Named-area catchments
Some schools give priority to named wards, parishes or districts. The boundary is those real areas, not a radius.
Insight · Understanding catchments
What a grammar catchment actually is, and why it gets complicated.
It’s the geography a grammar school’s admissions are decided on, and where you live can decide whether your child is eligible. There are two kinds, and most catchment websites get them wrong by drawing a simple circle. Here’s what a catchment really is, how all 163 grammar schools in England decide who gets a place, and what those layers look like at one school.
The headline
What parents should know.
2 kinds
A catchment is either a named area (wards, parishes or districts), or a distance area, out to the furthest distance offered a place that year.
97 of 163
have a defined priority area. Living there gives you priority.
3 layers
decide a place: the catchment boundary, then the priority criteria, then the tie-break conditions. The order matters.
01 · The basics
What is a grammar school catchment area?
It’s the geography a grammar school’s admissions are decided on, and where you live can decide whether your child is eligible. There are two kinds, and most catchment websites get them wrong by drawing a simple circle.
Distance catchments
Others simply admit the children who live closest, out to the furthest distance offered a place that year.
Real boundaries, not estimates
Two homes the same distance from a school can fall on opposite sides of the line. GrammarBound maps the actual boundary.
Why circles mislead. A radius is symmetrical and a statutory boundary almost never is. Where a school admits from named areas, a home two miles away can sit outside the catchment while one five miles away sits inside it. And where a school admits by distance, last year’s furthest offer is a result rather than a rule. It moves every round with the size and shape of the applicant pool.
Every catchment is built from the school’s published admissions policy, then checked by hand.
- 163 grammar schools in England
- Mapped from official policies
- Human-verified
Named areas come from Office for National Statistics boundary data; distances from the latest admissions round; school details are cross-checked against Department for Education and Ofsted data. Search your postcode below, or explore the full grammar schools map of England.
02 · By the numbers
England’s 163 grammar schools, broken down.
No two admissions systems are quite alike. Here’s how every grammar school decides who gets a place, and how much where you live really matters.
How each school decides who gets in
163
schools in total
Defined priority area
97
have a defined priority area. Living there gives you priority
Nearest by distance
33
admit the nearest by distance, with no fixed area
Test score alone
33
admit on test score alone: location is irrelevant
The 97 defined areas, by how the boundary is drawn:
postcode districts
bespoke designated areas
a fixed-mile radius
a mix of areas
civil parishes
electoral wards
18
did not fill their places last round, so any child who passes the test can attend, wherever you live.
See how every school performs in the grammar school rankings league table: sortable by GCSE and A-level results, university destinations and Ofsted.
03 · How places are ranked
The five ranking conditions.
Passing the test only gets your child into the queue. When more children qualify than there are places, the school ranks them, and the rule it uses is the single biggest thing your address does or doesn’t change. There are five in use across England.
Test score only
The highest scorers in the whole region get in: the “super-selective” model. Where you live has no bearing at all.
Score, then distance
Ranked by score, with distance used only as a final separator between children on the same mark.
Area, then score
A defined catchment area first, then the top scorers inside it. Being in the area is what puts you in the running.
Area, then distance
A defined area first, then the nearest qualifying children inside it, so the address matters both ways.
Distance only
No area, no ranking by ability: just the nearest qualifying children, out to the furthest offer that year.
Every school states its rule in its determined admission arrangements, and applies it after the statutory priority criteria: looked-after children first, by law. GrammarBound records which of the five each of the 163 schools uses.
04 · What else counts
Beyond the catchment: who else gets priority.
Most grammar schools rank applicants on more than geography. Here’s how common each extra priority is across all 163.
Pupil Premium92%
Sibling52%
Staff child42%
Medical / social23%
Service (forces)17%
Feeder school6%
Faith4%
Looked-after and previously looked-after children come first at every school, by law. Percentages overlap: most schools use several of these. A handful count Pupil Premium as a tie-breaker rather than a named criterion. Source: each school’s published admissions policy.
05 · Worked example
06 · Your address
How to actually use this.
The only numbers that matter are the ones for your address. Which named areas you fall inside, how far you are from each school, which pool that puts you in, and which tie-break each school applies.
Drop in a postcode and GrammarBound checks it against the determined arrangements of all 163 English grammar schools, street by street.
How many grammars can your postcode reach?
See every catchment you fall inside, your distance to each school and the criteria each one uses.
Wondering where the most test systems overlap? See where grammar test systems stack.
Method & sources
How we did this.
- Coverage. Every grammar school’s published catchment (named-area polygons, or distance areas drawn from the latest cut-off) as mapped on GrammarBound. The counts by catchment type come from the same dataset.
- Sources. Determined admission arrangements published by each school or local authority; ONS boundary data for wards and parishes; Department for Education and Ofsted data for school detail. Every boundary is audited by hand against the source PDF.
- Caveats. Distance cut-offs are last year’s result rather than a rule, and move each round; the priority-criteria shares overlap, because most schools use several. Always confirm the current arrangements with the school or local authority before applying.