Week 4 2025

Pupil attendance in schools

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Introduction

These figures are derived from regular data automatically submitted to the Department for Education (DfE) by participating schools. The data is submitted on a daily basis and includes the attendance codes (opens in a new tab) for each pupil on their registers during the morning and afternoon sessions.

Figures relate to the attendance of 5 to 15 year old (i.e. compulsory school age) pupils in state-funded primary, secondary and special schools in England.

This release covers the 2024/25 academic year from 09 September to 24 January 2025. National level figures are included in underlying data for the week commencing 02 September 2024. For the full 2023/24 academic year and termly pupil absence data, including by characteristics please see this historical publication.

The figures are published as official statistics in development to give an indicative figure for the absence rate during the 2024/25 academic year, from the 09 September 2024. National level figures for the week commencing 02 September 2024 are included in underlying data of the first publication of the academic year. The pupil attendance dashboard (opens in a new tab) will be updated fortnightly, providing aggregate metrics on overall absence and reasons for absence estimated at national, regional and local authority level only. Due to the timeliness of the data and that they are based on a subset of schools, figures are estimates that we expect to change as registers are adjusted. They should be viewed as an early indicator for the more detailed but less frequent Accredited Official Statistics on pupil absence (which include school level breakdowns). The Accredited Official Statistics are updated termly, with the latest data published in October 2024 relating to the Autumn and Spring term 2023/24, including data on characteristics.

From the start of the 2024/25 academic year, it became mandatory for schools to share attendance data (opens in a new tab) with the DfE. If you are a school that is not already sharing your daily attendance data, you need to approve this in your Wonde portal. This will also give you, your local authority and your multi-academy trust (if applicable) access to daily attendance reports (opens in a new tab) to help identify pupils needing attendance support earlier.

Schools can use the ‘Compare your attendance (opens in a new tab)’ dashboard to compare with other schools in the local authority. This has been updated to show data for this current academic year. Use it to compare absence and unauthorised absence for your school, as well as special educational needs and free school meals pupils.

Related information

Releases in this series

View releases (57) for Pupil attendance in schools

Methodologies

Headline facts and figures - 2025

Explore data and files used in this release

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  • Data catalogue

    Browse and download open data files from this release in our data catalogue

  • Data guidance

    Learn more about the data files used in this release using our online guidance

  • Download all data (ZIP)

    Download all data available in this release as a compressed ZIP file

View related dashboard(s)


Access the Pupil attendance and absence in schools in England: data dashboard (opens in a new tab) here

The pupil attendance dashboard (opens in a new tab) is updated fortnightly. The latest data relates to the week commencing 20 January 2025. The dashboard displays attendance and absence headline figures, and reasons for absence at national, regional and local authority geographic levels. Data is available across state-funded primary, secondary and special schools and can be broken down by individual school type.

Underlying data is available within the “Explore data and files” section of this page, under the data catalogue.

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Latest data - week commencing 20 January 2025

Access the Pupil attendance and absence in schools in England: data dashboard (opens in a new tab) here.

The latest data relates to the week commencing 20 January 2025 and is available in the pupil attendance dashboard (opens in a new tab). Data is collected on a daily basis and data for the interim weeks between publications is included in year-to-date figures and is available on a daily and weekly basis in the underlying data available on this page (see “Explore data and files”). The dashboard displays attendance and absence headline figures, and reasons for absence at national, regional and local authority geographic levels. Data is available across primary, secondary and special schools and can be broken down by individual school type.

The data shows that the attendance rate across the week for all schools was 92.8%, giving an overall absence rate of 7.2%. The absence rate varied across the week with a low of 6.7% on Wednesday, and a peak 8.7% on Friday. The peak in absence on a Friday is in line with weekly patterns seen during 2023/24 and in historical attendance data.

Users should be aware of the following:

  • Response rate - Of schools participating in the School Census, 98% provided information on the latest full day of data (24 January 2025). Therefore national figures are estimates. Across school types this was: 99% of state-funded primary schools, 97% of state-funded secondary schools and 96% of state-funded special schools. The response rate may vary at certain points of the year due to different term dates. It also became mandatory for schools to share attendance data with the DfE from the start of the 2024/25 academic year, meaning the number of schools reporting may change over time.
  • Estimates for non-response - In recognition that response rates are not equal across school types and, therefore, not representative of the total school population, the total rates for all schools have been weighted based on the Spring 2024 school census.
  • Reporting lag - Schools update their registers continually and attendance codes change, resulting in absence rates for particular days to decrease over time. Analysis of data from the Summer 2022 term suggests that the absence rate could decrease around 1 percentage point before settling down. Historical figures from week 37 onwards will be recalculated in each publication.

From the start of the 2024/25 academic year, it became mandatory for schools to share attendance data (opens in a new tab) with the DfE. If you are a school that is not already sharing your daily attendance data, you need to approve this in your Wonde portal. This will also give you, your local authority and your multi-academy trust (if applicable) access to daily attendance reports (opens in a new tab) to help identify pupils needing attendance support earlier.

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Autumn term

Access the Pupil attendance and absence in schools in England: data dashboard (opens in a new tab) here

Data for Autumn term 2024/25 relates to the period from 09 September and 21 December 2024.

