Changes to Ofsted inspections of Early Years settings 2025

Inspections of Early Years settings from November, 2025

In their accompanying guidance, Ofsted state that, "The foundations of our renewed inspections are:

• Children and pupils first – high expectations with a focus on outcomes and experiences.
• The care and well-being of those we inspect – through collaborative working with settings and building positive relationships with leaders and staff.
• A provider’s unique context – evidence is evaluated in the light of each setting’s strengths, challenges and priorities for improvement, and how well it identifies and meets the needs of significant groups of children.
• The lens of the toolkit – the toolkit sets out the grading standards, supporting shared professional dialogue.
• Quality and impact – evidence-based decisions focus on the quality and the impact of leaders’ choices and actions on children, reflected in the grading standards."

We heard from ‍Becky Cook, Executive Headteacher, Waterton Pre-Schools, that the new inspection style should feel more collaborative. Becky and her team took part in one of the early thematic inspections, during the consultation process for the new framekwiork

“Right from the phone call, it felt different in terms of the information they gathered,” explains Becky, “The inspector really took the time to understand the context of the setting. Usually, it's more the practical things: your numbers, the people, your qualifications, the welfare requirements, but they wanted to talk about our curriculum offer, what's unique about us, our ethos, and what's strong in the setting. It was a very much a two-way discussion.”

What are Ofsted's new grades for Early Years settings?

Instead of the headline, one-word grade for overall effectiveness of a provision, Ofsted will now award grades across areas of the provision, to form the end "Report Card". The new possible grading settings will be evaluated as are:

• Exceptional
• Strong standard
• Expected standard
• Needs attention
• Urgent improvement

Safeguarding will be judged as 'met' or 'not met'.

Which areas of Early Years provision will Ofsted inspect?

As stated in the new Early Years Inspection Toolkits, Early Years settings will be graded across the following areas:

• Inclusion
• Curriculum and teaching
• Achievement  
• Behaviour, attitudes, and establishing routines
• Children’s welfare and well-being
• Leadership and governance, including how well providers support and promote leader and staff well-being.

Inspectors are looking to understand how well children:

• Achieve – develop the knowledge, skills and confidence they need
• Belong – feel safe, welcomed and valued
• Thrive – benefit from the right systems, processes and levels of oversight so that they are kept safe and are able to flourish, whatever their background or individual needs

How will Ofsted inspectors gather evidence in Early Years settings?

Let's see what the new Early Years Toolkit says...

• Inspectors collect first-hand evidence of how the setting typically operates, mainly through professional conversations and observing, often alongside leaders, the day-to-day work of the setting.
• Inspectors are required to view specific documentation. This should be limited to documents relating to the setting’s statutory requirements or documents it produces as part of its normal business processes.
• Inspectors do not need information to be presented in any specific format, as long as it is easily accessible. We do not need leaders to produce documents specifically for an Ofsted inspection of their setting. This would create unnecessary workload.
• Inspectors will be proportionate in weighing up the evidence they gather, balancing the extent of any strengths or areas for development in each of the evaluation areas. This will support grading and allow specific features of practice, whether strengths or areas for development, to be reported clearly.

“The team felt like they'd been asked the right questions about early years and their practice, but it was a discussion rather than questioning,” explains Becky, “Each member of staff that they approached got the opportunity to talk about what they were doing and the impact on the children.”

Each area of provision described in the Early Years Toolkit now contains a "Gathering evidence about..." section to show settings exactly what inspectors will be looking for.

When will Ofsted inspect Early Years settings?

According to the guidance, 'Early years inspection information', settings registered on the Early Years Register will be inspected once every 4 years, if all evaluation areas are graded ‘expected standard’ or above. However, settings can expect to receive a visit from Ofsted within 12 months,  if any evaluation area is graded as ‘needs attention’, or 6 months if any evaluation area is graded as ‘urgent improvement’. The guidance also states that, "We reserve the right to inspect without notice, where necessary."