This publication provides statistics on school revenue funding from financial year 2010 to 2011 through to 2023 to 2024.
The aim is to provide an overview of trends in school funding over recent years, as well as detailed information about funding allocations for individual schools for 2022 to 2023.
The total amount of funding allocated to English schools for 5-16 year old pupils has grown since 2010-11 as the total pupil population has also grown.
In cash terms, the total funding allocated to schools through the grants covered in this report is £57.3 billion in 2023-24, an increase of 64% compared to the £35.0 billion allocated in 2010-11. The 2022 Autumn Statement means funding will increase further in 2024-25.
On a per-pupil basis the total funding allocated to schools for 5-16 year old pupils, in cash terms, in 2023-24 was £7,460, a 44% increase compared to £5,180 allocated per pupil in 2010-11.
When adjusted for inflation, funding per pupil was broadly flat between 2010-11 and 2015-16 at about £6,700 in 2022-23 prices. It then fell by 3.8% over 2016-17 and 2017-18, but subsequently increased by 1.3% over 2018-19 and 2019-20. Since then, funding has increased by 10.3% over the course of the following four years, reaching £7,220 in 2023-24 (in 2022-23 prices).
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This data shows the funding received by individual mainstream schools, both through their core budgets and through several other revenue grants. This file is a downloadable version of the entire dataset in Excel.
In this publication
Throughout this release, the time periods referred to are financial years unless otherwise stated. The shorthand “2022-23” is used to denote the 2022 to 2023 financial year (i.e. the period from April 2022 to March 2023), and similarly for other years. The shorthand “2022/23” is used to denote the 2022 to 2023 academic year (i.e. the period from September 2022 to August 2023), and similarly for other years.
This publication contains two sets of data:
All this data relates to the funding that is allocated to local authorities and state-funded schools by the Department for Education (DfE) in each year.
This is not the same as the amount of money that is spent in a year by schools and local authorities. Other official statistics reports published by the department provide information on local authority and school spending on education, including academies and children and young people's services. These can be found on gov.uk at https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/statistics-local-authority-school-finance-data (opens in a new tab).
The Methodology section provides much more detailed information about each of the datasets.
Feedback
This is the fourth edition of this annual statistics report and we are keen to receive feedback on the data presented. If you have any feedback or comments on this publication please contact us at:
Introduction
This section presents time series data on revenue funding for primary and secondary pupils aged 5-16 in England.
The funding covers all state-funded schools: that is, primary and secondary maintained schools and academies; special schools; pupil referral units (including alternative provision academies and free schools); local authority alternative provision; and non-maintained special schools.
For mainstream schools, funding covers pupils in reception through to year 11.
Important note on GDP deflators
To calculate inflation-adjusted school funding figures in this report, we use the GDP deflator, for which the most recent figures were published in January 2023 by HM Treasury (HMT).
The GDP deflator is the broadest measure of inflation in the domestic economy. It is commonly used to indicate price changes in public sector expenditure and is the most suitable for this national-level time series. Price inflation experienced by individual schools may be different.
The series displays atypical year-on-year movement in the data for years 2020-21 and 2021-22, which has arisen as a result of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The deflator series indicates like-for-like price increases of about 5.5% over the two year period overall, equivalent to increases of 2.7% in each year.
Given the atypical year-on-year movement in the deflator data, we have considered inflation-adjusted changes over that two-year period as a whole, rather than for each of the individual years, and the commentary in this publication is written from that standpoint.
Coverage of the figures
The following funding elements in 2023-24 are included in the figures:
This coverage has been chosen both to capture core funding for schools and to ensure the series is as comparable over time as possible, despite changes to the specific grants allocated to schools over the years shown.
In this publication, the figures for 2010-11 to 2022-23 are based on the latest funding allocations that have been issued to schools and local authorities. The figures for 2022-23 in last year’s report were based on the budgets that were agreed and announced as part of the 2021 Spending Review; they have now been updated with allocations data. The figures for 2023-24 are based on a combination of published funding allocations, the budget settlements agreed at the 2021 Spending Review and 2022 Autumn Statement, and some estimates of small grant and high needs spending.
Note that the figures do not include any funding allocated to schools to support them with responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. More information on funding provided to schools for the pandemic can be found in the Annex.
