Applying for a school place in England
Places at state schools in England are allocated by the council where you live, in two national rounds a year: one for children starting secondary school in Year 7, one for children starting primary school in Reception. Here are this year's deadlines, and for each council how to apply, how many families got their first choice, and which schools were hardest to get into.
Year 7 applications for September 2027 close in 28 days
Deadline Saturday 31 October 2026. Apply to your council (the council where you live). Offers on 1 March.
Reception applications for September 2027 close in 104 days
Deadline Friday 15 January 2027. Apply to your council (the council where you live). Offers on 16 April.
- Barking and Dagenham
- Barnet
- Barnsley
- Bath and North East Somerset
- Bedford
- Bexley
- Birmingham
- Blackburn with Darwen
- Blackpool
- Bolton
- Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
- Bracknell Forest
- Bradford
- Brent
- Brighton and Hove
- Bristol, City of
- Bromley
- Buckinghamshire
- Bury
- Calderdale
- Cambridgeshire
- Camden
- Central Bedfordshire
- Cheshire East
- Cheshire West and Chester
- City of London
- Cornwall
- County Durham
- Coventry
- Croydon
- Cumberland
- Darlington
- Derby
- Derbyshire
- Devon
- Doncaster
- Dorset
- Dudley
- Ealing
- East Riding of Yorkshire
- East Sussex
- Enfield
- Essex
- Gateshead
- Gloucestershire
- Greenwich
- Hackney
- Halton
- Hammersmith and Fulham
- Hampshire
- Haringey
- Harrow
- Hartlepool
- Havering
- Herefordshire, County of
- Hertfordshire
- Hillingdon
- Hounslow
- Isle of Wight
- Islington
- Kensington and Chelsea
- Kent
- Kingston upon Hull, City of
- Kingston upon Thames
- Kirklees
- Knowsley
- Lambeth
- Lancashire
- Leeds
- Leicester
- Leicestershire
- Lewisham
- Lincolnshire
- Liverpool
- Luton
- Manchester
- Medway
- Merton
- Middlesbrough
- Milton Keynes
- Newcastle upon Tyne
- Newham
- Norfolk
- North East Lincolnshire
- North Lincolnshire
- North Northamptonshire
- North Somerset
- North Tyneside
- Northumberland
- North Yorkshire
- Nottingham
- Nottinghamshire
- Oldham
- Oxfordshire
- Peterborough
- Plymouth
- Portsmouth
- Reading
- Redbridge
- Redcar and Cleveland
- Richmond upon Thames
- Rochdale
- Rotherham
- Rutland
- Salford
- Sandwell
- Sefton
- Sheffield
- Shropshire
- Slough
- Solihull
- Somerset
- Southampton
- Southend-on-Sea
- South Gloucestershire
- South Tyneside
- Southwark
- Staffordshire
- St. Helens
- Stockport
- Stockton-on-Tees
- Stoke-on-Trent
- Suffolk
- Sunderland
- Surrey
- Sutton
- Swindon
- Tameside
- Telford and Wrekin
- Thurrock
- Torbay
- Tower Hamlets
- Trafford
- Wakefield
- Walsall
- Waltham Forest
- Wandsworth
- Warrington
- Warwickshire
- West Berkshire
- Westminster
- Westmorland and Furness
- West Northamptonshire
- West Sussex
- Wigan
- Wiltshire
- Windsor and Maidenhead
- Wirral
- Wokingham
- Wolverhampton
- Worcestershire
- York