16 to 19 funding: information for 2025 to 2026
Details for 16 to 19 funded institutions on how funding will work in academic year 2025 to 2026.
Applies to England
Purpose
This guide explains 16 to 19 funding for academic year 2025 to 2026.
Changes for 2025 to 2026
June 2025 update
We have increased rates and programme cost weightings to reflect the £190 million additional investment. You can see the changes in the following sections:
- national funding rates
- T Level rates
- disadvantage funding
- programme cost weightings
- English and maths funding
We aim to revise 16 to 19 funding allocation statements in June 2025 to include the latest rates. We will upload revised allocation statements to Document exchange and confirm this in a DfE update article.
May 2025 update
We are announcing an investment of £160 million for colleges and other 16 to 19 providers in financial year 2025 to 2026. This funding will boost opportunities for students across the country and drive forward delivery of the critical skills needed to grow our economy.
This funding represents a significant investment and will support colleges and other 16 to 19 providers to address immediate priorities, including recruiting and retaining expert teachers in high value subject areas.
Additional funding of over £30 million will be available from within the £615 million for 2025 to 2026 announced alongside the 2025 to 2026 school teachers’ pay award. Together, this means that a total additional sum of over £190 million will be available for 16 to 19 funding in financial year 2025 to 2026, which will be included within 16 to 19 allocations for academic year 2025 to 2026.
We will direct this funding by:
- increasing the per student funding rate, recognising the need for all providers to drive forward high quality delivery, including recruiting and retaining staff in a competitive labour market
- increasing programme cost weightings for higher cost courses to boost capacity in priority sector subjects such as construction, manufacturing and digital which are vital to economic growth
- increasing funding for English and maths delivery and disadvantage funding to boost opportunity for disadvantaged learners and those who require further support to gain a level 2 in English and maths, along with those in care and care leavers
We will begin to make updated payments from the start of academic year 2025 to 2026.
March 2025
The Autumn Budget delivered on 30 October 2024 provided an additional £300 million funding for further education for financial year 2025 to 2026 to ensure young people are developing the skills this country needs.
We have made approximately £50 million of this funding available to further education colleges and sixth-form colleges for the period April to July 2025 via the post-16 budget grant. This one-off grant will enable colleges to respond to current priorities and challenges, including workforce recruitment and retention.
This £50 million funding for colleges is in addition to the grant funding for schools and academies with 16 to 19 provision which will continue over this period.
We will use the remainder of the £300 million budget uplift to support 16 to 19 funding from August 2025 onwards.
We have now published information on the Post-16 National Insurance contributions grant.
Post-16 budget grant
We will continue to pay the post-16 schools budget grant for the rest of academic year 2024 to 2025. From April 2025, the grant includes further education colleges and sixth-form colleges and is called the post-16 budget grant.
This grant will stop at the end of academic year 2024 to 2025. For academic year 2025 to 2026, we have brought the grant into the national funding rate which will be the same for all institutions with a 16 to 19 allocation.
National funding rate for students funded via the 16 to 19 funding formula
We have increased the national funding rate for students aged 16 and 17 and students aged 18 and over with high needs in band 5 to £5,105 and have increased other funding bands proportionately.
Table 1: national funding rate for students funded via the 16 to 19 funding formula
| Band (study programmes) |
Annual planned hours | Students | National funding rate per student |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 | 580+ hours | 16 and 17 year olds and students aged 18 and over with high needs | £5,105 |
| 4a | 485+ hours | students aged 18 and over who are not high needs | £4,223 |
| 4b | 485 to 579 hours | 16 and 17 year olds and students aged 18 and over with high needs | £4,223 |
| 3 | 385 to 484 hours | all students | £3,434 |
| 2 | 300 to 384 hours | all students | £2,715 |
| 1 | up to 299 hours | all students | £5,105 proportion of band 5 |
National funding rates for T Levels
Table 2 shows the funding rate per student for the 2 year T Level programme. This includes a 5% uplift to T Levels for academic year 2025 to 2026. We have also updated the rates in our 16 to 19 funding rates and formula and T Level funding guidance for academic year 2025 to 2026.
The funding rate per student for 1 year of the T Level programme is half the amount shown in table 2, at the rate in the relevant academic year.
Table 2: national funding rate per student for T Levels
| Band (T Levels) |
Minimum planned hours for the programme 2 years | Average planned hours for the programme 2 years | National funding rate per student, per programme 2 years |
|---|---|---|---|
| 9 | 1,730 hours | 1,830 hours | £15,430 |
| 8 | 1,580 hours | 1,680 hours | £14,146 |
| 7 | 1,380 hours | 1,530 hours | £12,864 |
| 6 | 1,180 hours | 1,330 hours | £11,154 |
T Level under-delivery tolerance
We will no longer apply an under-delivery tolerance for T Levels from academic year 2025 to 2026. As the T Level programme matures, we expect institutions to be more able to judge their expected T Level recruitment. The removal of the tolerance follows steady reductions in the under-delivery tolerance since 2022 to 2023. This means that from academic year 2025 to 2026, all under-delivery is subject to recovery as part of the T Level reconciliation process.