More detailed information on the funding covered by the figures in this section can be found in the Methodology section.
Total funding 2010-11 to 2023-24
The total amount of funding allocated to English schools for 5-16 year olds is closely linked to the number of pupils in attendance, and has grown since 2010-11 as the total pupil population has also grown.
In cash terms, the total funding allocated to schools through the grants listed above was £57.3 billion in 2023-24, an increase of 64% compared to the £35.0 billion allocated in 2010-11.
Per-pupil funding 2010-11 to 2023-24
On a per-pupil basis the total funding to be allocated to schools for 5-16 year olds, in cash terms, in 2023-24 is £7,460, a 44% increase compared to £5,180 allocated per pupil in 2010-11.
After adjusting for inflation, funding per pupil was broadly flat between 2010-11 and 2015-16 at about £6,700 in 2022-23 prices.
It then fell by 3.8% over 2016-17 and 2017-18, but subsequently increased by 1.3% over 2018-19 and 2020-21. Since then, funding has increased by 10.3% over the course of the following four years, reaching £7,220 in 2023-24 (in 2022-23 prices).
Funding for 2022-23 to 2024-25
Taking account of some small differences in coverage, these figures are comparable to the three-year school funding settlement announced in the 2021 Spending Review, which covers the financial years 2022-23 to 2024-25.
The 2021 Spending Review confirmed an additional £4.7 billion by 2024-25 for the core schools budget in England, over and above the 2019 Spending Round settlement for schools in 2022-23. The 2022 Autumn Statement confirmed an additional £2.0 billion in funding for 2024-25, on top of that announced at the 2021 Spending Review. This means that core schools funding will reach approximately £58.8 billion in 2024-25.
Coverage of the data
The data in this section is presented in two ways.
First, if you are interested in seeing the data for an individual school, the easiest way to access this is using the table tool: this can be found higher up this page by selecting ‘Explore data and files’ and then ‘Create your own tables’.
Alternatively, data for all schools can be accessed by downloading the data file (which is in Excel format) associated with this release entitled ‘School funding allocations for 2022-23 (Excel version)’. This can be found by selecting ‘Explore data and files’ and then ‘List of all supporting files’.
The data shows the total funding that has been allocated to each individual mainstream school through several different funding streams for 2022-23. This covers funding allocated to mainstream schools for their running costs for pupils aged 5-16, that was provided through some of the funding streams covered in the other main section of this report, “School revenue funding for 5-16 year olds for 2010-11 to 2023-24”:
The school funding allocations data also includes several other funding streams for schools that are not included in the figures in the previous section. This funding is provided to schools for specific functions and pupils of other ages in attendance. Detailed school allocations through these funding streams have been previously published for 2022-23, but they are included here to show schools’ data in a single place:
Funding years
For core funding, the data shows financial year 2022-23 allocations for local authority maintained schools, and academic year 2022/23 allocations for academies (including free schools). This is because these are the time periods for which maintained schools and academies receive their budgets.
For the other grants, the data primarily shows allocations for financial year 2022-23. More information about this data and the different elements of funding presented is provided in the Methodology section.
Consistency with the 2010-11 to 2023-24 time series data
The totals of the figures in this section do not match those for 2022-23 shown in the time series dataset, for several reasons.
First, the figures presented in this section relate to mainstream schools only, whereas the previous section also includes funding for age 5-16 pupils attending other types of institution, such as special schools, non-maintained special schools and alternative provision settings.
Second, these school-level figures for 2022-23 include some funding (the PE and sport premium and universal infant free school meals) which are not included in the previous section, for the reasons explained above.
Schools included in the data
Please note that schools listed in the data are as at 31 March 2022. The figures do not reflect where schools have changed their name, opened, closed, or have been subject to other changes since that date.
Other publications
For years prior to 2019-20, these data were published by ESFA in a separate annual report ‘Schools block funding allocations’. However, those previous reports presented data for core funding and the teachers’ pay grant only. The more recent school funding statistics reports also include data on schools’ allocations for the pupil premium, UIFSM and other grants as listed above.
Comparison with national funding formula data
The figures presented here are the funding schools received in 2022-23. These are not the same as illustrative allocations under the national funding formula (NFF) in 2022-23 that the DfE has previously published.
