Home › Guides › What do Ofsted ratings mean?
Until September 2024, Ofsted gave every state school in England a single overall grade from four: Outstanding, Good, Requires improvement or Inadequate. That word summed up a full inspection covering the quality of teaching, behaviour, pupils' wider development and how the school is led. The grade is a snapshot from the days inspectors visited, so its date matters as much as the word, and for state schools it is now the previous system rather than the current one.
If you have looked up a school and seen a word like "Good" next to it, that word comes from Ofsted, the government body that inspects schools in England. For years, an Ofsted inspection ended with one overall grade that parents could compare at a glance. It is still the rating you will see attached to most schools today, because a grade stays in place until the school is inspected again. Knowing exactly what each grade means, and what it does not tell you, is the difference between reading a school fairly and being misled by a single word.
Ofsted used a four-point scale. The two top grades were treated as positive outcomes; the bottom two signalled that inspectors wanted to see change.
| Grade | What it means in plain English |
|---|---|
| Outstanding | The school is strong across the board and exceptional in the areas Ofsted judges. A high bar, and a smaller share of schools reach it. |
| Good | The school does what parents would reasonably expect well. This is the standard most schools are working to meet, and most Good schools are perfectly solid choices. |
| Requires improvement | Not yet Good, but not failing. There are weaknesses Ofsted expects to see addressed, and the school would usually be re-inspected within roughly two years. |
| Inadequate | Serious weaknesses. This splits into "serious weaknesses" and "special measures", the more serious of the two, and normally triggers close monitoring and intervention. |
A useful rule of thumb: Outstanding and Good are the reassuring grades, Requires improvement is a "look closer and ask questions" grade, and Inadequate is a "understand what has happened since" grade. None of them replaces visiting the school yourself.
The overall grade was never a single test score. Under this framework, inspectors reached separate judgements on four areas and then formed an overall view. Understanding these helps you read a report properly rather than fixating on the headline word.
A school could be Good overall while being stronger in some of these than others. This is exactly why the full inspection report is worth reading rather than the grade alone, and it is a large part of the thinking behind the reform Ofsted brought in during 2024.
It is easy to read Requires improvement as a red flag, but it sits above Inadequate for a reason. It often describes a school that is competent and improving, or one that slipped from Good and is expected to climb back. What matters is the story behind it: read the report to see which of the four areas pulled the grade down, and check the date. A Requires improvement grade from several years ago tells you little about the school your child would attend today.
No. Since September 2024, Ofsted no longer gives state schools a single overall grade at all, so a newer inspection will show separate judgements or a short-inspection outcome instead of one word. A missing headline grade usually just means the last visit happened under the new rules. We explain this fully in the 2024 Ofsted grading change, because it changes how you should read every grade you come across.
A grade stays attached to a school until the next inspection, and inspections can be years apart. A "Good" from 2015 and a "Good" from 2023 are not the same reassurance. Leadership, intake and results can all shift in that time. Whenever you look up a rating, note the year it was awarded and treat an old grade as a starting point for questions rather than a settled verdict. When you compare several schools near you, seeing each grade next to its date side by side is far more honest than reading them one at a time. If you are weighing up options, our guides on choosing a primary school and choosing a secondary school turn this into a practical checklist.
You can verify any school's inspection history yourself: search the school on the Ofsted reports site and cross-check its details on Get Information about Schools (get-information-schools.service.gov.uk), the Department for Education's official register. Both are free and authoritative, so nothing on this page has to be taken on trust.
For how we source and present ratings in the report, see our methodology.
We show every state school near your postcode with its latest Ofsted rating and the year it was given. A grade is a snapshot, not a promise, so always check the date and visit before you decide.
