What Score Does Your Child Need to Pass the Birmingham 11+?
It is the first question almost every parent asks us, and the honest answer is that there is no single pass mark. There are two different numbers, they do different jobs, and the one that actually decides whether your child gets a place is not the one most people have heard of.
There are two numbers, not one
The qualifying score is the minimum standardised score a child needs to be considered for any of the Birmingham grammar schools at all. For 2027 entry it is 205.
The priority score sits higher, at 224 for 2027 entry. At the six King Edward VI schools, a child who reaches it and lives in the school’s catchment goes into a category that is filled before the open one. For a great many families that makes 224, not the headline cut-off, the number that actually decides things. Neither figure is fixed — both can change from year to year.
Both figures are published by the King Edward VI Foundation, which runs the entrance test on behalf of the Birmingham grammar schools.
Reaching the qualifying score does not get your child a place
This is the part that catches families out. Passing 205 means your child is eligible. It does not mean they have been offered anything. Thousands of children clear the qualifying score every year and many of them do not receive a grammar school offer, because each school then works down its own ranked list until its places are full.
Where that list stops is the number that matters, and it is different at every school.
What the open category required in 2026
These were the 2026 outcomes for the open category — the one your child falls into unless they are looked after or eligible for Pupil Premium. The spread is nearly 40 points, and at one school the open category received no offers at all.
| School | Open category score, 2026 |
|---|---|
| King Edward VI Camp Hill School for Girls | 255 |
| King Edward VI Camp Hill School for Boys | 254 |
| Bishop Vesey’s Grammar School | 229 |
| Sutton Coldfield Grammar School for Girls | 227 |
| King Edward VI Handsworth School for Girls | 219 |
| King Edward VI Aston School | 217 |
| King Edward VI Handsworth Grammar School for Boys | 216 |
| King Edward VI Five Ways School | No offers made |
A child scoring 230 would have been comfortably above the bar at Handsworth, Aston and Sutton Coldfield, a long way below it at either Camp Hill school, and at Five Ways would not have been offered a place whatever they scored, because that category received no offers. Same child, same paper, completely different outcome depending on where you apply.
Why the cut-offs move every year
A cut-off is not a target the school sets in advance. It is what is left over once that year’s applicants have been ranked and the places have run out. If a strong cohort applies to a popular school, the cut-off rises. If fewer high scorers put it first, it falls.
So treat last year’s figures as a guide to how competitive each school tends to be, never as a score to aim at. Nobody — including us — can tell you what this year’s cut-off will be.
Catchment, siblings and Pupil Premium change the picture
Each school sorts every qualifying applicant into one category, then fills its places category by category, in order. At the six King Edward VI schools that order is:
- Looked-after and previously looked-after children scoring 205 or more
- Pupil Premium children scoring 205 or more, living in catchment
- Pupil Premium children scoring 205 or more, living outside catchment
- Any child scoring 224 or more, living in catchment
- Everyone else
Bishop Vesey’s and Sutton Coldfield Grammar School for Girls currently run no catchment, so they use three categories: looked-after children, Pupil Premium children, and everyone else. That could change.
The consequence is the thing worth understanding. Category 4 is filled before Category 5 is reached, so at Camp Hill Boys in 2026 a child in catchment scoring 224 was offered a place while a child outside catchment scoring 253 was not. This is why two families comparing scores over the school gate can reach opposite conclusions and both be right.
So what should we actually aim for?
Start by working out which category your child will fall into at each school you are considering. If you live in catchment, the target is 224 with room to spare. If you do not, the target is that school’s open-category score, which at some schools is thirty points higher.
Either way, aim comfortably above the bar rather than at it. A child sitting right on last year’s figure has no margin for a bad morning, a misread question, or a slightly harder paper.
And be realistic about the spread. If your heart is set on Camp Hill, you are looking at a materially harder task than a family whose nearest school is Handsworth. That is not a reason to give up. It is a reason to know what you are preparing for, and to start early enough that the work is steady rather than frantic.
How the score is worked out
The test is two papers of roughly an hour each, set by GL Assessment. It covers English comprehension, verbal reasoning, maths and non-verbal reasoning, each carrying 25% of the marks. Scores are standardised for age, so a child born in August is not penalised against one born in September.
That even split surprises people. Non-verbal reasoning counts for exactly as much as maths, and English comprehension and verbal reasoning together make up half the paper — which is where we see the biggest gains from early, consistent work.
An honest look at where your child stands
We run free Saturday assessments at our Edgbaston centre. We look at a sample of all four 11+ subjects to find where your child is strong and where the gaps are. It is not a timed exam, and it is not just a score — what we are really judging is how much room there is to improve towards grammar school entrance level. You get a straight answer, including when that answer is that grammar school may not be the right route. No obligation, and no sales pitch.
Book a free assessment, or read more about the Year 3, Year 4 and Year 5 programmes.