English pupils have pulled ahead of the rest of the UK in international reading, maths and science tests, new data suggests, with Scotland and Wales falling further behind.
The 2025 Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) saw reading and maths scores slump in each UK nation except England, while all four saw an uptick in science, with that rise again most notable in England.
The latest Pisa report, which is published every three years, also warned of a worldwide decline in teenagers’ reading skills.
Teenagers were losing the skills that “matter most in the age of AI”, such as being able to critically evaluate information from different sources, it said.
The share of “hasty readers”, who rush through texts to give quick, incorrect answers, has almost doubled between 2018 and 2025. The report warned the fall was greatest in those from “relatively well off” families.
Run by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the Pisa tests assess teenagers on their ability to solve problems, think critically and communicate, before asking them a wider range of questions about their education in a questionnaire.
Although the UK performed well overall, the rankings varied significantly again, with results showing England, where the curriculum is significantly different, pulling consistently ahead of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
England’s schools minister, Georgia Gould, said the government wanted to “build on” the positive results and “go further so all young people leave school with strong literacy and numeracy”.
