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📚 Lower secondary school starting age

Lower secondary school starting age is the age at which students would enter lower secondary education, assuming they had started at the official entrance age for the lowest level of education, had studied full-time throughout and had progressed through the system without repeating or skipping a grade.

📅 2025📏 years209 entries
Every dot is one country, placed by its value (years); the vertical bar marks each row’s median. Rows are world regions, ordered by their median. Hover a dot for its name.
1
🇳🇦Namibia
14 years
2
🇿🇦South Africa
14 years
3
🇹🇿Tanzania
14 years
4
🇿🇲Zambia
14 years
5
🇦🇫Afghanistan
13 years
6
🇧🇼Botswana
13 years
7
🇩🇰Denmark
13 years
8
🇸🇻El Salvador
13 years
9
🇬🇶Equatorial Guinea
13 years
10
🇪🇪Estonia
13 years
11
🇸🇿Eswatini
13 years
12
🇪🇹Ethiopia
13 years
13
🇫🇮Finland
13 years
14
🇬🇲Gambia
13 years
15
🇬🇹Guatemala
13 years
16
🇬🇳Guinea
13 years
17
🇮🇸Iceland
13 years
18
🇮🇩Indonesia
13 years
19
🇮🇪Ireland
13 years
20
🇱🇻Latvia
13 years
21
🇱🇸Lesotho
13 years
22
🇲🇱Mali
13 years
23
🇲🇿Mozambique
13 years
24
🇳🇪Niger
13 years
25
🇳🇴Norway
13 years
26
🇵🇬Papua New Guinea
13 years
27
🇸🇪Sweden
13 years
28
🇺🇬Uganda
13 years
29
🇿🇼Zimbabwe
13 years
30
🇦🇸American Samoa
12 years
31
🇦🇩Andorra
12 years
32
🇦🇴Angola
12 years
33
🇦🇬Antigua and Barbuda
12 years
34
🇦🇷Argentina
12 years
35
🇦🇼Aruba
12 years
36
🇦🇺Australia
12 years
37
🇧🇭Bahrain
12 years
38
🇧🇪Belgium
12 years
39
🇧🇯Benin
12 years
40
🇧🇹Bhutan
12 years
41
🇧🇴Bolivia
12 years
42
🇻🇬British Virgin Islands
12 years
43
🇧🇳Brunei
12 years
44
🇧🇫Burkina Faso
12 years
45
🇧🇮Burundi
12 years
46
🇰🇭Cambodia
12 years
47
🇨🇲Cameroon
12 years
48
🇨🇦Canada
12 years
49
🇨🇻Cape Verde
12 years
50
🇨🇫Central African Republic
12 years

Highlights

As of 2025, Namibia ranks first with 14 years, followed by South Africa (14 years) and Tanzania (14 years).

The top two are virtually level: Namibia and South Africa differ by less than 1%.

Across 209 countries and territories, values run from 14 years (Namibia) to 10 years (United Arab Emirates), with a median of 12 years.

By region, the top 10 is made up of 6 from Africa, 2 from Europe, 1 from the Americas and 1 from Asia.

Source: World Bank Open Data — Lower secondary school starting age (years), 2025. Unit: years.

Source: World Bank Open Data — Lower secondary school starting age (years) · CC BY 4.0 · fetched Oct 16, 2026