PISA 2025 Results: OECD Reading and Maths Scores Fall to Record Lows
OECD’s PISA 2025 report finds reading fell 28 points and maths 22 points since 2015, with AI writing use linked to weaker outcomes.
Photo by Yan Krukau on Pexels
The OECD published the PISA 2025 results on September 8, 2026, finding that student performance across OECD countries has reached the lowest average ever recorded by the Programme for International Student Assessment in mathematics and reading. PISA 2025 tested 760,000 15-year-olds across 91 countries and economies, and the report links part of the decline to increased digitalisation and longer screen time, while noting a more mixed picture on classroom AI use.
Reading recorded the steepest fall, with OECD average scores dropping 28 points between 2015 and 2025. Mathematics scores fell 22 points over the past decade, equivalent to just over one year of formal learning. Science, the focus subject of the 2025 cycle, held broadly stable between 2022 and 2025 after trending downward from 2009 to 2022. Across the OECD, one in five 15-year-old students is now a low performer across science, mathematics and reading combined, up from 16% in 2022.
Screen time and AI use linked to weaker reading outcomes
The report ties part of the reading decline to increased digitalisation, longer screen time and falling rates of reading for pleasure. “Most troubling is the decline in the very skills that matter most in the AI age: evaluating information, making connections across multiple sources and thinking critically about what we read,” the PISA 2025 report stated. It also found that the share of “hasty readers” – students who rush through a text and give a quick, incorrect answer – almost doubled between 2018 and 2025. More than one in four students said classmates were distracted by digital devices in most or every science lesson, and those students performed less well and felt less engaged and connected to their school.
On AI specifically, the OECD found that students who said they did not use AI to draft text for writing assignments outperformed those who said they did. Among frequent AI users, however, students who used the tools to help them learn and were taught how to assess the quality of AI-generated information tended to perform better than peers who received no such guidance. OECD Secretary-General Mathias Cormann said “technology and AI can strengthen learning and help prepare young people for the future, but only when used purposefully and not as a substitute for attention, effort and understanding.”
Socio-economic gaps narrowed as advantaged students fell furthest
The traditional gap between advantaged and disadvantaged students narrowed between 2022 and 2025, but the report attributes this mainly to declines among advantaged students rather than gains among disadvantaged ones. In reading, disadvantaged students’ scores fell 4 points against a 20-point decline for advantaged students. In mathematics, advantaged students’ scores fell 14 points while the change among disadvantaged students was not statistically significant. In science, disadvantaged students’ performance stayed stable across OECD countries while advantaged students’ scores fell 8 points.
| Metric | Figure |
|---|---|
| Students assessed | 760,000 across 91 countries and economies |
| Reading, OECD average change, 2015-2025 | -28 points |
| Mathematics, OECD average change, past decade | -22 points (about one year of learning) |
| Science, OECD average, 2022-2025 | Stable, after declining 2009-2022 |
| Low performers (science, maths, reading combined) | 1 in 5 students, up from 16% in 2022 |
| Students reporting classmates distracted by devices in most/every science lesson | More than 1 in 4 |
The findings echo an earlier warning covered in Winss Solutions’ report on screens in schools and test-score data, which found similar reading and mathematics declines in the PISA 2022 cycle.
Background
PISA has run every three years since 2000, led by the OECD’s Directorate for Education and Skills, and measures how well 15-year-olds can apply reading, mathematics and science skills to real-world situations rather than testing curriculum recall. The assessment rotates a focus subject each cycle; PISA 2025 focused on science after mathematics anchored the 2022 round, which recorded the sharpest single-cycle decline in the test’s history following pandemic-era school disruption. The 2025 cycle is the first to systematically survey students on their use of generative AI tools for schoolwork, giving the OECD an initial dataset on how AI use correlates with reading and writing performance. The September 8, 2026 release of PISA 2025 extends a decade-long downward trend in OECD reading and mathematics scores and adds AI use to the list of factors the organisation says school systems need to manage deliberately rather than assume will help on its own.
Sources: OECD; Euronews; Winss Solutions (prior coverage)
Featured image: photo by Yan Krukau on Pexels (free Pexels license).
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I specialize in sustainability education, curriculum co-creation, and early-stage project strategy. At WINSS, I craft articles on sustainability, transformative AI, and related topics. When I’m not writing, you’ll find me chasing the perfect sushi roll, exploring cities around the globe, or unwinding with my dog Puffy — the world’s most loyal sidekick.
