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Results and higher education entry for 2025 in Scotland
More Scottish 18 year olds will start university in 2025 than ever before, with nearly 80 per cent (16,490) placed at their first or insurance choice of course. Just 7.91 per cent (1,640) are still holding an offer on the morning of SQA results day.
There's also been a small rise in the number of international students studying in Scotland, from 3,480 last year to 3,660 this cycle.
The entry rate for the SIMD quintile 1 (most deprived) 18 year old population is 16 per cent, the highest on record – this will improve as more people accept places either via existing offers or clearing.
The majority of Scottish young people attend universities in Scotland – the vagaries of the UCAS tariff mean that Scotland does not have a “low tariff” provider of its own. The highest number (10,060) of 18 year olds on record have accepted a place at a high tariff provider. As always, UCAS data for Scotland does not include entry to higher education delivered in further education via FE colleges.
The Scottish Qualifications Authority has published detailed results for Higher and Advanced Higher candidates, noting that there were more than 200,000 Higher entries this year, with 75.9 per cent of entries leading to grades A to C, and 30.8 leading to an A. There were 28,610 Advanced Entries, with 76.7 per cent landing grades A to C and 31.4 per cent with an A.
I’ve put together a chart to help you compare grades with previous years for individual subjects. For Highers you can see a notable decline in the proportion of A grades in English over last year, alongside an increase in A grades for history.
Do note that due to storm disruption, some candidates have yet to receive their results by post: they are urged to contact SQA. This, of course, is the last results day for the SQA: a new body, Qualifications Scotland, will take over from next year.