What Is an ATAR and How Do Universities Use It?

For Queensland parents and students, this guide explains what an ATAR measures and how universities use it.

What does an ATAR of 80 mean?

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An ATAR of 80 means your child finished ahead of 80% of everyone their age in the state. That group includes people who left school in Year 10. It is a different thing from a mark of 80%.

ATAR stands for Australian Tertiary Admission Rank. QTAC, which calculates the ATAR in Queensland, describes it as a rank showing where a student sits against their peers in the same age group.

Why does the ATAR scale stop at 99.95?

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The scale runs from 0 to 99.95 in steps of 0.05. There is no ATAR of 100. VTAC explains that the top students cannot outperform themselves, so the top of the scale is a band they share.

Steps of 0.05 divide the scale into exactly 2,000 bands. QTAC spreads everyone in your child’s age group across those bands.

An ATAR under 30 is not shown as a number. In Queensland the results notice says 30 or less. A student who hasn’t met the requirements is shown differently, as not eligible in New South Wales. That is a different outcome from a low ATAR.

Who is your child ranked against for the ATAR?

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Your child is ranked against everyone their age in the state, a much wider group than their year level.

QTAC builds this group from population figures for people aged 16 to 20. It deliberately includes:

• students who qualify for an ATAR
• students who stayed at school but were not eligible for an ATAR
• people who finished their senior years through a vocational provider or a program such as the International Baccalaureate
• people who left school before the end of Year 12.

People at the bottom of this group never receive an ATAR, so the students who do receive one are drawn from the upper part of the scale. That is why the middle ATAR is well above 50.

In 2025 the middle ATAR was 70.75 in New South Wales and 69.48 in Victoria. QTAC does not publish a median. Its distribution table puts the middle Queensland student in the 79 band.

Is a Queensland ATAR worth the same as a New South Wales ATAR?

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Yes. Queensland’s middle ATAR looks higher because a smaller share of the age group receives one: about 30,000 of roughly 75,000, or around 40%. In New South Wales the share is closer to 57%.

Measured against the whole age group, students with an ATAR of 90 or above made up just over 10% in Queensland and just under 10% in New South Wales. An ATAR of 90 is the top 10% of the age group in both states. Every state uses the same conversion model, coordinated through ACTAC.

What are the rules for getting an ATAR in Queensland?

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QCE eligibility

Your child first needs to be on track for the QCE (Queensland Certificate of Education): 20 credits plus a literacy and a numeracy requirement.

From 2026, current Year 12 students also need to complete an academic integrity course. It is a QCAA online course of about an hour, or the school’s own version.

Five subjects

The ATAR needs Units 3 and 4 in five subjects, made up in one of three ways:

• five General subjects
• four General subjects and one Applied subject
• four General subjects and a completed vocational qualification at Certificate III or higher.

Only one Applied subject or vocational qualification can be included.

English

Your child must get a C or better in one of five English subjects. Essential English, an Applied subject, is on the list.

Passing English is a condition of eligibility. The result only counts towards the ATAR if it is one of the best five scaled results. In New South Wales and Victoria, English is always included in the calculation.

Internal and external assessment

Most General subjects are 75% school assessment and 25% external exam, and General maths and science subjects are 50/50. Applied subjects have four internal assessments and no external exam.

A vocational qualification counts as complete or not complete. Every one receives the same scaled score, whoever delivered it and whatever it was, so weigh this up before choosing a Certificate III.

The final rank

The five scaled results are added into an aggregate out of 500. QTAC tests every valid combination and uses the one that gives your child the best result. Every student is then ranked across the 2,000 bands.

In 2026, subject results are released on 16 December and ATARs at 9 am on Friday 18 December.

Does ATAR scaling measure how hard a subject is?

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Scaling adjusts marks so a result in one subject means the same as a result in another. UAC’s principle is that a student should not be advantaged or disadvantaged by their choice of subjects.

A subject’s scaling depends on how its students perform across all their other subjects. It reflects the strength of the other students in the subject. UAC and VTAC both say perceived difficulty is not the reason a subject scales up.

The differences are large. These are 2025 New South Wales mean scaled marks, where the state average is about 25.

NSW subject	Mean scaled mark
Mathematics Extension 2	43.4
English Advanced	32.8
Biology	26.2
Business Studies	23.9
English Standard	20.4
Community and Family Studies	18.5

Same subject, different students

Mathematics Advanced has a mean scaled mark of 31.9 across everyone who takes it. Among students who take it without an extension subject, the figure is 29.4. The subject and the exam are the same, and the different group of students changes the scaling.

