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UK 11+ Grammar Schools by Region: Zone & Exam Board Guide (2026)

"What exam board does my child actually sit?" sounds like a simple question, and for most families it isn't answered anywhere near as clearly as it should be. The honest answer is: it depends entirely on which school or testing zone you're in, and that changes region by region, sometimes even school by school within the same county.

This guide pulls together the zones, consortia and individual schools we track inside SharpY Mind — the same data that powers our exam board calculator — organised by region so you can find your area and see, at a glance, which board or format applies. It's a starting point for research, not a replacement for checking directly with your target school.

London: Sutton zone (Sutton SET)

The five Sutton zone grammar schools share a single test, the Sutton SET, run by the schools themselves rather than a national exam board. See our full Sutton Zone guide for Stage 1/Stage 2 detail.

Sitting the SET itself has no catchment restriction — any eligible Year 6 child can take it. What varies is what happens after a child passes: Sutton Grammar's own admissions page confirms that meeting the required standard in testing "does not guarantee the offer of a place," since places are then ranked and allocated competitively where the school is oversubscribed — see Sutton Grammar School's own admissions page for the current detail. Exact priority categories differ by school, so check the specific school's published policy rather than assuming one school's rules apply to another in the same zone.

London & South East: bespoke superselectives

These schools are highly selective and set their own paper rather than using GL, CSSE or ISEB directly — often harder and less predictable than a standard regional 11+.

Essex: CSSE (Consortium of Selective Schools in Essex)

Essex runs its own written-response test rather than GL or CEM. See our full CSSE guide for what that format involves, the complete Essex 11 plus parent guide for the 2027-entry dates and application steps, and CSSE pass marks & scores for the standardised score each school needs.

Kent Test area — around 30 grammar schools, almost all on one test

Kent has one of the largest selective systems in England — well over 30 grammar schools, far more than most counties. The good news is that this makes Kent simpler than it looks: Kent County Council confirms that all Kent state grammar schools sit the same Kent Test, administered by GL Assessment, so the exam-board answer is consistent across nearly the entire county.

The table below is a sample of named Kent grammar schools SharpY Mind tracks individually — not the full list. For the complete, current list and each school's own admissions criteria, see Kent County Council's official admissions criteria page, and our dedicated Kent Test parent guide for dates, papers and the suitability threshold. Neighbouring Medway is a separate authority with its own Medway Test.

Buckinghamshire — 13 grammar schools, one shared test

The Buckinghamshire Grammar Schools (TBGS) consortium covers 13 grammar schools across the county, all using the Buckinghamshire Secondary Transfer Test (GL Assessment-based). Buckinghamshire Council also runs a Priority Area Checker tool so families can look up how catchment affects a specific school. See Buckinghamshire Council's official grammar schools page for the full list and current criteria.

Trafford, Greater Manchester (GL Assessment)

The named schools below are the ones SharpY Mind tracks individually — not necessarily every school in the area. Any other Trafford grammar school follows the same GL-based format unless it states otherwise.

Wirral, Merseyside (Quest Assessments)

The non-Catholic Wirral grammar schools use Quest Assessments rather than GL — a different exam board covering English, Maths, Verbal and Non-Verbal Reasoning, plus a puzzles/problem-solving section.

Gloucestershire (GL Assessment)

The named schools below are the ones SharpY Mind tracks individually — not necessarily every school in the area. All seven Gloucestershire grammars share one GL-format test; see our Gloucestershire 11+ guide for the dates, the two papers and how each school sets its threshold.

West Midlands: Birmingham & Warwickshire (GL Assessment)

Two separate consortia, both now on GL Assessment. The King Edward VI Foundation runs one free entrance test for eight grammar schools across Birmingham and Sutton Coldfield — see our Birmingham 11+ guide. Warwickshire's five grammar schools (around Rugby and Stratford-upon-Avon) share a county-council test that moved from CEM to GL for 2023 entry — see our Warwickshire 11+ guide.

Lincolnshire (GL Assessment)

Lincolnshire has more grammar schools than any other county — 15, all sharing one Consortium test of verbal reasoning and non-verbal reasoning, with a qualifying score of 220. Each school then sets its own catchment. See our full Lincolnshire 11+ guide, or use the exam board calculator.

Torbay, Devon (GL Assessment)

Covers Torquay Boys' Grammar School, Torquay Girls' Grammar School and Churston Ferrers Grammar School — all sitting a GL-based test as part of the Torbay area's shared 11+ arrangement.

Berkshire: the Slough Consortium (GL Assessment)

Herschel, Langley, St Bernard's Catholic and Upton Court share one GL-based Consortium test. A standardised score of 111 makes a child eligible, but Herschel ranks children inside a four-mile catchment ahead of everyone else before filling remaining places on score alone. Reading School and Kendrick run separately. Full detail in our Slough and Berkshire 11+ guide.

London: Bexley (Bexley Selection Test)

Beths, Bexley Grammar, Chislehurst & Sidcup and Townley use the Council-run Bexley Selection Test, weighted 50% verbal ability, 25% numerical and 25% non-verbal. There is no pass mark published in advance, and distance decides most offers once the selective standard is met. See the Bexley Selection Test guide.

