Secondary school admissions in Trafford

All Trafford secondary schools take part in a single, coordinated admissions round for Year 7 entry, run by Trafford Council on behalf of every school in the borough – including academies, faith schools and grammar schools.

Parents submit one common application form listing up to five preferred schools, in order of preference. Each school then ranks all applicants against its own published oversubscription criteria, and the council coordinates the results so that every child is offered a single place at the highest-preference school where a place is available to them.

Grammar schools require an additional step: children must sit the 11+ entrance test earlier in the process, and register for it separately from the main common application form – see our Grammar Admissions guide.

In 2026, Trafford's 19 secondary schools allocated a combined 3,625 Year 7 places against a total Published Admission Number of 3,455. 15 schools were oversubscribed, while 4 (Broadoak, Lostock High, St Antony's and Wellacre) admitted all applicants. 12 schools used distance as a tie-break.

Places allocated reflects the number of places actually offered in the admissions round, not the number of applications received. The platform does not store applications received or first-preference data.

Registration for the Trafford Consortium grammar school 11+ test closed at 12 noon on 19 June 2026, and the test was sat on 14 September 2026. Loreto Grammar and St Ambrose College ran a separate test on 18 September 2026.

Three terms come up repeatedly in secondary admissions outcomes. Understanding what each one means will help you read the data on this page and on individual school profiles:

Published Admission Number (PAN) is the number of places a school must offer in its normal Year 7 admissions round. It is set in advance by the admissions authority and does not change based on how many applications the school receives.

Allocation category describes how far down the school's oversubscription criteria places were allocated. If a school reached "Category 4", everyone in categories 1–3 was offered a place and only some (or all) of category 4 received offers. A school that offered places to all applicants simply shows "All" rather than a category number.

Furthest distance offered is the straight-line distance from the school at which the furthest successful applicant lived. This is only recorded when a school was oversubscribed and used distance as a tie-break — it is not the same as a catchment area, and it is not a guarantee that living within that distance will secure a place in a future year. See our Catchment Areas and Admission Distances guide for a fuller explanation.

The number of places allocated shown on this page reflects the number of places actually offered in the admissions round — not the number of applications the school received. The platform does not store applications received, first-preference counts or waiting-list numbers.

Explore how places were allocated at each Trafford secondary school. Use the year selector to compare outcomes from 2022 to 2026.

When a school receives more applications than it has places, it works down its published oversubscription criteria until its places are filled. For most Trafford community and academy secondary schools, places are typically offered in this order:

1. 1Looked after and previously looked after children
2. 2Children with a sibling already at the school
3. 3Children living in the school's catchment area, where one applies
4. 4Children with an exceptional medical or social need
5. 5Children living nearest to the school (straight-line distance)

Faith schools may prioritise practising members of their faith, and grammar schools instead rank applicants by 11+ test performance. Your ranked preferences are never seen by schools when they rank applicants – each school considers every application on its own merits, and the council matches preferences to available places afterwards. Exact criteria vary by school – always check the individual school's profile and admission policy.

Before you finalise your preferences, look beyond distance and reputation: check each school's latest Ofsted judgement, its actual admissions outcomes in recent years, and whether it suits your child academically and pastorally. Visiting on an open day and reading a school's full profile — including its historical admissions data — will tell you far more than distance alone about your realistic chances of a place.

For a borough-wide view across all 79 schools with admissions outcomes, explore the full Admissions Intelligence Report.