Specific formula elements
Disadvantage funding
For academic year 2025 to 2026 funding allocations, we have increased the disadvantage block 1 rate to £609 for students who are in care or who have recently left care.
We have also increased the disadvantage block 2 rates, which reflect the additional cost of teaching and supporting students who have low prior attainment at:
- £609 for bands 4 and 5 students
- £371 for bands 2 and 3 students
- £825 for T Level students
Programme cost weightings
We have increased the programme cost weightings for higher cost courses to boost capacity in priority sector subjects such as construction, manufacturing and digital which are vital to economic growth.
High value courses premium
We will continue to fund high value courses premium (HVCP) in academic year 2025 to 2026 at £600. This is to further encourage delivery and enrolments in courses with higher wage returns. We have published the list of qualifying A level subjects and sector subject areas that we use to calculate HVCP for 2025 to 2026 allocations.
Maths funding
Advanced maths premium
We removed core maths qualifications from the advanced maths premium in academic year 2024 to 2025.
We will continue to pay the advanced maths premium for other qualifications in scope in academic year 2025 to 2026 at £900.
In academic year 2024 to 2025, we revised the updated baseline we used to calculate the premium to use advanced maths enrolments recorded between academic year 2019 to 2020 and academic year 2020 to 2021 to remove core maths qualifications.
Core maths premium
We will continue to fund the core maths premium in academic year 2025 to 2026 at a rate of £900 to encourage the provision of core maths qualifications and expand maths education for students up to the age of 18.
English and maths funding
We have increased the rate for the English and maths payment for students studying 16 to 19 study programmes or T Levels who are retaking English and maths because they have not gained a GCSE grade 9 to 4 or level 2 in these subjects.
This additional funding is intended to support students’ participation in their study programme or T Level by ensuring institutions have the resources to provide extra hours of education or other extra support where needed to deliver English and/or maths alongside other qualifications.
The rates for the English and maths funding will be:
- £418 per student per subject in band 4 and above
- £255 per student per subject in bands 3 and 2
- £418 per full-time equivalent per subject in band 1 where students are on programmes of 150 hours or more
All students subject to the maths and English condition of funding will attract the payment.
Maths and English condition of funding
We’ve updated our maths and English condition of funding guidance to explain the minimum teaching hours for English and maths for academic year 2025 to 2026. We’ve explained how we are implementing a reduction of the tolerance from 5% to 2.5% of institutions’ 16 to 19 cohort in academic year 2025 to 2026. This will impact funding allocations in academic year 2027 to 2028.
Data error thresholds and cases
It remains the responsibility of all institutions to ensure that data returns through the school census or the individualised learner record are accurate. Read our full guidance before submitting a business case.
Academic year 2025 to 2026
Whilst the thresholds remain the same for academic year 2025 to 2026, we will now calculate them using your total programme funding amount.
We have changed the deadline for business cases for academic year 2025 to 2026. We will now only accept cases submitted within 4 weeks of your allocation statement being issued. We will not accept late cases.
As T Level under-delivery tolerances have been removed for academic year 2025 to 2026, we have removed the specific thresholds for T Levels. Institutions will not be financially impacted if they correct their data errors in their autumn returns for academic year 2025 to 2026. We will revise allocations in-year against actual data following the T Level reconciliation.
Academic year 2026 to 2027
From academic year 2026 to 2027, we will only accept business cases affecting that academic year. We will not accept business cases affecting previous years.
We will also change how the threshold works. When we agree a case, we will deduct the threshold and only pay funding over that amount. For example, if the same 5% or £100k (whichever is lower) threshold were to remain, institutions will need to fund that 5% or £100k.
Teachers’ pension scheme employer contribution grant
We will pay the teachers’ pension scheme employer contribution grant (TPSECG) for sixth forms and 16 to 19 schools funded via the 16 to 19 funding formula. As in previous years, we will pay the grant separately to core allocations in financial year 2025 to 2026.
We will also pay the TPSECG for further education providers for academic year 2025 to 2026. We will include this grant in 16 to 19 allocations. We have amended the methodology and from 2025 to 2026 we are uplifting the employer contributions at the 16.4% rate by estimated average increases in earnings.
Updates to this page
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We have updated this page to show the increased rates and programme cost weightings for 16 to 19 funding in academic year 2025 to 2026.
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We have updated this page to announce additional 16 to 19 funding for financial year 2025 to 2026.
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We’ve updated this page to explain that we aim to revise 16 to 19 funding allocation statements in June 2025 to incorporate the 5% T Level uplift we announced on 23 April. The rates in your current 16 to 19 funding allocation statements do not contain the uplift.
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We've updated this page to confirm a 5% uplift in T Level funding rates for academic year 2025 to 2026.
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First published.