Attendance rates

Pupil attendance rates have not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels. In the 2024 to 2025 academic year, overall attendance in Scotland’s schools was 91.0%. Although an increase on the previous year, it remained below the 2018 to 2019 academic year rate of 93.0%.

In the 2024 to 2025 academic year, the overall rate of authorised pupil absence across Scotland’s schools was 5.3%. Despite recent improvement from a high of 6.1% in the 2022 to 2023 academic year, it remains above pre-pandemic levels of around 4.4%. 

Sickness without education provision remains the main reason for authorised absence. This applies when pupils are unable to attend school because of illness or a medical condition. Although this rate has fallen since the 2023 to 2024 academic year, at 4.4% it remains higher than the pre-pandemic average of around 3.5%.

Unauthorised absence decreased only slightly, from 3.8% in the 2023 to 2024 academic year to 3.7% in the 2024 to 2025 academic year. Unexplained absence, including truancy, remains the largest aspect of unauthorised absence, although this also reduced slightly. 

By contrast, unauthorised holidays rose marginally, from 1.0% to 1.1%. This is the highest level recorded since the 2009 to 2010 academic year.

Persistent absence, defined as absence of 10% or more, decreased from 31.4% in the 2023 to 2024 academic year to 28.5% in the 2024 to 2025 academic year. 

Scottish Government data indicates that attendance is lower for children and young people with additional support needs than their peers. This attendance gap increased slightly in the 2024 to 2025 academic year. Attendance was 88.2% for those with an additional need compared to 92.9% for those without. 

Lower attendance rates are also closely linked to levels of deprivation. In the 2024 to 2025 academic year, average attendance was 94.1% for children and young people living in the least deprived areas, compared with 87.6% for those living in the most deprived areas. The attendance gap between these groups narrowed slightly from 6.7 percentage points in the 2023 to 2024 academic year to 6.5 percentage points in the 2024 to 2025 academic year.