Estimate of additional children claiming Free School Meals following expansion of eligibility
Reporting year 2026

The data provides estimates of the number of children aged 4-15 in England living in a household in receipt of Universal Credit. This is broken down by age groups and includes estimates of pupils currently taking up Free School Meals and Universal Infant Free School Meals.

Data files

Free School Meal eligibility estimates

Filename: fsm_elig_estimates.csv
Geographic levels: National
Time period: 2023/24 to 2029/30
Content summary: Estimates of the number of children aged 4-15 in England living in a household in receipt of Universal Credit broken down by age groups.

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable name                    |  Variable description
-------------------------------  |  -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
actual_fsm_elig                  |  Actual number of pupils claiming a free meal
additional_claiming_free_meal    |  Additional pupils claiming a free meal
children_in_uc_households_4_6    |  Children in households receiving Universal Credit (Aged 4-6)
children_in_uc_households_7_15   |  Children in households receiving Universal Credit (Aged 7-15)
children_in_uc_households_total  |  Children in households receiving Universal Credit (Aged 4-15)
children_taking_fsm              |  Children taking up Free School Meal
uifsm_discounting_fsm            |  Pupils estimated to be receiving Universal Infant Free School Meals, discounting those eligible for FSM
