Pupil absence, including overall, authorised and unauthorised absence and persistent absence by reason and pupil characteristics for the full academic year.
This page provides a range of routes to access data from within this statistical release to suit different users.
This includes all data sets, guidance files and any supporting files
Featured tables are pre-prepared tables created from a statistical release's data sets. They provide statistics that are regularly requested by users and can be adapted to switch between different categories.
Data sets: download or create tables
Data sets present comprehensive open data from which users can create their own tables using the EES table tool or download a zipped CSV file.
Description of the data sets included in this release, including information on data sources, coverage, quality and any data conventions used.
Alternatively use our data catalogue to search and filter for specific data sets from this release or our entire library, providing full data summaries, data previews and access to API data sets.
Featured tables are pre-prepared tables created from a statistical release's data sets. They provide statistics that are regularly requested by some users (such as local councils, regional government or government policy teams) and can be adapted to switch between different categories (such as different geographies, time periods or characteristics where available).
Absence rates by school type between 2016/17 Autumn term and 2023/24 Autumn term
Rates of persistent absence and severe absence by school type, Autumn 2018/19 to Autumn 2023/24
Overall absence and persistent absence rates by Sex, FSM eligibility, SEN provision and Year group
Data sets present comprehensive open data from which users can create their own tables using the EES table tool or download a zipped CSV file.
Local authority, National, Regional
Absence information for all enrolments in state-funded primary and secondary schools and special schools (from 2016/17) including information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15.
School
Absence information for all enrolments in state-funded primary and secondary schools and special schools (from 2016/17) including information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15. Includes school level data.
Local authority, National, Regional
Absence information for all enrolments in state-funded alternative provision (including pupil referral units) with information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15.
School
Absence information for all enrolments in state-funded alternative provision (including pupil referral units) with information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15. Includes establishment level data.
Local authority, National, Regional
Overall absence for all enrolments in state-funded primary and secondary schools and special schools (from 2016/17) for pupils aged 4.
School
Overall absence for all enrolments in state-funded primary and secondary schools and special schools (from 2016/17) for pupils aged 4. Includes school level data.
National
The number of pupil enrolments by their absence in the term as a percentage of possible sessions. Covers overall absence, authorised absence and unauthorised absence. Data by one percent bands.
Local authority, National, Regional
The number of enrolments with one or more session of absence, including by reason for absence. Primary and secondary only before 2016/17.
School
The number of enrolments with one or more session of absence, including by reason for absence. Primary and secondary only before 2016/17. Includes school level data.
Local authority, National, Regional
Absence information for full academic years for all enrolments in state-funded primary, secondary and special schools including information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15.
School
Absence information for full academic years for all enrolments in state-funded primary, secondary and special schools including information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15. Includes school level data.
Local authority, National, Regional
The number of enrolments with one or more session of absence, including by reason for absence.
School
The number of enrolments with one or more session of absence, including by reason for absence. Includes school level data.
National
The number of pupil enrolments by overall, authorised and unauthorised absence percentage point bands.
Local authority, National, Regional
Absence information for full academic years for all enrolments in state-funded alternative provision (including pupil referral units) with information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15.
School
Absence information for full academic years for all enrolments in state-funded alternative provision (including pupil referral units) with information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15. Includes establishment level data.
Local authority, National, Regional
Absence information for the full academic year, by pupil characteristics including SEN, FSM, language, year group, gender and ethnicity for England.
National
Absence information for autumn, spring and summer terms at national level in state funded primary, state-funded secondary and special schools
Local authority, National, Regional
Absence information by characteristics for all enrolments in state-funded primary, secondary and special schools including information on overall absence, persistent absence and reason for absence for pupils aged 5-15. Characteristics included are sex, year group, free school meal eligibility, SEN provision, SEN type of need, ethnicity and language.
Description of the data sets included in this release, including information on data sources, coverage, quality and any data conventions used.
This document describes the data included in the ‘Pupil absence in schools in England’ National Statistics release’s underlying data files. This data is released under the terms of the Open Government License (opens in new tab) and is intended to meet at least 3 stars for Open Data (opens in new tab). The methodology should be referenced alongside this data. It provides information on the data sources, their coverage and quality as well as explaining methodology used in producing the data.
This release provides information on the levels of overall, authorised and unauthorised absence in:
It includes information on:
The information is based on pupil level absence data collected via the school census.
This dataset has not had suppression applied. Rates are presented to one decimal place in the report but are unrounded in the underlying data files
The following convention is used throughout the underlying data.
‘x’ Not available.
‘z’ Not applicable
All data files associated with this releases are listed below with guidance on their content. To download any of these files, please visit our data catalogue.
If you have a specific enquiry about Pupil absence in schools in England statistics and data:
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