London: Redbridge (Ilford County & Woodford County)

Two schools, one test of English with verbal reasoning and maths with non-verbal reasoning — and a common catchment area that in practice decides everything, since out-of-catchment applicants rank below every qualifying in-catchment child. See the Redbridge 11+ guide.

Yorkshire and the North (FSCE and GL)

Yorkshire is not a reasoning region. Heckmondwike, Crossley Heath, North Halifax, Skipton Girls' and Ermysted's use FSCE papers in English, maths and creative writing, while Ripon Grammar uses GL and changed its format from September 2026. Deadlines are set school by school. See the Yorkshire grammar schools guide.

Northern Ireland (SEAG)

Northern Ireland runs an entirely separate system. The single SEAG Entrance Assessment replaced the former AQE and PPTC dual tests, so children now sit one assessment across two November papers covering English and maths. There is no local-authority catchment framework — each school publishes its own criteria. See the Northern Ireland transfer test guide.

Independent schools nationally (ISEB Pre-Test)

Many major independent day and boarding schools use the ISEB Pre-Test — an adaptive, computer-based assessment covering English, Maths, Verbal and Non-Verbal Reasoning — rather than a paper-based regional test. See our full ISEB Common Pre-Test parent guide for the sections, timings, scoring and how the sat-once, shared-result model works.

This is a small sample of ISEB-using schools, not an exhaustive list — most major independent schools with a Year 7 entry point use some form of computer-adaptive pre-testing. Confirm directly with any specific school not listed here.

How proximity and priority rules actually work

"Do we live close enough?" is a different question from "which exam board do they use?" — and it's worth understanding why. Across the areas researched for this guide, one thing held consistently true: sitting the test itself is rarely restricted by where you live — Sutton's SET and the Kent Test are both open to any eligible child regardless of address. What decides an actual offered place, if a school is oversubscribed, varies genuinely by area: Kent and Buckinghamshire both use defined catchment/priority-area concepts (with Buckinghamshire providing an online Priority Area Checker), while Sutton Grammar's own admissions page describes competitive ranking of test results without specifying distance as a named factor. In every case, a published, school-specific policy — not a generic national rule — is what actually decides it.

Three worked examples, from opposite ends of the spectrum. In Redbridge, catchment status sorts the queue before score is considered at all, and out-of-catchment applicants have in practice not been offered places. In Bexley, children qualify on score and are then separated almost entirely by home-to-school distance. In Slough, catchment children rank first but the remaining places go on pure exam rank — so a high enough score can still win a place from outside. Same country, three completely different strategies.

This varies enough by school and by local authority that a single set of "proximity rules" doesn't exist nationally. The reliable approach is to go to the specific authority or school's own published criteria:

For any area not listed above — Trafford, Gloucestershire, Torbay, Wirral, Lincolnshire, or a specific independent school — search "[council or school name] admissions criteria" and look for the current admissions year's published policy, or contact the admissions team directly. This is exactly the kind of detail that changes yearly and shouldn't be taken from an older guide, including this one.

What this means for your preparation

If your region uses GL Assessment (the most common format by a clear margin), prepare for multiple-choice papers across Maths, English, and usually Verbal and Non-Verbal Reasoning.

If your school uses CSSE, Sutton SET, or a bespoke paper, don't assume standard GL-style multiple-choice practice transfers directly — written-response formats and school-specific papers reward different skills. See the linked guides above for each.

If your school uses ISEB Pre-Test, remember it's adaptive and computer-based — the pacing and format differ meaningfully from a fixed paper booklet.

Mistakes to avoid

• Assuming a whole county has exactly the schools listed here — Kent alone has around 30 grammar schools; this guide names a sample, not the full list.
• Treating home-to-school distance as a hard cut-off rather than one factor in a school's wider priority order.
• Relying on an older sibling's experience without checking the current admissions year — formats and criteria do change.
• Buying exam-board-specific materials before confirming which board your actual target school uses.
• Assuming a dual-pathway school like Weald of Kent has only one exam board, when it actually accepts either of two.

Frequently asked questions

Related SharpY Mind resources

• 📘 The 11+ Guide — every guide we have, mapped
• Search any school instantly →
• BCP 11+: One Test, Four Schools, No NVR
• Sutton Zone: The Complete 11+ Guide
• CSSE 11+ Exam Guide
• 11 Plus in Essex: The Complete CSSE Parent Guide
• Kent 11+: The Kent Test Parent Guide
• Medway 11+: The Medway Test Guide
• Birmingham 11+: The King Edward VI Test Guide
• Warwickshire 11+: The Grammar Schools Guide
• Gloucestershire 11+: The Grammar Schools Guide
• Wirral 11+: The Quest Assessments Guide
• Super-Selective Grammar Schools: The Hardest 11+
• The ISEB Common Pre-Test: A Parent's Guide
• 11+ Dates 2026: Every Area's Deadline for 2027 Entry
• Moving House for a Grammar School Place: What Counts
• CEM vs GL Assessment: Why It Changed
• How Many Children Compete Per Place?
• The 11+ Pass Rate: What the National Numbers Mean
• The Real Cost of the 11+ in 2026