Stephen Gniel, CEO of the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority, says the 2025 NAPLAN results were broadly stable, with encouraging signs of improvement in some key areas.
With Term 3 complete, it’s been a full and rewarding school term for students, teachers and families.
For many parents and carers, myself included with three school aged children, it’s been a busy time supporting children through assessments, assignments and activities. For those with children in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 this year, the individual results from the NAPLAN assessments sat in March are starting to come through in the form of Individual Student Reports (ISRs) from their school.
These reports provide a useful summary of each student’s performance in reading, writing, conventions of language (spelling, grammar and punctuation), and numeracy. The results are reported against national proficiency standards that reflect a challenging but fair expectation of what students should know and be able to do at the time of testing. Used alongside classroom assessments and teacher feedback, the NAPLAN results can support helpful discussions about each student’s progress and where support or extension may be required.
Alongside the individual results, ACARA has now released the national results, which include national, state and territory breakdowns, as well as data grouped by student background, gender, language background other than English and location and data on participation.
The overall national picture in 2025 remains broadly consistent with the results from 2024 and 2023. Encouragingly, some of the new data reveals promising early indicators of improvement in certain areas, as well as reinforcing those areas where further attention is needed.
Across all year levels and assessment areas, about two-thirds of students achieved results at the ‘Strong’ or ‘Exceeding’ proficiency levels. This reflects a strong level of achievement for students, meeting challenging but achievable benchmarks. At the same time, around one in 10 students were identified as being in the ‘Needs additional support’ category. This reminds us that it’s vital to continue helping those students who may be finding literacy or numeracy challenging.
This year, the results show some encouraging improvements in numeracy. On average, students in Years 5, 7 and 9 performed better in this domain, particularly among the stronger students. The increase in students achieving at the ‘Exceeding’ level in numeracy may seem small when presented as a national percentage, but it represents real learning growth. This improvement translates to more than 20,000 additional students reaching that higher level of achievement compared to last year.
Demographically, trends have remained consistent. Writing performance was strong across most year levels, with girls continuing to outperform boys. Female students achieved higher average writing scores than their male peers in every year group, with a greater percentage of girls reaching the ‘Strong’ or ‘Exceeding’ levels. In contrast, boys performed better in numeracy, particularly in the higher achievement bands.
However, the results continue to highlight areas that need our collective attention, such as supporting students from our regional and remote areas, those from disadvantaged backgrounds, and Indigenous students. In good news, one of the emerging trends is an increase since 2023 in the percentage of Indigenous students achieving at the ‘Exceeding’ level in writing and numeracy in Years 7 and 9. These gains in higher-level achievement is a promising step forward, and we hope to see this progress continue in 2026 and beyond.
This year’s results also highlight ongoing equity challenges. Nationally, around one in three Indigenous students were in the ‘Needs additional support’ category in reading and numeracy, compared to fewer than one in 10 non-Indigenous students. Students in very remote areas, on average, achieved at lower proficiency levels compared with students in major cities. Similar patterns exist in numeracy and writing. These differences don’t tell the whole story, as many students and schools in remote areas are doing well, but they point to some persistent systemic challenges that need our dedicated attention and support.
Participation in NAPLAN 2025 was a clear highlight. Nationally, 93.8 per cent of students took part in the assessments, making this the highest participation rate since 2017. Participation in primary years reached 95.3 per cent, the highest primary rate in a decade, with secondary years at 92.4 per cent. This reinforces that people do really care about NAPLAN and are interested in seeing the results, particularly to see how their children are progressing against their peers across the nation.
Queensland’s participation rates were particularly strong and played a key role in lifting the national average. I’d like to give a special shout out to education authorities, teachers and students in Queensland and northern NSW who, at the same time as preparing for the NAPLAN tests, were also dealing with impact of ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred. The flexibility of the online assessment platform, combined with strong support from education departments and school communities, ensured that the affected students were still able to participate despite these challenges.
Years 5, 7 and 9 students who participated in NAPLAN 2025 are the first students to have completed two assessments since the introduction of the new proficiency levels, ‘Strong’, ‘Exceeding’ and ‘Developing’, in 2023. This information will provide an important benchmark for future years and compares how the same group of students perform over their time at school.
As we reflect on the 2025 NAPLAN results, it’s clear the overall picture is one of steady performance, with signs of growth in some key areas. What remains vital is ensuring every student, regardless of background, gender or location, has access to the right support to grow their literacy and numeracy skills.
NAPLAN continues to play a valuable role as the only national assessment that allows us to measure and compare achievement across all Australian schools. It gives families and educators a clearer understanding of where students are at and where we need to provide additional support, so all our students are developing the literacy and numeracy skills that are essential in everyday life.
To learn more about the results, visit www.acara.edu.au/naplanresults.
Need more information?
To keep up to date with ACARA’s work on the Australian Curriculum, the National Assessment Program and the reporting on schooling in Australia, follow it on Facebook or LinkedIn and subscribe to its regular ACARA Update e-newsletter at www.acara.edu.au/news-and-media/subscribe-to-acara-update.
