WJEC GCSE grade boundaries 2026: the marks for every grade

WJEC GCSE grade boundaries June 2026

These figures come from two WJEC documents: GCSE Grade Points (Non Uniform Mark), June 2026 and Overall GCSE UMS Grade Boundaries and Unit Information. WJEC publishes its Welsh GCSEs in two ways. Linear qualifications, such as Maths and Computer Science, get one grade from one total of raw marks, and the boundaries change every year. Unitised qualifications, such as the sciences, turn each unit into a uniform mark, and those boundaries never change. The tables below follow that split. WJEC grades run from A* down to G, not 9 to 1, and each tier awards only some of them.

GCSE Maths grade boundaries 2026, by tier

Maths comes in three tiers: Higher (A* to C), Intermediate (B to E) and Foundation (D to G), according to the 3300 specification. Wales also offers GCSE Mathematics-Numeracy (3310), which WJEC grades the same way. Each cell is the lowest raw mark that earns the grade. Our WJEC GCSE Maths page adds the unit marks.

GCSE Computer Science grade boundaries 2026

Computer Science (3500) has one tier and is out of 400. Its three units are weighted so that Unit 1 and Unit 2 count double. The Computer Science page breaks out the units.

Science grade boundaries 2026: the fixed uniform marks

Biology (3400), Chemistry (3410), Physics (3420) and Science (Double Award) (3430) are unitised. WJEC says its UMS grade boundaries remain the same every year, so the totals below are the same in 2025 and 2026. What moves is the raw mark a unit needs to reach each uniform mark, and WJEC publishes that in its grade converter. Each science has its own page: Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Science (Double Award).

Science (Double Award) is worth two GCSEs, so it is graded in pairs of letters out of 800. A*A* needs 720, AA needs 640, BB needs 560, CC needs 480, DD needs 400 and GG needs 160, and a mixed pair such as AB (600) sits halfway between two doubles.

How marks become a grade

The route depends on the subject. For a linear subject you add your papers and read the grade off the table. Take a Maths Higher candidate with 51 out of 80 on the non-calculator Unit 1 and 47 out of 80 on the calculator Unit 2. That is 98 out of 160. It clears the A boundary of 89 and falls short of the A* boundary of 118, so the grade is an A, 20 marks short of an A*.

For a unitised subject you convert first. A Physics candidate with uniform marks of 126, 108 and 28 on Units 1, 2 and 3 has 262 out of 400. That is above the C boundary of 240 and below the B boundary of 280, so the grade is a C, 18 uniform marks short of a B. In every WJEC table a total equal to a boundary earns that grade.

How 2026 compares with 2025

WJEC's June 2025 figures are in its 2025 document. The table shows the top and the bottom grade that each tier awards, in both years.

The two Maths qualifications moved in opposite directions on the Higher tier. In Maths (3300) the boundaries came down by 2 to 4 marks at every grade, while in Maths-Numeracy (3310) they went up by 5 to 9 marks. Computer Science fell at every grade, by 2 to 7 marks. A boundary moves with the difficulty of the paper, not with how much the grade is worth.

What the 2026 results looked like in Wales

JCQ's Wales release for 20 August 2026 reports 289,506 GCSE entries, with 19.6% of candidates getting A*/9 to A/7 and 62.3% getting C/4 or above. In Mathematics, 13.9% reached A*/9 to A/7 and 48.3% reached C/4 or above. In Mathematics-Numeracy the figures were 11.9% and 49.4%. JCQ adds that 2026 is the last year in which a student can enter both Mathematics and Mathematics-Numeracy, because of GCSE reform. Our guide to GCSE grades in Wales explains how the letters line up with England's numbers.

What the boundaries mean for you

Read them as shares of the total. In Maths Higher, a C is 17% of the 160 marks, an A is 56% and an A* is 74%. Foundation tops out at D, which is 50% of the 130 marks, so a Foundation entry cannot lead to a C. That limit matters when you and your teacher choose a tier.

• Add every paper first. A single paper has no grade of its own in a linear subject. WJEC calls the component boundaries on its sheet "notional", meaning a guide only.
• Check which course you are on. The new Made-for-Wales GCSEs get their own boundaries when they are first awarded: Mathematics and Numeracy in November 2026, most other subjects from 2027, and the new sciences from 2028. These tables are for the current specifications.
• Do not borrow another board's table. AQA, Edexcel and OCR grade from 9 to 1 out of different totals.

Use today's paper to estimate your grade

Pick the paper for your subject on our GCSE papers, sit it as a timed mock and mark it. It is 8 questions worth 25 to 35 marks, written by us and not by WJEC, so use it for a share of the total and not for a boundary mark. Say you score 21 out of 30. That is 70%. In Maths Higher it is above the A share of 56% and below the A* share of 74%, so it points to an A. Repeat on several days to see a pattern.

Our tracks show numbers from 9 to 1. For a Welsh letter grade, read grade 4 as a C and grade 7 as an A, as described in our grade equivalents guide.

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UK · GCSEWJEC GCSE Maths grade boundaries 2026: A* to G by tierWJEC's official June 2026 GCSE Maths boundaries for the Foundation, Intermediate and Higher tiers, with unit marks, a worked grade and the change on 2025.