wales is available from the Welsh Government website. Information on educational attainment for secondary schools in Scotland is available from Scottish Government website. Information on educational attainment for secondary schools in Northern Ireland is available from the Department for Education Northern Ireland (DENI) website. |
| Information published by JCQ and Ofqual | Detailed information on the grade awarding process: Ofqual guide for schools and colleges 2025 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) Summer 2025 exam results: Examination results - JCQ Joint Council for Qualifications |
This section focuses on the attainment and progress of pupils who attended schools that were in multi-academy trusts (MATs) in England. Further information on MATs can be found in the equivalent Key stage 2 attainment and A level and other 16 to 18 results statistical releases.
Background
Multi-academy trusts (MATs) can comprise converter academies, sponsored academies, free schools, studio schools, and/or university technical colleges (UTCs):
Due to the different historic performance of schools that become sponsored or converter academies and those which remain LA maintained, simple comparisons between the whole MAT sector and other state-funded schools will not be meaningful and are not made in this publication.
Further, caution should be taken when comparing national MAT statistics across years as the composition of the academies and MATs included continues to vary, as the sector matures.
The measures cover state-funded mainstream schools within MATs only. Special schools, pupil referral units, alternative provision academies and alternative provision free schools are not included.
Eligibility criteria
In MAT performance tables data, accountability measures are only produced at KS4 for MATs:
We do this so that we include data at MAT level for MATs that are sufficiently well established to have had time to a) have an impact on the performance of schools within the MAT and b) so that aggregate data tells you more than the individual institution data would.
Performance tables data for eligible MATs can be found at the Compare school and college performance website (opens in new tab).
The commentary in this section focuses on pupils in academies that meet the eligibility criteria, as this is the accountability measure for MATs; but figures are also provided for those in all other academies in MATs, as well as an all academies in MATs total, for wider context.
National performance in MATs
The data below shows that for academies meeting the eligibility criteria:
Pupils in academies that were ineligible for the MAT performance tables data tended to have higher attainment than those in eligible academies. This is to be expected because the proportion of converter academies to sponsored academies is greater in ineligible academies than eligible academies.
Progress measures will not be published for the 2024/25 and 2025/26 academic years as KS4 pupils in these years did not have KS2 assessments due to the COVID-19 pandemic
Find out how and why we collect, process and publish these statistics.
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Accreditation signifies their compliance with the authority's Code of Practice for Statistics (opens in new tab) which broadly means these statistics are:
Our statistical practice is regulated by the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR).
OSR sets the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics (opens in new tab) that all producers of official statistics should adhere to.
You are welcome to contact us directly with any comments about how we meet these standards. Alternatively, you can contact OSR by emailing regulation@statistics.gov.uk or via the OSR website (opens in new tab).
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