Chloe CollinsThe Department for Education launched a new online service on 13 November 2026 that lets parents in England compare schools side by side. Called "find and compare school and college profiles", it gathers location, age range, attendance, results and extras such as free breakfast clubs on one page per school. With primary applications open in every local area and a January deadline, many families will use it within weeks.
What are parents actually asking about the new school profiles?
Most questions fall into three groups: what the tool shows, whether it replaces visits and league tables, and how much weight each figure deserves. The first answer comes from the Department for Education (DfE) release, issued with Schools Minister Georgia Gould.
Each profile combines practical details with outcomes. For secondary schools, it lists GCSE subject entries and where pupils went after year 11: further education, apprenticeships or employment. Comparison was first offered for secondary schools and is being rolled out to primary schools.
The DfE says Ofsted reports will be added next year, and information on out-of-classroom activities will follow in the coming years. So today's profile is a partial picture. Parents who treat it as the whole story risk drawing conclusions the data cannot yet support.
Why does the attendance figure matter more than it looks?
Attendance sits beside results on each profile, and it is easy to skim past. A school with strong exam outcomes and weak attendance may be doing well with the pupils who turn up while losing others along the way.
The DfE also cites new research findings that children whose parents received very clear information about their progress achieved higher GCSE results and were less likely to be persistently absent. The release gives no figures for this, so treat it as a direction of travel and not a promise. The practical lesson is simple: ask each school how it reports progress to families, not only how it scores.
Parents who want to see how exam data translates into later choices can read our piece on V Levels, T Levels or A Levels, which covers what happens after GCSEs.
What does the tool leave out?
Three gaps stand out. Ofsted judgements are not yet on the profiles. Extracurricular detail is promised only over the coming years. And a profile cannot tell you how a school feels to a nervous eleven-year-old or a child with additional needs.
Two new groups are working on part of that gap. The Enrichment Alliance, chaired by Steve Chalke MBE, will test community-shaped extra-curricular activities and aims to address the drop in engagement and attendance in early secondary years. The School-Parent Partnership Alliance, co-chaired by Ed Vainker and Fiona Forbes, is gathering views from parents, teachers and school leaders through an online form. The most effective ideas will be tested in more schools from next year.
Families who want a view on grades and what they mean can also look at our guide to GCSE results day and the app, which explains how results are reported to students.
How would a family use it? A worked example
Take a hypothetical family in a town with two primary schools within a mile of home. They have until January to submit their application, so they set aside one evening in late November to compare the profiles. The figures below are invented for illustration and are not taken from the DfE tool.
School A has 96% attendance and no breakfast club. School B has 93% attendance and a free breakfast club that opens at 7:45am. One parent starts work at 8:15am and currently pays £9 a day for a childminder to cover the morning gap.
If the parent works five days a week, that childcare costs about £45 a week, or roughly £1,700 across a 38-week school year. If the breakfast club genuinely removes that cost, School B saves the family around £1,700 a year, which is worth weighing against a three-point difference in attendance.
But if School B's attendance is low because many pupils miss days for reasons the profile does not explain, the saving may not outweigh the concern. In that case the family should phone the school and ask directly. The profile starts the conversation. It does not end it.
This is where a tutor or education adviser earns their fee. A professional who works with local families can explain what a gap between two schools usually reflects, and which questions to put to a head teacher on an open day.
Are primary and secondary profiles used differently?
Yes, because the data on offer differs. The secondary profiles include GCSE subject entries and post-16 destinations, which tell parents whether a school steers pupils towards academic routes, apprenticeships or work. Primary profiles are still being rolled out, so parents of younger children may find fewer fields filled in this winter.
For a primary applicant, location, age range and attendance carry most of the weight. For a secondary applicant, the subject entries deserve a closer look. A school that enters few pupils for a language or a science may suit some children less than the headline results suggest.
How should families handle gaps and disagreements in the data?
Treat the profile as a starting document and check it against a second source. Local authority admissions pages list oversubscription criteria and last year's offers, and these often matter more than any score. A school that looks perfect on paper is of little use if your address falls outside its catchment pattern.
If a figure looks wrong, raise it with the school first, then with the DfE using the enquiries number above. Schools usually know quickly whether a number reflects a data cut-off, a merger or a one-off event.
If two schools look close on every field, break the tie with practical tests. Time the journey at 8am on a weekday, check whether siblings are already on the roll, and ask what happens to pupils who fall behind in the first term. Those answers rarely appear in any dataset, yet they shape daily life more than a one-point gap in attendance.
Keep a simple table with one row per school and one column per question. Fill it in after each visit or call, and note the date. By the time the January deadline approaches, you will have a written record to rank your choices from, instead of a memory of impressions that fades after three or four visits.
What should parents do before the January deadline?
Start with the profiles for every school on your shortlist, and note attendance, the age range and any wider offer that affects your working week. Then check your local authority's admissions page for the exact closing date, because the DfE release says only that parents have until January.
Next, visit in person where you can. Ask how the school tells parents about progress, since the research the DfE cites points to clear communication as a factor in better outcomes. Finally, list your preferences in the order you truly hold them. On most admissions forms, the order you give is the order the council records.
Parents with a child who has special educational needs, a child who is behind in reading or maths, or a child changing school mid-year may want a specialist view. Our education experts can help you read a profile against your child's circumstances and prepare questions for visits.
The DfE publishes the full announcement, including the new alliances and the contact line (0370 000 2288, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm), on GOV.UK.
