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Gross enrolment ratio in primary education

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Global Education

What you should know about this indicator

  • Not all students enroll in school at the same age. This indicator shows how many students are attending a certain level of education, regardless of whether they are considered to be within the expected age range for that level.
  • It captures the total number of students enrolled at a specific education level, expressed as a percentage of the population in the official age group for that level.
  • For example, if upper secondary school is designed for ages 15 to 17, the gross enrolment ratio compares total enrolment at that level to the population of 15- to 17-year-olds.
  • A high value means many people are accessing education at that level, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that they are in the appropriate grade for their age.
  • The gross enrolment ratio includes students who are younger or older than expected due to late entry, early entry, or grade repetition.
  • The data comes from administrative records, such as school enrolment reports, and from population estimates, usually provided by UN or national sources.
  • A gross enrolment ratio close to or above 100% can indicate strong system capacity, but it doesn’t tell us whether every school-age child is enrolled.
  • This indicator is best understood when used together with the net enrolment rate, which focuses on age-appropriate participation.
  • One limitation is that the gross enrolment ratio can exceed 100%, which may require further data to understand the reasons — such as whether students are repeating grades or starting school late.

Total enrollment in primary education, regardless of age, expressed as a percentage of the population of official primary education age. GER can exceed 100% due to the inclusion of over-aged and under-aged students because of early or late school entrance and grade repetition.

Gross enrolment ratio in primary education
Number of children of any age group who are enrolled in education expressed as a percentage of the total population of the official primary school age.
Source
UNESCO Institute for Statistics (2025) – processed by Our World in Data
Last updated
May 1, 2025
Next expected update
May 2026
Date range
1970–2024
Unit
%

Explore charts that include this data

Primary, secondary and tertiary education enrolment and completion rates

Sources and processing

This data is based on the following sources

The UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) is the official and trusted source of internationally-comparable data on education, science, culture and communication. As the official statistical agency of UNESCO, the UIS produces a wide range of state-of-the-art databases to fuel the policies and investments needed to transform lives and propel the world towards its development goals. The UIS provides free access to data for all UNESCO countries and regional groupings from 1970 to the most recent year available.

Retrieved on
May 1, 2025
Retrieved from
https://databrowser.uis.unesco.org/resources/bulk
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS), Education, https://uis.unesco.org/bdds, 2025

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All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.

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  • All data produced by third-party providers and made available by Our World in Data are subject to the license terms from the original providers. Our work would not be possible without the data providers we rely on, so we ask you to always cite them appropriately (see below). This is crucial to allow data providers to continue doing their work, enhancing, maintaining and updating valuable data.
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Citations

How to cite this page

To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Gross enrolment ratio in primary education”, part of the following publication: Hannah Ritchie, Veronika Samborska, Natasha Ahuja, Esteban Ortiz-Ospina, and Max Roser (2023) - “Global Education”. Data adapted from UNESCO Institute for Statistics. Retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gross-enrollment-ratio-in-primary-education [online resource]
How to cite this data

In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

UNESCO Institute for Statistics (2025) – processed by Our World in Data

Full citation

UNESCO Institute for Statistics (2025) – processed by Our World in Data. “Gross enrolment ratio in primary education” [dataset]. UNESCO Institute for Statistics, “UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) - Education” [original data]. Retrieved May 24, 2025 from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gross-enrollment-ratio-in-primary-education