England's Pupils Now Outread France, Finland as Global Reading Slump Deepens

England's pupils have held their ground in reading as scores slide across much of the developed world, scoring 497 in PISA 2025 and moving ahead of Finland and well clear of France's 456.

The result leaves England broadly level with pupils in the United States and other high-performing systems at a time when global reading performance is in marked decline.

The PISA 2025 results show how widespread that decline has been. Across OECD countries, the average reading score fell 14 points between 2022 and 2025, from 477 to 463. Thirty-three of the 41 highest-performing education systems recorded a significant drop.

Andreas Schleicher, the OECD's director of education and skills, said teenagers' ability to read complex texts had fallen by the equivalent of two school years over the past decade. He described reading as the 'mother of all skills'.

England's Maintains Stable Reading Scores

England's 497 reading score in PISA 2025 was broadly unchanged from previous years, when it scored 496 in 2022, 505 in 2018 and 500 in 2015. That stability is notable given the sharp falls recorded elsewhere. All five of England's main comparator countries, Australia, Canada, Estonia, Ireland and Singapore, saw significant declines between 2022 and 2025.

England also moved ahead of Finland, which scored 474. Its result was statistically similar to those of the United States, Ireland, Estonia and New Zealand.

Only three participating education systems performed significantly better than England: Singapore, with 535, B-S-J-Z (China), with 527, and Taiwan, with 508. B-S-J-Z refers to Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, the four Chinese provinces and municipalities included in the PISA assessment.

Hasty Reading, AI Impacts Comprehension

The OECD also found changes in how teenagers approach reading. Between 2018 and 2025, the share of pupils classed as 'hasty readers' almost doubled. These students tend to move quickly through texts and give incorrect answers.

The PISA report also linked leisure use of digital devices at school with substantially worse learning outcomes.

It said long-form reading remains important because it helps pupils follow and retain complex information over longer periods.

The OECD has also warned that heavy reliance on AI can lead to 'cognitive off-loading', where pupils get answers without doing the research and retrieval needed to learn for themselves.

The report stresses the importance of being able to find information from different sources, judge whether it is reliable and bring it together.

The OECD warns that using AI mainly to provide quick answers could reduce the effortful learning needed to develop those skills. However, the OECD also notes that evidence on the wider impact of AI in education is still limited.

England's Stability Across the UK

England's reading score was broadly unchanged over the longer term, with pupils scoring 497 in 2025 compared with 500 in 2015. Scotland scored 488 in 2025, down from 504 in 2018 and 526 in 2000. Northern Ireland scored 482, compared with 497 in 2015 and 501 in 2018.

Wales also continued to record lower scores, falling from 477 in 2015 and 483 in 2018 to 466 in 2022 and 459 in 2025. OECD education director Andreas Schleicher has pointed to England's consistent education policies when discussing the differences in performance between the UK nations.

In England, female readers scored 503 in reading in 2025, compared with 492 for male readers. The 11-point difference was smaller than the 23-point gap recorded in 2015. Among lower-performing pupils, female readers scored 379 at the 10th percentile, compared with 355 for male readers.

At the 90th percentile, there was no significant difference, with female readers scoring 626 and male readers 621.