St Paul's School
St Paul's School admissions guide
How St Paul's 13+ entry works: registering through ISEB three years ahead, the pre-test, the January papers, and the third outcome most guides never mention.
By Richard and Freddie, who joined The Perse in 2019 and left in 2026 after Year 13 to become expert admission tutors.
Last checked 18 August 2026
Almost every school has two answers at the end of an admissions round: an offer, or a decline. St Paul's publishes three. A candidate who shows potential without being offered a place can be invited to be reassessed in Year 8.
Very little written about this school mentions it, and for a family whose son narrowly misses it is the difference between reading a December decision as the end and knowing there is a way back. This guide covers the whole 13+ process, and that third outcome in particular.
Three outcomes, not two
The School sets out all three on its selection procedure page.
| Outcome | What it means |
|---|---|
| Offer | Conditional on continued good conduct and academic progress at his current school |
| Year 8 reassessment | An invitation to reapply, with further testing in September of Year 8 and interviews in October |
| Decline | The School is unable to offer a place |
Be precise about what the middle one is. It is an invitation to be reassessed, not a promise of a place at the second attempt, and it would be wrong to sell it as one. What it is, is a door that stays open where most schools shut it, and a family who does not know it exists will not think to ask.
Registration goes through ISEB, not the School
This is the first thing families get wrong here.
St Paul's takes 13+ registrations through ISEB rather than directly. Candidates for 2029 entry register from July 2026 onwards, and there is no charge to register with ISEB. The practical consequence is that the deadline you need to watch is ISEB's rather than one published on the School's own admissions pages.
Registration opens three years before entry. That is a long lead time, and like Westminster's twelve-month window it is the kind of deadline that slips precisely because it feels distant.
The pre-test, in Year 6
The ISEB pre-test is sat in October or November of Year 6, preferably at your son's current school, or at St Paul's in November.
This is the filter. A first decision on who progresses to the January papers comes in mid-December, so by Christmas of Year 6 you know whether the rest of the process is happening.
The papers, in January
| Paper | Length |
|---|---|
| Mathematics | 75 minutes |
| English | 45 minutes |
Seventy-five minutes is long for a paper at this level, and it is the detail worth building a plan around. Accuracy and stamina are different things, and a child who is reliably accurate for forty minutes may not be at seventy. Practising to the real length matters more here than at most schools.
The interview, which is partly an assessment
The interview falls on a Saturday in late January or early February.
It is not purely conversational. The School describes assessments covering numeracy and critical analysis of source material, alongside a discussion of co-curricular interests. So a boy who prepares for it as a chat about his hobbies is preparing for half of it.
What that means in practice: he should be comfortable being handed something unfamiliar to read and asked what he makes of it, and comfortable doing arithmetic out loud without a pencil. Neither is difficult to practise, and neither is what most interview preparation covers.
Interview outcomes come at the end of February.
Every entry point
| Entry | Sat in | Joins | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 7+ | Year 2 | Year 3 at St Paul's Juniors | About 72 boys admitted at this point |
| 11+ | Year 6 | Year 7 at St Paul's Juniors | Feeds the senior school |
| 13+ | Year 6 pre-test, Year 7 papers | Year 9 | The main entry point |
| 16+ | Year 11 | Year 12 | Sixth-form entry |
The number names the assessment rather than the year group your son joins. The 13+ route is the unusual one on this table because it spans three school years: register in Year 6, sit the papers in Year 7, and start in Year 9.
How to prepare
Register through ISEB, and do it when the window opens rather than when it closes. Three years is long enough to forget.
Build for the pre-test first, because it decides whether the January papers happen at all. Then build stamina for a 75-minute maths paper, which is a different training problem from the 40-minute papers most other schools set.
For the interview, practise being given something to read cold and asked for a view on it, and practise mental arithmetic out loud. Those are the two halves families skip.
And if your son is declined but invited back for Year 8 reassessment, treat it as a real route. It is one, and we prepare candidates for it.
Our St Paul's School page has the shorter version, with all three outcomes and every date on one screen.
Common questions
- What happens if my son narrowly misses a place at St Paul's?
- There is a third outcome besides an offer and a decline. Candidates who show potential without being offered a place can be invited to be reassessed in Year 8, with further testing in September and interviews in October. It is an invitation to reapply rather than a guarantee of a place, but it is a route that stays open where most schools close.
- How do you register for St Paul's 13+?
- Through ISEB rather than through the School directly, which means the deadline is ISEB's. Candidates for 13+ 2029 entry register from July 2026 onwards, and there is no charge to register with ISEB.
- What papers does St Paul's set at 13+?
- Two, in January of Year 7: Mathematics for 75 minutes and English for 45 minutes. The 75-minute maths paper is long by the standards of this round, so stamina matters as well as accuracy.
- What is the St Paul's 13+ interview like?
- It falls on a Saturday in late January or early February, and it is partly an assessment. It covers numeracy and critical analysis of source material as well as a discussion of the candidate's co-curricular interests, so it sits somewhere between a conversation and a paper.
- When does St Paul's tell you the outcome?
- A first decision, on who goes through to the January papers, comes in mid-December. Interview outcomes follow at the end of February. Registration is three years ahead of entry, so the process runs from Year 6 through to a place in Year 9.
Sources
Facts on this page were checked against the following on 18 August 2026. Where a school does not publish a detail, the page says so rather than filling it in from elsewhere.
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