Vocational qualifications dataset
This dataset covers the quarterly number of certificates issued in England from 2012 onwards for vocational and other qualifications regulated by Ofqual.
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Scope of the data
This dataset covers certificates issued quarterly in England for vocational and other qualifications regulated by Ofqual. For each quarter, qualifications regulated in that quarter are included. All currently regulated qualifications can be found on Ofqual’s Register of Regulated Qualifications.
This dataset does not include:
- GCSEs, AS and A levels, advanced extension awards and Extended Project Qualifications
- apprenticeship end-point assessments and Apprenticeship Assessment Qualifications
- T Levels
The dataset covers the time from 2012 to the latest available quarter published in the vocational and other qualifications quarterly official statistics release.
Context
The qualifications covered in this release are regulated by Ofqual. Awarding organisations issuing certificates for regulated qualifications have to meet Ofqual’s General Conditions of Recognition.
Qualifications
The qualifications Ofqual regulates are set out in the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009. Even if Ofqual regulates an organisation, not all their offered qualifications might be regulated. For example, an awarding organisation could only have qualifications regulated that are of a particular level or type, or in a particular subject area. Regulated qualifications must comply with the Conditions of Recognition. For instance, they must be fit for purpose and have an objective that leads to a benefit for the student, such as progression to other qualifications or employment.
Ofqual maintains a Register of Regulated Qualifications. The qualification title, level, sector subject area and awarding organisation offering the qualification are registered. Sometimes these details are updated: this might be to correct an error or to make updates when awarding organisations change, for example after a merger. Each qualification has a unique qualification number that identifies the qualification, even if other details change.
Awarding organisations
Awarding organisations refer to organisations recognised by Ofqual to develop, deliver and award qualifications. Awarding organisations are assigned unique Ofqual recognition numbers. They can change the legal entity which they are recognised under, for example because of a merger with another organisation, which results in a new Ofqual recognition number. The same qualification can be associated with multiple Ofqual recognition numbers.
Certificates
Awarding organisations issue certificates to students who have completed a regulated qualification.
Additional Context
Context for every quarter is published in the vocational and other qualifications quarterly official statistics release. This includes key headlines and background information including details on data quality and areas of uncertainty and the appropriate use of the statistics.
Updates and revisions
The dataset is updated alongside every release of the vocational and other qualifications quarterly official statistics release. For dates, see our upcoming official statistics and recently published official statistics.
Every update covers the full dataset to reflect the latest data. Sometimes there are revisions made to data for previous quarters. If a quarterly update included revisions to the number of certificates for previous quarters, a table of revisions was published accompanying the vocational and other qualifications quarterly official statistics release.
Revisions can relate to awarding organisations resubmitting data for a previous quarter to correct an error or omission. Revisions can also be caused by qualifications changing in or out of scope of this release, due to a correction being made in Ofqual’s Register of Regulated Qualifications.
Data sources
Information on qualifications (title, type, awarding organisation, sector subject area and level) is taken from Ofqual’s Register of Regulated Qualifications. The Register is a live database and may change between updates to this dataset.
Data on the number of certificates issued was supplied to Ofqual by the awarding organisations. Every awarding organisation with regulated in-scope qualifications in the quarter is required to submit data. Data was submitted in line with our Vocational quarterly: guide to the data submission process. Data for each quarter is submitted at the beginning of the next quarter according to Ofqual’s published reporting schedule. The data Ofqual receives contains the number of certificates issued aggregated per qualification in the quarter.
Confidentiality and disclosure control
To ensure confidentiality of the data, numbers of certificates are rounded, according to our rounding policy for statistical publications.
Certificate numbers are rounded to the nearest 5. If the value is less than 5 (1 to 4), it is represented as ‘Fewer than 5’. True zero is denoted as ‘0’.
Related statistics
This dataset underlies Ofqual’s:
- Vocational and other qualifications quarterly official statistics release
- Vocational and other qualifications over time interactive visualisation
See Statistics at Ofqual for links to our other statistical releases and interactive visualisations.
For quarterly certificate statistics for vocational and other qualifications for Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland, see:
- Northern Ireland - Vocational and Other Qualifications Bulletins published by CCEA
- Wales – Vocational and Other Qualifications Quarterly published by Qualifications Wales
- Scotland - Quarterly and Annual Statistics Reports published by Qualifications Scotland Accreditation
Contact details
Email: data.analytics@ofqual.gov.uk
Updates to this page
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Added the January to March 2026 release to the collection. Updated the dataset description to provide useful context and added metadata - no changes were made to the scope of the data
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Added the October to December 2025 release to the collection
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A revision to include an additional 83,755 certificates in quarter 3 2025.
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Added the July to September 2025 release to the collection
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Added the April to June 2025 release to the collection. Added explanation about revisions.
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Added the January to March 2025 release to the collection.
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Added the October to December 2024 release to the collection.
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Added the July to September 2024 release to the collection.
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Added the April to June 2024 release to the collection.
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Added the January to March 2024 release to the collection.
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Added the October to December 2023 release to the collection.
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Added the July to September 2023 release to the collection.
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Added the April to June 2023 release to the collection.
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Added the January to March 2023 release to the collection.
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Added the October to December 2022 release to the collection.
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Updated the quarter 3 2022 values after an awarding organisation noticed an error in their data and resubmitted figures. A total of 179,285 (rounded) certifications were added.
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Added the July to September 2022 release to the collection.
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Added the April to June 2022 release to the collection.
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Added the January to March 2022 release to the collection.
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Latest dataset (Q4 - October to December 2021) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q3 - July to September 2021) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q2 - April to June 2021) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q1 - January to March 2021) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q4 - October to December 2020) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q3 - July to September 2020) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q2 - April to June 2020) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q1 - January to March 2020) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q4 - October to December 2019) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q3 - July to September 2019) uploaded
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Republished the dataset because one of the awarding organisations (Pearson) has resubmitted their data which has increased the number of certificates awarded by them in Q2 2019 by nearly 150K.
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Added a user note on resubmission of data by Pearson.
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Latest dataset (Q2 - April to June 2019) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q1 - January to March 2019) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q4 - October to December 2018) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q3 - July to September 2018) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q2 - April to June 2018) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q1 - January to March 2018) uploaded
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Latest dataset (Q4 - October to December 2017) uploaded. Removed datasets for Wales and Northern Ireland following an agreement with Qualification Wales and CCEA.
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Updated with data for July to September 2017.
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Latest datasets (Q2 - April to June 2017) uploaded
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Latest datasets (Q1 - January to March 2017) uploaded
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Latest datasets (Q4 2016 - October to December 2016) uploaded
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Latest datasets (Q3 - July to September 2016) uploaded
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Corrected data supplied by one awarding organisation.
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Latest (Q2 2016) data released
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Latest data (Q1 2016) uploaded
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All files were replaced because some data from Gateway Qualifications as well as a few other awarding organisations were missing.
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Latest datasets for October to December 2015 uploaded.
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After data quality checks, it was decided that the separate datasets for England, Wales and Northern Ireland would only go back to 2012 as this is when the data started being collected by country and that the dataset for all 3 countries would cover 10 years.
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Updated to include data for Q2 2015.
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The latest dataset includes data from the latest published quarter (January to March 2015)
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The previous version was missing data from a number of qualifications
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The following 3 files were revised as they contained errors: Dataset 1988 to present - England, Wales and Northern Ireland; Dataset 1988 to present - England only; and Dataset 2009 to present - England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
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Added the latest version of the data files for quarter 4 2014.
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First published.