The Uganda National Examinations Board (UNEB) has released the results of the 2025 Primary Leaving Examination (PLE), revealing that male candidates performed better than females and registered a lower failure rate.
Presenting the results at State House, Nakasero, UNEB Executive Director Dan Odongo said the examination was conducted on November 3 and 4, 2025, under the theme “Embracing Security and Holistic Assessment of Learners in a Dynamic Environment.” He noted that the theme, which was also used in 2024, remains relevant to Uganda’s assessment framework.
A total of 817,883 candidates from 15,388 examination centres registered for the 2025 PLE, an increase from 797,444 candidates in 2024. Of these, 522,036 candidates (63.8 percent) from 11,525 centres were beneficiaries of Universal Primary Education (UPE), while 295,847 candidates (36.2 percent) from 3,863 centres were non-UPE candidates.
UNEB reported that examiners and curriculum specialists commended the overall quality of the examination papers, noting that they reflected the ongoing shift towards competency-based learning.
“The papers clearly reflected the paradigm shift towards competency-based learning, with questions designed to assess learners’ ability to apply knowledge and skills,” Odongo said.
However, he observed that some teachers, particularly in Social Studies and Religious Education, have not fully adjusted their teaching approaches to align with the new curriculum. As a result, many candidates struggled with questions that required the application of knowledge to real-life situations.
“This partly explains the decline in performance in these subjects compared to 2024,” Odongo explained.
Examiners also raised concerns over the influence of materials circulated by unregulated examination bureaus shortly before the examinations, noting that such materials were misleading and negatively affected candidates’ preparedness.
On gender performance, UNEB data showed that males outperformed females in percentage terms and recorded a lower failure rate, a trend illustrated in both tabular and graphical analysis included in the results report.
Collection of results
Results for each examination centre will be uploaded to the Centre Portal and may be downloaded immediately upon official release. In addition, District, Municipal, and City Inspectors of Schools may collect hard copies of the results from the UNEB offices at Ntinda starting Monday, 2nd February 2026.
Parents, candidates, and other interested parties may also access results through the Short Messaging Service (SMS) available on MTN and Airtel mobile networks. Once the correct procedure is followed, candidates’ results will be sent instantly to their mobile phones.
