School attendance since the pandemic: what has changed?
School absence in England remains considerably higher than before the COVID-19 pandemic. The increase shows up in overall absence, in persistent absence, and most sharply of all in severe absence.
In short
Comparing like with like, autumn term 2018/19 with autumn term 2025/26: overall absence has risen from 4.29% to 6.47%, persistent absence from 10.94% to 18.10%, and severe absence from 0.74% to 2.12%.
Attendance has improved on some full-year measures, but the system has not returned to its pre-pandemic pattern.
Comparing the right periods
Absence changes through the school year, so autumn-term figures should be compared with other autumn terms and full-year figures with other full years. Both comparisons are shown below and they are kept separate throughout.
How much has overall absence changed?
The increase of 2.18 percentage points may sound modest, but across 7,145,603 pupil enrolments and 989,466,742 possible sessions it represents a very large increase in missed education.
What happened to persistent absence?
The change is far more striking for persistent absence. In autumn 2018/19, 10.94% of pupil enrolments were persistently absent. In autumn 2025/26 the figure was 18.10% — around 1.7 times the pre-pandemic rate.
What about severe absence?
Severe absence has risen most sharply of all, from 0.74% in autumn 2018/19 to 2.12% in autumn 2025/26 — close to 2.9 times its pre-pandemic level.
Has attendance started improving?
There has been improvement on some full-year measures. DfE's academic-year release shows overall absence falling from 7.15% in 2023/24 to 6.78% in 2024/25, and persistent absence falling from 19.95% to 18.14%, while severe absence rose from 2.30% to 2.39%.
The most recent autumn-term statistics, however, recorded increases against the previous autumn term:
- overall absence rose from 6.38% to 6.47%;
- persistent absence rose from 17.79% to 18.10%;
- severe absence rose from 2.04% to 2.12%.
The longer-term picture is therefore more complicated than saying attendance is simply “recovering” or “getting worse”.
Why is absence higher?
The statistics cannot identify a single cause. Illness remains the largest recorded reason for absence, at 3.37% of possible sessions in autumn term 2025/26, and remains above typical pre-pandemic levels.
National patterns also differ substantially by age, school phase, disadvantage, SEND, geography and other pupil characteristics. Attributing the whole post-pandemic change to one factor would be misleading. The data identifies the scale and pattern of the change; understanding the causes requires additional evidence.
Why does the comparison matter?
The pre-pandemic period provides essential context. Without it, a current absence rate can appear normal simply because similar rates have persisted for several years. Looking further back makes clear that the attendance environment faced by schools has changed materially.
Explore the data yourself
Follow overall, persistent and severe absence back to 2006/07 for England, any region or any local authority.
Explore the attendance trend →About this guidance
This page explains publicly available school attendance statistics and guidance for England. tutor2u uses Department for Education data and primary government guidance wherever possible. Every figure shown is calculated directly from the published DfE data files rather than transcribed by hand.
Attendance statistics describe patterns across pupils and schools. They should be interpreted with appropriate context and should not be used to make assumptions about the circumstances of an individual pupil.