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The right school for your child is in here.

27,297 government and private schools, with real NECTA exam results behind them. No adverts, no paid placements, no rankings for sale.

Level

O-level stream

O-level stream

Region

Ownership

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Schools near meTop schools 2025Free government gemsGirls-only schoolsBoys-only schoolsSeminaries

4,905

government secondary schools, free of tuition

1,364

private secondary schools

73%

of secondary schools are free government schools

The remaining 496 secondary centres are not private. They appear in NECTA's results with no TAMISEMI census record, and 298 of them are in Zanzibar, which the mainland census does not survey, so counting them as private would overstate private secondary schools by more than a third. Primary: 18,054 government and 2,478 private, of 20,532 schools.

The strongest schools right now

See all 100 →
01St. Francis GirlsMbeya · Private · 91 candidatesGPA 1.0402KemebosKagera · Private · 67 candidatesGPA 1.0703AhavaKigoma · Private · 40 candidatesGPA 1.0704Tengeru BoysArusha · Private · 143 candidatesGPA 1.1005MzumbeMorogoro · Government · 94 candidatesGPA 1.14FREE · GOVT06AhmesPwani · Private · 78 candidatesGPA 1.14

Ranked on mean CSEE 2025 GPA, lower being better, among schools that presented at least 40 candidates, NECTA's own category threshold. Without it a three-candidate centre on a perfect score outranks Ilboru.

The numbers behind the choice

Full State of Schools →

Boys, girls or mixed

Girls-only schools outnumber boys-only, nearly two to one.

Mixed5,8223.48
Girls2912.16
Boys1561.97
Not recorded496—

Bar = share of schools · figure = mean CSEE 2025 GPA, lower is better

Browse girls' schools →Browse boys' schools →Browse 82 seminaries →

Council type

Two in three secondary schools sit under a rural district council.

Rural district4,5583.46
Municipal8143.19
City4113.17
Town4873.27
Not classified71—

8 Zanzibar councils carry no TAMISEMI suffix

No council424—

No council on record

Bar = share of schools · figure = mean CSEE 2025 GPA, lower is better

This describes the council, not the school's own surroundings. A remote ward inside a city council still counts as city here. City councils do post better mean GPAs than rural ones, 3.17 against 3.46, but that gap is far smaller than the gap between the best and worst schools inside any one group.

Single-sex schools post much stronger mean GPAs: 1.97 for boys' schools and 2.16 for girls' against 3.48 for mixed. Read that with care: 285 of the 447 single-sex schools are private and 82 are seminaries, so this compares selective, fee-charging intakes with the schools that take everyone.

The strongest school in each region and council

Search them all →
01St. Francis GirlsMbeya · Private · 91 candidates, 20251.04GPA02KemebosKagera · Private · 67 candidates, 20251.07GPA03AhavaKigoma · Private · 40 candidates, 20251.07GPA04Tengeru BoysArusha · Private · 143 candidates, 20251.10GPA05MzumbeMorogoro · Government · 94 candidates, 20251.14GPA06AhmesPwani · Private · 78 candidates, 20251.14GPA07CanossaDar es Salaam · Private · 101 candidates, 20251.15GPA08Bethel SabsIringa · Private · 84 candidates, 20251.17GPA09Waja BoysGeita · Private · 66 candidates, 20251.19GPA10John MerliniDodoma · Private · 111 candidates, 20251.19GPA

Every school, placed.

All 27,297 schools on one map, coloured by results.

Open the full-screen map →

Four things parents ask that the data cannot answer.

School fees

NECTA records results, not costs. Government schools charge no tuition but do levy contributions; private fees range across two orders of magnitude. Ask the school directly and get it in writing.

Boarding & transport

Whether a school boards, and how children get there safely, is in no TAMISEMI or NECTA file. It is omitted here rather than guessed from single-sex or seminary status, which would look like data and be inference. Visit before you decide.

Values & teaching culture

A GPA cannot tell you how teachers treat children. Talk to current parents. Results open the shortlist, people close it.

Coverage limits

496 secondary centres appear in exam results with no census record, and 424 have no council at all. TAMISEMI's census covers the mainland only, so Zanzibar carries results but little else.

Free, and worth looking at.

Only 8 of the national top 100 are government schools, against 84 private. But the best of them scores 1.14, ahead of all but a handful of private schools in the country, and they charge no fees. The spread matters more than the average.

Best free schools →