Selective and independent schools assess before they admit, and the preparation needs starting well before the application rather than after it. If your list has narrowed to schools with entrance papers, pre-tests or interviews, we can tell you what each one involves and whether your child is currently working at the level required.
There is no best school in London. There is a best school for a particular child, living at a particular address, and the gap between those two ideas is where most of the stress in this process comes from.
London makes it harder than anywhere else in the country. The density of options is unusual, the admissions rules differ between neighbouring boroughs, and a family living on the wrong side of a road can find that half their shortlist was never realistic.
What follows is a way of narrowing the field. It starts with everything within reach and ends with six names on a form, and it deliberately avoids ranking schools, because the two measures most parents use for that have both stopped working the way they used to.
The familiar single words are gone. Single-word overall judgements were scrapped in September 2024, and from 10 November 2025 Ofsted replaced them with report cards graded across six areas: inclusion, curriculum and teaching, achievement, attendance and behaviour, personal development and wellbeing, and leadership and governance. Each area is graded on a five-point scale rather than summarised in one word, and safeguarding is assessed separately as either met or not met.
Here is the part that matters when you are comparing schools this autumn. A school inspected under the old framework still displays its old grade until it is re-inspected. So a list of six London schools in 2026 will contain some with a detailed report card and some with a single word from several years ago.
Two practical consequences. An “Outstanding” badge may be old rather than current, and it may reflect a school that has changed considerably since. And two schools cannot be compared on their headline grade at all if one has been re-inspected and the other has not. Read the report itself rather than the label, and check the date first.
Results tables tell you what a school's pupils achieved. They do not tell you what the school added, which is a different question and the one you actually care about.
A selective school admitting only high-attaining eleven-year-olds will post strong results whatever happens in its classrooms. Progress measures attempt to correct for this by comparing outcomes against prior attainment, and they are more useful than raw results, though still imperfect. Where a school looks exceptional on raw scores and ordinary on progress, the intake is doing the work.
This applies to independent schools too, and more so, since they select on both ability and fee. Our comparison of independent and state education covers that difference in more detail.
Better questions are specific to your child rather than general to the school.
How does this school handle a student in the middle of the ability range, given that is where most children sit. What happens when someone falls behind. How large are the classes in the subjects your child struggles with. What is the actual provision for a child with your child's particular need. How many pupils leave between Year 9 and sixth form, and why.
None of that appears in a table. Most of it can be answered on an open evening if you ask directly.
Three filters, applied in this order. The order matters, because the first two remove schools that were never realistic and save you from falling for one you cannot get into.
Map the journey properly, at the time your child would travel, using the route they would actually take. An hour each way is survivable in Year 7 and grinding by Year 10, and it removes the possibility of staying for anything after school.
London flatters distance on a map. A school two miles away can be forty minutes with a change, and one four miles away can be twenty on a single bus. Test it before it goes on the list.
This is where most shortlists fall apart, and it is entirely researchable in an evening.
Every state school publishes its oversubscription criteria and, crucially, how far down those criteria it went last year. Some publish the furthest distance offered, which tells you immediately whether your address is in range. If a school admitted to 0.6 miles last year and you are at 1.4 miles with no sibling connection, that school is not a realistic choice however much you like it.
Criteria vary considerably across London. Some schools use straight distance, some use banding tests to admit across the ability range, some give substantial priority on faith grounds, and selective schools rank by exam score. Our guide to grammar schools and how selection works covers the selective route, which follows different rules again.
Only now is it worth thinking about ethos, results, facilities and feel, and only for schools that survived the first two filters.
Fit is genuinely personal and resists generalisation. A large school offering thirty subjects and four sports teams suits a child who will take advantage of it, and can swallow a quieter one whole. A small school with close pastoral attention is a relief for some children and claustrophobic for others.
Most open evenings are designed to impress, and they succeed. The useful information is available anyway if you go looking for it.
Talk to the pupils rather than the staff. They are usually the school's best students and they will still tell you more than a scripted tour. Ask what they would change, which subject they find hardest and why, and what happens if you do not understand something in a lesson.
Look at the corridors between presentations. Displayed work that is genuinely recent, and from a range of pupils rather than only the strongest, says more than a hall full of prospectuses.
Ask the head of the department that matters most to your child, not the headteacher. And ask one direct question that cannot be answered with a brochure line: what does the school do about a child who is quietly coasting.
Where the school assesses at entry, ask what the assessment involves and when. For independent schools the answer often includes an interview, and our guide to preparing for a private school interview covers what those are really testing.
A few things catch families out here that would not elsewhere.
Borough boundaries are not admissions boundaries. You apply through your home borough but can name schools in any borough, and living in one does not usually give priority in another. Check each school rather than assuming.
Banding is common in London and misunderstood. A banded school tests applicants and admits a set proportion from each ability band, which means a very able child is competing against other very able children for a limited number of places. Strong performance does not guarantee entry.
Distance is measured in ways that differ by school, sometimes straight line and sometimes safest walking route, and the two can produce different answers for the same address. Where you are borderline, this is worth checking precisely.
Independent schools sit outside the local authority process entirely, with their own deadlines, their own assessments and their own registration fees, usually falling earlier than the state timetable. If fees are the obstacle, our guide to bursaries and how schools assess them is worth reading before ruling the option out, since more support exists than most families assume.
The state secondary application closes on 31 October, with offers issued the following March.
Use every preference available. Naming fewer schools does not strengthen your case at any of them and increases the risk of an allocation you did not choose. Rank honestly, because schools assess your child against their own criteria without seeing where you placed them, so ranking a school lower protects nothing.
Include at least one school you would genuinely accept and are likely to be offered. A list of six oversubscribed schools, none of which you are close to, is the most common route to a difficult March. If it does come to that, our guide to school appeals and waiting lists sets out the options and the deadlines that apply.
The schools that appear on published lists of the best in London are, almost without exception, either highly selective or expensive, and frequently both. They are excellent schools. They are also not the answer to the question most parents are asking, which is where their particular child will do well.
A child who is happy, known by their teachers and taught at the right pace will do better at an ordinary school than an unhappy one at a celebrated school. That is not a consolation for missing out on a first choice. It is the thing worth optimising for from the start.
Not in the old form. Single-word overall judgements were scrapped in September 2024, and from 10 November 2025 Ofsted has issued report cards grading schools across six areas on a five-point scale, with safeguarding assessed separately. Schools inspected before the change still display their previous grade until they are re-inspected, so comparing two schools on their headline result may not be comparing like with like.
Start by ruling schools out rather than ranking them. Check what is genuinely reachable on a real journey, then check each school's published oversubscription criteria and how far down them it admitted last year. Only then consider fit. Schools you cannot realistically get into do not belong on a shortlist however good they are.
Less than they appear to. Raw results largely reflect who a school admits, particularly at selective and independent schools. Progress measures, which compare outcomes against prior attainment, are more useful. Where a school looks exceptional on results and ordinary on progress, the intake is doing most of the work.
31 October, with offers issued the following March. You apply through your home borough but may name schools in other boroughs. Independent schools run separate processes with their own deadlines, which usually fall earlier.
Ask pupils rather than staff what they would change and which subject they find hardest. Ask the relevant head of department, not the headteacher, what happens when a child falls behind or is quietly coasting. Look at displayed work in the corridors and check whether it represents a range of pupils.
A banded school tests applicants and admits a set proportion from each ability band, so that its intake spans the range. A very able child therefore competes against other very able children for a limited allocation, and a strong result does not guarantee a place. Several London schools use this, so check each one's criteria.
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