SOMERSET'S most oversubscribed primary schools have been revealed by new government data, with the council attributing the demand to their ‘high standards’.

The Department for Education figures show how many places schools offered compared to the number of first-preference applications they received for the 2023/24 academic year.

Nerrols Primary School in Taunton topped the list with the number of first-choice applications nearly doubling the number of offered places.

Parents who put some of Somerset's other in-demand schools as their first choice had around a 66 per cent chance of getting an offer, as shown by our searchable table.

Other schools across the county are undersubscribed, meaning they had more spaces to fill than first-choice applications from parents.

Overall, 94.5 per cent of Somerset applicants received an offer from their first-choice primary school, and 98.6 per cent got a space at one of their top three.

The Department for Education has previously released data on primary schools' performance based on pupils' standards at the end of Key Stage 2.

Some of the 20 most oversubscribed schools scored highly against the department's ‘expected standard’ metric, which considered how pupils performed based on reading and maths tests and their standard of writing.

This includes Kingsmoor (83 per cent meeting expected standard), Trull (77 per cent), North Petherton (75 per cent) and Northgate (68 per cent).

But some of the undersubscribed schools also scored well; Norton-sub-Hamdon (78 per cent) had 16 places to offer but just 12 first-preference applications.

Cheddon Fitzpaine also scored highly (71 per cent) but was able to offer 21 places compared to its 13 first-choice applications.

Somerset Council offers the free and impartial Somerset Choice Advice Service to help families with school admissions, appeals and transitions.

A council spokesperson said: “Overall, there are more than enough places in Somerset schools, and pupil numbers across the county are dropping in many places.

“However, one of the reasons schools can become oversubscribed is because standards are higher than some other choices in the locality.

“We work hard to raise the standard of education in schools and nurseries, including working with the trusts who run academy schools.

“We want every child to have access to a great local school so that parents feel they can choose their local school without any compromise.”

The Department for Education says 92.5 per cent of parents successfully got their child a space in their first-preference primary school.

This fell to 82.6 per cent for secondary schools.