The NFF is a single, national formula which calculates a notional allocation for all mainstream schools in England based on their pupils’ needs and characteristics. However, schools’ NFF allocations for 2022-23 were in most cases not exactly the same as the funding they actually received.
For each local authority in England, the schools NFF calculates overall per-pupil amounts at primary and secondary level, which are then multiplied by the latest pupil numbers to give a total allocation to the authority. Each local authority then determines schools’ final allocations for the year through setting a local funding formula.
It is schools’ final funding as indicated by their authority’s local formula which is shown in this report.
Types of schools
The data shows figures for 20,177 mainstream schools in England. Of these, 10,950 are maintained schools, meaning that they are overseen by the local authority, and 9,227 are academies, meaning they operate independently of local authority control and receive their funding directly from the ESFA.
Core funding
The basic entitlement factor in authorities’ local formula gives every school a basic amount of funding for every pupil, and authorities could specify different per-pupil amounts for primary age pupils, for pupils in key stage 3 (years 7 to 9), and for pupils in key stage 4 (years 10 and 11).
Differences between schools’ basic entitlement funding reflect where they had different numbers of pupils and where their respective local authorities decided to set different per-pupil rates in their 2022-23 local formulae.
In their local formula, authorities could also choose to use several other ‘pupil-led factors’ – these are factors where the amount of funding a school receives depends on the number of pupils with appropriate characteristics that attend the school. Descriptions of each factor can be found in the Methodology section.
Figure 2 shows the percentage of schools receiving funding in 2022-23 through each of these other pupil-led factors. For low prior attainment, all local authorities used this factor in their local formula, but a very small number of schools did not have any pupils eligible to attract this funding.
Differences in the amount of funding that schools received through the pupil-led factors in 2022-23 were due to several reasons: such as where schools had different numbers of pupils who were eligible to attract funding through the factor, and where the local authority set different per-pupil rates in their local formula (or chose not to use the factor in their formula at all).
The DfE already publishes a large amount of information about funding allocated to schools. This section indicates where some of this further information can be found.
National funding formula for schools
Since 2018-19, school funding has been distributed according to a formula based on the individual needs and characteristics of every school in England. In 2022-23, the national funding formula (NFF) was used to determine the total schools block funding for each local authority, but local authorities continued to be responsible for distributing that money between the schools in their area using a locally-agreed formula. The school-level figures presented in this report are schools’ final funding allocations, calculated using their respective local formulae. More information about the schools NFF in 2022-23 can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-funding-formula-tables-for-schools-and-high-needs-2022-to-2023 (opens in a new tab). In many cases the final allocations presented here will differ slightly from the NFF figures for 2022-23, including because the latter are based on schools’ pupil counts and characteristics from an earlier period (as explained in more detail in the school-level chapter).
Pupil premium
Details of pupil premium funding to schools in 2022-23 can be found here (opens in a new tab).
PE and sport premium
Details of PE and sport premium funding allocated in 2022-23 can be found here (opens in a new tab).
Universal infant free school meals
More information about universal infant free school meals funding for academic year 2022/23 can be found here (opens in a new tab).
Coronavirus (COVID-19) recovery premium funding
Details of recovery premium funding to schools in 2022-23 can be found here (opens in a new tab).
School-led tutoring grant
Details of school-led tutoring grant funding to schools can be found here (opens in a new tab).
Schools supplementary grant
More information about the funding provided through the schools supplementary grant in 2022-23 can be found here (opens in a new tab).
Data on school spending
While this report focuses on funding provided for schools, the department already publishes official statistics reports on how schools and local authorities spent their funding on education, children's services and social care. These can be found here (opens in a new tab).
Other data
Data on trends in school spending is published by the IFS as part of their annual report on all education spending, but is not directly comparable to our time series on funding, primarily due to different coverage. Their 2022 report can be found here (opens in a new tab).
Public Expenditure Statistical Analysis (PESA) data is published by HM Treasury and can be found here (opens in a new tab).
Introduction
Schools have faced additional pressures as a result of COVID-19. The Government responded with a range of funding measures, targeted towards supporting schools’ response to COVID-19.
Many of the funding measures provided in 2020-21 and 2021-22 have now ended, although some, especially those related to education recovery, remain in 2022-23 as we continue supporting schools with managing the longer-term impact of the pandemic.
