What is QTS?

Qualified teacher status (QTS) is the professional award that confirms you meet the Teachers’ Standards in England. You need it to be employed as a qualified teacher in a maintained school or a non-maintained special school, to start the two-year early career teacher induction, and to be paid on the main and upper pay ranges. You get it by completing an accredited teacher training course or, if you already teach, through assessment only or the overseas recognition service.

What QTS lets you do

With QTS you can be appointed as a teacher in any state-funded school in England, including maintained schools, academies and free schools. Without it, maintained schools can only employ you in limited circumstances, such as while you train on a salaried route or as an instructor with specialist skills, and you are paid on the unqualified teacher range.

The pay difference is clear. From September 2026, the unqualified range in England outside London starts at £23,732. A newly qualified teacher on M1 earns £34,069, and the main range rises to £46,940 at M6. Unqualified teacher pay has the full range.

Academies have historically had more freedom to employ teachers without QTS, and many academy trusts write their own pay policies. Government policy on this has been changing, so check the current DfE guidance and the contract before assuming QTS is optional anywhere in the state sector. Independent schools and further education colleges set their own rules; many ask for QTS or an equivalent anyway.

QTS also does something easy to overlook: it is the gate to statutory induction. You cannot start early career teacher induction without it, and you need to pass induction to keep working as a teacher in maintained schools.

The Teachers’ Standards

QTS is awarded when a training provider recommends you after assessing you against the Teachers’ Standards. Part one covers teaching itself: setting high expectations, promoting pupils’ progress, subject knowledge, planning, adapting teaching to pupils’ needs, assessment, managing behaviour and wider professional responsibilities. Part two covers personal and professional conduct, including treating pupils with dignity, upholding British values and following the school’s policies.

The same standards are used throughout induction, so the evidence you gather during training is the start of a record that continues for your first two years in post.

Routes to QTS in England

Most people get QTS through initial teacher training. The options are:

• a one-year postgraduate course with a university, a SCITT or a School Direct partnership, often with a PGCE
• a salaried route, where a school employs you while you train
• the postgraduate teaching apprenticeship
• an undergraduate degree with QTS, such as a BEd
• a teacher degree apprenticeship, currently piloted for maths
• assessment only, for graduates who already have substantial teaching experience

Teacher training routes in England compares them on fees, pay and time in school. A PGCE and QTS are different things: the PGCE is an academic qualification from a university, while QTS is the professional status. Most fee-funded courses give you both. Some SCITT courses award QTS only, which is enough to teach in England.

The old professional skills tests in literacy and numeracy no longer exist. Providers now check those skills themselves during selection and training.

If you trained outside England

Teachers qualified in many countries outside the UK can apply to the Teaching Regulation Agency for QTS without retraining, as long as their qualification and experience meet the published criteria. Get Into Teaching lists the eligibility rules and the documents you need. The decision rests on your teaching qualification, subject and age range, so not everyone qualifies.

If your country is not covered, international qualified teacher status (iQTS) is a separate course run by English providers for people training abroad, and there are assessment only options once you are working in England. For visa questions see teaching in the UK on a Skilled Worker visa, and for anything about your own immigration status speak to an OISC-registered adviser.

Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland

QTS is an England award, but the other nations have their own systems. Wales also uses QTS, and you register with the Education Workforce Council to teach there. Scotland requires registration with the General Teaching Council for Scotland, which has its own probation year. Northern Ireland requires registration with the General Teaching Council for Northern Ireland. Moving between nations is usually possible with your existing qualification, but each council decides individually, so apply early if you are relocating.

Getting your QTS confirmed

When your training provider recommends you, the Department for Education records the award against your teacher reference number. You should see it on your record within a few weeks of the end of the course. Keep a copy of your certificate; schools check the record as part of pre-employment checks anyway, and a mismatch between your name and the record can hold up a start date.