The overall absence rate for the autumn term was 6.5% and the persistent absence rate (pupils who miss 10% or more of their possible sessions) was 19.2%.

Absence tended to increase the week immediately before half term and end of term breaks, which is in line with patterns seen during 2023/24. In the week commencing 21 October 2024, the week immediately prior to half term for most schools, was 7.0%, rising from 4.7% at the beginning of the term. Following half-term, absence fell to 6.0% then peaked at 9.4% in the week commencing 16 December 2024, the final week of the autumn term. 

These changes were mainly driven by illness absence, which was 4.9% in the week commencing 11 December, up from the start of term when it was 1.9%.

Unauthorised absence was fairly stable at around 2.0% across the autumn term, with peaks in the week immediately prior to half term when it was 2.4% and in the final week of term when it was 3.3%.

Free school meals (FSM)

The overall absence rate for pupils who are eligible for free school meals was 10.0% in the Autumn term. This compares to 5.2% for pupils who were not eligible for free school meals.

31.7% of pupils who were eligible for free school meals were persistently absent in the Autumn term, compared to 14.4% of pupils who were not eligible.

Special educational needs (SEN)

The overall absence rate for pupils with an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan was 13.1% in the Autumn term. This compares to 10.1% for pupils with SEN support and 5.8% with no identified SEN.

35.1.% of pupils with an EHC plan were persistently absent in the Autumn term, compared to 29.0% for pupils with SEN support and 17.0% for pupils with no identified SEN.

Sex

The overall absence rate during the Autumn term was 6.6% for female pupils and 6.5% for male pupils.

The persistent absence rate during the Autumn term was 19.3% for female pupils and 19.1% for male pupils.

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Academic year to date

Access the Pupil attendance and absence in schools in England: data dashboard (opens in a new tab) here.

Data for the academic year 2024/25 relates to the period from 09 September 2024 to 24 January 2025. Data from across the year to date is available in the pupil attendance dashboard (opens in a new tab) and the data catalogue on this page (see “Explore data and files”).

Overall absence across the 2024/25 academic year to date was 6.6% and the rate of persistent absence (pupils who miss 10% or more of their possible sessions) was 18.6%.

Absence increased in the latter weeks of the autumn term and peaked at 9.4% in the final week (week commencing 16 December 2024), up from the start of the academic year when it was 4.7%. Absence fell to 6.8% in the first week of the Spring term (week commencing 06 January 2025) and continued to decrease to 6.4% in the following week. It has since increased to 7.2% in the latest week (week commencing 20 January 2025).

The majority of the change in absence has been driven by illness absence, which peaked in the week commencing 16 December 2024 at 4.9% from 1.9% at the beginning of the term. At the beginning of the spring term, illness absence had fallen to 3.0%, and has since increased to 3.9% in the most recent week.

Unauthorised absence has remained fairly stable at around 2.0% across the autumn term, with peaks in the week immediately prior to half term when it was 2.4% and in the final week of the autumn term when it was 3.3%. Unauthorised absence remained high in the first week of the spring term at 2.7% but has since decreased to 2.1% in the most recent week.

Users should be aware of the following:

  • Response rate - Of schools participating in the School Census, 98% provided information on the latest full day of data (24 January 2025). Therefore national figures are estimates. Across school types this was: 99% of state-funded primary schools, 97% of state-funded secondary schools and 96% of state-funded special schools. The response rate may vary at certain points of the year due to different term dates. It also became mandatory for schools to share attendance data with the DfE from the start of the 2024/25 academic year, meaning the number of schools reporting may change over time.
  • Estimates for non-response - In recognition that response rates are not equal across school types and, therefore, not representative of the total school population, the total rates for all schools have been weighted based on the Spring 2024 school census.
  • Reporting lag - Schools update their registers continually and attendance codes change, resulting in absence rates for particular days to decrease over time. Analysis of data from the Summer 2022 term suggests that the absence rate could decrease around 1 percentage point before settling down. Historical figures from week 37 onwards will be recalculated in each publication.

From the start of the 2024/25 academic year, it became mandatory for schools to share attendance data (opens in a new tab) with the DfE. If you are a school that is not already sharing your daily attendance data, you need to approve this in your Wonde portal. This will also give you, your local authority and your multi-academy trust (if applicable) access to daily attendance reports (opens in a new tab) to help identify pupils needing attendance support earlier.

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Help and support

Methodology

Find out how and why we collect, process and publish these statistics.

Official statistics in development

These statistics are undergoing a development. They have been developed under the guidance of the Head of Profession for Statistics and published to involve users and stakeholders at an early stage in assessing their suitability and quality.

They have been produced as far as possible in line with the Code of Practice for Statistics.

This can be broadly interpreted to mean that these statistics are:

  • managed impartially and objectively in the public interest
  • meet identified user needs
  • produced according to sound methods
  • well explained and readily accessible

Find out more about the standards we follow to produce these statistics through our Standards for official statistics published by DfE guidance.

Contact us

If you have a specific enquiry about Pupil attendance in schools statistics and data:

School Census Statistics Team

Email: schools.statistics@education.gov.uk
Contact name: School Census Statistics Team

Press office

If you have a media enquiry:

Telephone: 020 7783 8300

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Telephone: 037 0000 2288

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