Every December, a few students make the news for getting the top ATAR of 99.95. For everyone else in Year 12, it can feel like the bar was set somewhere far, far out of reach.

It's worth knowing how few people actually get there, and how little your ATAR decides about the rest of your life.

First up: what an ATAR of 99.95 actually means

Your ATAR isn't a mark out of 100. It's a rank. It shows where you sit compared with everyone your age in your state, and scaling across schools and subjects is a complicated bit of work.

An ATAR of 80 doesn't mean you got 80%. It means you're in the top 20% of your age group.

The highest ATAR you can get is 99.95. There's no 100. A 99.95 puts you in the top 0.05% of your age group.

How many students receive an ATAR of 99.95?

A lot less students than you might think. In 2025, just 150 students in NSW, Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia received the top ranking, out of around 150,000 students who got an ATAR. That roughly equates to 1 in 1,000 students.

  • NSW | Total students who got an ATAR: 60,432 | Total students who got a 99.95: 53
  • Victoria | Total students who got an ATAR: 49,310 | Total students who got a 99.95: 42
  • Queensland | Total students who got an ATAR: 30,167 | Total students who got a 99.95: 37
  • Western Australia | Total students who got an ATAR: 10,265 | Total students who got a 99.95: 18

Lots of Year 12 students don't get an ATAR at all, so the real odds are even longer. In Queensland, only 52% of Year 12 grads received an ATAR in 2025. Across Australia, 64% of Year 12 students got one in 2024.

If you didn't get a 99.95, then breathe: you're in the majority.

students sitting around playing cards
Trust us: nobody will be asking about your ATAR in a year.

(Pssst: check out our guide to exactly when ATAR results are released in every state and territory, plus what to do if you can't access yours.)

What's a typical ATAR?

The average ATAR is usually around 70.

It sits above 50 because the ATAR compares you with everyone your age, including people who left school early. The smaller group who stay on to get an ATAR pushes the average up.

An ATAR in the 60s or 70s puts you right in the middle of the pack. Plenty of good courses and careers start from there.

How much your ATAR really counts

We know an ATAR is the thing you've just spent years studying for, so we're going to hold your hand when we say this: an ATAR is just one number. It doesn't define you, it doesn't get asked in job interviews, and most adults can't even remember their ATAR.

Recent research from Victoria University's Mitchell Institute showed ATAR results played a lesser role in university admissions than you might think.

In 2023, half of all domestic undergrad students starting a bachelor's degree were not recent school leavers, which the Mitchell Institute said meant the ATAR was not relevant to their admission. And even among recent school leavers, three in 10 were admitted without their ATAR even being considered. Courses in Creative Arts, Education and Agriculture had the lowest proportion of admissions made solely on ATAR (41-43%), while Engineering and Natural and Physical Sciences had the highest ATAR-only admissions (72%).

“The ATAR is often treated as if it decides everything, but our analysis shows it applies much less often than people think. Three in ten school-leaver admissions were made on a basis other than ATAR. Students deserve clear information about what the ATAR means, how it will be used, and about the full range of pathways available to them,” Mitchell Institute Director Professor Peter Hurley said.

Uni isn't the only option

The ATAR is mostly used for uni entry. There are plenty of great career options and pathways that don't need it at all. TAFE, apprenticeships and traineeships don't need an ATAR, or you could even go straight into work and get training on the job.

What to do if you didn't get the ATAR you wanted

First of all, take a minute to process the grief. You worked really hard, and didn't get where you wanted to. Feeling disappointed is normal. Learning how to pick yourself up after disappointment — a.k.a. building resilience — is the thing that's going to push you further in your career, anyway.

Now for the practical steps.

  1. Check every way into the course you wanted. Plenty of courses have more than one entry path, so look past the cut-off number.
  2. Look at nearby options. A related course or a TAFE diploma can get you where you want to go.
  3. Check if you're eligible for any ATAR bonus points. Regional schools, leadership positions, or school recommendation schemes can help you bump the number up.
  4. Remember it's just one number. Your ATAR says nothing about your character, how hard you work, or what your life has in store for you.

Not sure what's next?

Whether you got a 99.95, a 59.95 or no ATAR at all, the question is the same: what do you actually want to do?

That's where Anyway comes in (that's us!). We built the solution to help young people like you figure out what you actually want to do, not just what your parents, school or social media is saying you should do. Get started by asking Blinky — our AI-powered career coach — how to figure out your thing.