Pupils eligible for free school meals, England
Percentage of pupils in state-funded and non-maintained special schools in England who are eligible for free school meals, from the January school census each academic year.
Pupils eligible for free school meals
26.5%
2025/26 · 2,214,994 pupils
Verified against source, 29 October 2026, 17:45 UTCSource: Department for Education. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Data table
11 periods, newest first
| Period | Eligible for free school meals |
|---|---|
| 2025/26 | 26.5% |
| 2024/25 | 25.7% |
| 2023/24 | 24.64% |
| 2022/23 | 23.81% |
| 2021/22 | 22.54% |
| 2020/21 | 20.83% |
| 2019/20 | 17.33% |
| 2018/19 | 15.43% |
| 2017/18 | 13.57% |
| 2016/17 | 13.96% |
| 2015/16 | 14.32% |
Source and licence
- Publisher
- Department for Education
- Check it yourself
- https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-pupils-and-their-characteristics
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0 – Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Retrieved
- 29 October 2026, 17:45 UTC
- Raw files fetched
- https://api.education.gov.uk/statistics/v1/data-sets/019e7404-df19-71ce-90a8-f2e3db7dd7fa/csvSHA-256 4fdad989d719b1183a0d26bf7948df6c1070edfff872e51ac0ba49e83276ea5d · 1,469,973 bytes
Verification
Verified against source, 29 October 2026, 17:45 UTC Run at 29 October 2026, 17:45 UTC; 11 of 11 figures matched the live source.
| Result | Check | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Pass | Provenance recorded | Department for Education; Open Government Licence v3.0; retrieved 2026-10-29T17:45:04Z; 1 raw file(s) |
| Pass | Raw files match recorded SHA-256 | 1 of 1 files intact |
| Pass | Re-parsing raw files reproduces figures | 11 of 11 figures and the headline reproduced |
| Pass | Figures are finite numbers | 11 figures, 0 invalid |
| Pass | Live source matches every figure | 11 of 11 figures match exactly after downloading 1 source file(s) again (1 byte-identical); the headline matches |
| Pass | EES query API agrees | 11 of 11 figures match the EES query API (https://api.education.gov.uk/statistics/v1/data-sets/019e7404-df19-71ce-90a8-f2e3db7dd7fa/query) |
| Pass | Source page answers | https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-pupils-and-their-characteristics – HTTP 200 |