National assessments regulation annual report 2025
Statutory national curriculum assessments are regulated by Ofqual. This report details the regulatory activity and findings relating to the national assessments in 2025.
Applies to England
Documents
Details
Ofqual regulates all aspects of the development and delivery of national assessments. This report outlines our regulatory activity and findings related to the assessments conducted in 2025.
This year marked a transition in responsibilities because at the end of this cycle of activities for national assessments, Capita will be concluding its role as the Standard and Testing Agency’s (STA’s) delivery supplier. From September 2025 Pearson assumed responsibility for delivery of the 2026 cycle. September 2025 also saw the launch of a revised version of the reception baseline assessment (RBA) that has been developed by STA with new test content and a new delivery method.
STA maintained its established approach to national assessment development this year, drawing on expert input (including from teachers) and quantitative data from trialling to inform decisions about test content. The statistical processes required to maintain standards for the key stage 2 (KS2) tests were completed as usual. Ofqual is satisfied that the KS2 results in 2025 can be robustly linked to the standards as they were originally set in 2016.
STA returned more than 99.9% of KS2 results to schools on time. Ofqual’s analysis confirmed a high degree of KS2 marking reliability, consistent with trends reported since 2018. The phonics screening check and the multiplication tables check were also successfully delivered.
STA delivered a new version of the RBA to schools from August 2025 and by 17 October schools had completed assessments with 551,517 pupils.
Ofqual will continue to monitor risks to validity and public confidence from any changes to the arrangements for national assessments for 2026.