NAPLAN 2027 dates by state: 10 to 22 March 2027 for NSW, Victoria, Queensland and WA, and a term-by-term preparation plan

NAPLAN 2027 is Wednesday 10 March to Monday 22 March 2027. That is one window for every state, set by ACARA, and the only date that is fixed for every school in the country is the first day: all schools complete the writing test on Wednesday 10 March. The other three tests are timetabled by the school inside the window, in the required order, with catch-up sessions for children who are away. This post gives the dates by state, what each year level sits, when the results come home, and the plan we use with families from Term 4 to test week.

NAPLAN 2027 dates by state

The exact day your child sits each of the other three tests is decided by the school and usually shared with parents in February. The order is fixed by ACARA: writing, then reading, then conventions of language, then numeracy. A child who is sick on a test day sits a catch-up inside the window, so the last possible test day is Monday 22 March.

What each year level sits

"Adaptive" is the part parents ask about most. After a first block of questions the test branches: a child doing well is sent to a harder block, a child struggling to an easier one. It means two children in the same class see different questions, that a strong child should not be alarmed by a hard second block, and that there is no benefit in rushing the first block. We practise the pacing for this specifically; the details are on the NAPLAN tutoring online page.

When results come home

Schools receive the data first; individual student reports reach parents through the school in July or August. In 2026 the Victorian reports were released from 13 July and the national results were published in the first week of August. The report gives one of four proficiency levels for each of the five areas (writing, reading, spelling, grammar and punctuation, numeracy): Exceeding, Strong, Developing or Needs additional support. How to read it, and what to do with each level, is in NAPLAN results explained.

The term-by-term plan

This is the plan we run with families, for numeracy first because it is the area most responsive to teaching in a term, with the literacy tests folded in.

Term 4, 2026 (October to December): find the gaps. The child sits a practice test at the year level, untimed at first, then timed. We use our own (Year 3, Year 5) and the ACARA past papers. The wrong answers are grouped by topic, not by question; in Year 3 it is usually subtraction with regrouping, fractions and time, in Year 5 decimals, area and perimeter, and two-step word problems, in Years 7 and 9 ratio, algebra and the non-calculator section. Two classes a week on those topics, in the order the school teaches them.

Summer holidays (December to January): keep the facts warm. Ten minutes a day of number facts (times tables to 12 for Year 5 and up, addition and subtraction facts for Year 3), a chapter book a day for reading, and nothing else. Children lose fluency over six weeks of holiday; that is the whole risk.

Term 1, weeks 1 to 3 (late January to mid-February): the year's strand, a term ahead. School has just started the Year 3 or 5 or 7 or 9 content; NAPLAN tests the whole year's strand in March, so the child is examined on material the school has not reached. We teach the rest of the strand in these three weeks, at the school's pace and order, so that nothing on the test is new.

Term 1, weeks 4 and 5 (late February to early March): the format. Now the online question types: drag and drop, hot spots, typed answers, the calculator and non-calculator sections for Years 7 and 9, one full timed test a week, and the writing prompt practised against the NAPLAN marking criteria (ideas, structure, vocabulary, sentences, punctuation, spelling). Writing is the test with the widest gap between what children can do and what they do under a timed prompt, so two timed prompts in these weeks is the best return of the whole plan.

Test week (10 to 22 March): nothing new. Sleep, breakfast, the device charged if the school uses the child's own, and the one instruction that matters: read every question twice, the second time for what it actually asks.

April to July: forget it, then read the report properly. When the report comes home, the level for each area tells you what to do next; a child who is Developing in numeracy in Year 3 has two years to reach Strong by Year 5, which is very achievable with a plan and no drama.

For Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth families

The same window applies, and the same plan; what changes is what the family is planning around. In Sydney NAPLAN Year 3 numeracy is the early signal for the Opportunity Class test in Year 4 and the Selective High School test in Year 6, so the standard we teach to is the top of the strand. In Melbourne the Year 5 and 7 results feed SEAL and select-entry decisions. In Perth Year 5 numeracy is the signal families watch before GATE testing in Year 6. Our city pages have the local detail: NAPLAN tutoring Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth.

What we do

One tutor, one child, on a shared whiteboard, at Australian after-school times (4 pm in Sydney is 12:30 pm in Chandigarh, an ordinary working hour for our tutors), covering the year's strand in the school's order and then the NAPLAN formats. The first 30-minute class is free. Bring the practice test, marked, and the last school report, and we will tell you which topics to fix first and how many weeks it takes.

Questions parents ask

See how we teach this, 1-on-1 online →