The data presented in the first section of this report, school revenue funding from 2010-11 to 2023-24, does not include the additional funding allocated to schools to support them through COVID-19. This is because including time-limited funding would give rise to inconsistencies in the time series.
However, the data in the second section of this report, on schools’ individual funding allocations for 2022-23, does include two funding streams provided to schools to support their COVID-19 response: recovery premium funding and the school-led tutoring grant (further information on the scope of the two datasets is provided in the relevant commentary sections).
This annex gives more detail on the COVID-19 funding provided to schools.
COVID-19 funding for schools
Schools in England continue to be provided with some additional funding, over and above core funding, to support their response to the pandemic.
This summary covers COVID-19 funding made available to schools in 2022-23.
Funding streams are detailed below. Some streams of funding, such as reimbursing exceptional costs, have now ended.
National Tutoring Programme (NTP)
On 31 March 2022, we announced £349 million of National Tutoring Programme (NTP) funding for schools for the 2022/23 academic year. Schools were allocated £485 million for the 2021/22 academic year, following on from £109 million for the 2020/21 academic year.
Schools can use their funding allocation to provide tutoring via any of the 3 tuition routes established in academic year 2020/21: tuition partners, academic mentors and school-led tutoring.
Allocations have been calculated on the basis of the number of pupils eligible for the pupil premium (PP). Mainstream schools will receive £162 per PP eligible pupil, with other schools receiving £423 per PP eligible pupil.
The Department will provide a further £149m to schools in the 2023/24 academic year to subsidise the delivery of tuition.
Recovery premium funding
Over £300 million of funding for schools was allocated in the 2021/22 academic year via the recovery premium, to support pupils whose education was impacted by COVID-19.
This funding stream focuses on PP eligible pupils and pupils in specialist settings, because of the greater disruption the pandemic has had on these pupils.
Allocations:
A ‘floor’ ensures that a primary school receives at least £2,000 and a secondary school receives at least £6,000.
The recovery premium has been extended for 2022/23 and 2023/24 academic years with £1 billion allocated across the two years. Recovery premium allocations will be calculated on a per pupil basis, based on the below rates:
Mainstream education:
For other eligible schools, including special education units in mainstream schools, the rate is double the mainstream rate (£290 per primary pupil and £552 per secondary pupil).
Discontinued COVID-19 funding streams
Between March and July 2020, schools were able to claim for exceptional costs. Schools could claim for the following:
During this period, 72% of schools submitted claims, with reimbursements totalling £139 million.
In November 2020 the Government announced the COVID-19 workforce fund to help schools meet the cost of staff absences in November and December 2020.
The COVID-19 workforce fund was reintroduced in November 2021 to provide financial support for absence costs incurred from 22 November until 31 December 2021. It was then further extended in 2022, eventually running until April 2022.
As of 8 April 2022, the Coronavirus (COIVD-19) workforce fund for schools has been withdrawn (final claims could be submitted up until 24 May 2022). Overall, published data (opens in a new tab) shows that the workforce fund provided over £13.9 million in additional funding to schools and colleges that faced the most significant staffing and financial pressures during the pandemic.
During the lockdown period in January to March 2021, schools were eligible to apply for additional funds to help schools provide free school meals where they were not using the national voucher scheme. Schools received a total of £50 million reimbursements.
Schools, colleges and specialist settings could also access funding to help them cover workforce costs associated with on-site testing. Schools and colleges were allocated over £223 million through this funding, covering the period 4 January 2021 to 31 March 2022.
Since June 2020, additional investment for education recovery has been announced, to support children and young people to catch up on missed learning. This includes the Recovery Premium funding and National Tutoring Programme funding mentioned above. It also includes:
Sources
National Tutoring Programme allocations:
Recovery premium funding guidance:
Exceptional costs funding guidance:
Workforce funding guidance:
Mass testing allocations:
June 2020 catch-up announcement:
Catch-up premium allocations:
February 2021 catch-up announcement:
Summer schools guidance:
June 2021 catch-up announcement:
October 2021 catch-up announcement:
Early years education recovery:
16 to 19 funding: Additional hours in study programmes:
16 to 19 funding: 16 to 19 tuition fund:
Find out how and why we collect, process and publish these statistics.
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