What do admissions centres say about scaling?

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The admissions bodies warn against it.

• VTAC says choosing a subject you are not good at or not engaged in, because it might be scaled up, would be a mistake. You are more likely to get a higher result from a scaled-down subject you did well in than from a scaled-up subject you didn’t.
• UAC says you need high marks in the first place to benefit from scaling.
• TISC in Western Australia says scaling is not decided in advance.

Scaling never changes the order of students within a subject, so finishing near the bottom of a high-scaling subject does not help. In 2025, the 53 New South Wales students with an ATAR of 99.95 had studied 36 different subjects between them. Your child’s school does not appear in the calculation either.

When your child chooses senior subjects in Year 10, base the choice on what they are genuinely good at and will work hard at. Scaling rewards doing well in a subject far more than choosing cleverly.

How is the ATAR calculated in other states?

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The ATAR is national, but each state builds it differently.

• New South Wales uses the best 10 units, and the best two units of English are compulsory.
• Victoria uses English plus the next best three subjects, then 10% of the fifth and sixth.
• Western Australia uses the best four scaled subjects.
• South Australia works off 90 credits.

The ACT has no external subject exams. Students sit the ACT Scaling Test so results can be compared between colleges. It ran in August 2026 and has not been replaced.

Western Australia is the only state that adds bonuses inside the ATAR: 10% of the best language score, 10% of Mathematics Methods and 10% of Mathematics Specialist. Articles saying WA scrapped these in 2026 are wrong. TISC says the change has been postponed until further notice.

In Victoria, the VCE Vocational Major does not produce an ATAR. In 2025, nearly 10,000 students took this path, about 15% of VCE completers. Those who go on to university get in through non-ATAR entry.

What is a selection rank?

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Universities select on a selection rank, which is the ATAR plus any adjustment factors. Adjustment factors used to be called bonus points. They leave the ATAR unchanged and raise the rank a university uses for one course.

Every Queensland university caps them: UQ at 5 points in total across all its schemes, QUT at 10, Griffith at 8 and UniSQ at 10. At UQ, no amount of adjustment takes a student from an 80 to a 90.

Which ATAR cut-off should you look at?

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Three different numbers all get called the cut-off, and families often decide on the wrong one.

1. The guaranteed ATAR is published in advance and is a genuine promise. UQ’s guaranteed ATARs for 2027 include 70 for Arts, 80 for Science, 85 for Engineering, 85 for Nursing and 98 for Law. Medicine has none.
2. The lowest selection rank is a record of the previous year. UAC warns it is not the minimum ATAR needed, and plenty of students below it get offers.
3. The course profile shows the highest, lowest and median unadjusted ATAR, which universities are required to publish.

For Griffith’s Bachelor of Nursing, the advertised number is 72, the lowest selection rank including adjustments. The lowest actual ATAR that received an offer was 64.05, a gap of about 8 points.

Prerequisites

Prerequisites apply at any ATAR. UQ’s engineering degree requires General English, Mathematical Methods, and Chemistry or Physics, each at C. A student with an ATAR of 99 and no Mathematical Methods is not eligible.

Guarantees are changing

The University of Melbourne has removed its ATAR guarantees for 2027, except for equity applicants. UQ, QUT and Griffith are still guaranteeing entry for 2027, and UQ has said it would have to reconsider under tighter enrolment settings. If your child is relying on a guarantee, check it in the year they apply.

How much does the ATAR decide about getting into university?

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A December 2025 Mitchell Institute report from Victoria University found that, of school leavers starting a bachelor degree, 63% got in on ATAR alone, 7% on ATAR plus something else and 30% on criteria that did not involve the ATAR. Its ATAR-alone figure already includes students who received adjustment factors.

School leavers are also only about half of new bachelor students.

The ATAR does predict results. UAC’s research found first-year failure rates of about 8% for ATARs in the 90s, 29% for the 70s and around 52% for the 50s. That predictive power drops sharply below 80, and the ATAR cannot account for motivation, maturity or support. It predicts groups well and individuals badly.

Is the ATAR being scrapped?

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No government has proposed scrapping the ATAR. The new Australian Tertiary Education Commission has no remit over admissions. The Universities Accord did not recommend abolishing it, and the Mitchell Institute report recommends clearer information for families.

What has changed is that fewer students need one, and universities have been tightening entry.

Related resources

• 9 minVideoDoes Year 11 Count Towards the ATAR in Queensland?
• 11 minVideoHow Is the ATAR Calculated in Queensland?
• 6 minVideoHow ATAR Scaling Works in Queensland and What It Means for Subject Choices