NISRA Childcare In Northern Ireland Survey – Published May 2025

The Northern Ireland Executive has prioritised delivering more affordable, accessible, high quality early education and childcare as part of the Programme for Government 2025 – 2027. This commitment aims to support children’s development, ease financial pressure on working families and expand access to high quality early education and childcare.

The NI Childcare Survey 2024, which took place in Autumn/Winter 2024, was commissioned by the Department of Education and is part of the commitment to collect more robust and comprehensive data on the sector.

The Department of Education intends to use the findings in the report, published in May 2025, to evaluate current provision and inform the development of new policies, specifically the development of an Early Learning and Childcare strategy.

The report details a range of issues including type and amount of childcare used; childcare costs; summer holiday childcare arrangements; financial support claimed including under the Northern Ireland Childcare Subsidy Scheme; factors influencing parental childcare choices including affordability and quality of childcare; and the impact of childcare on employment, education and training.

Some key findings

  • 62% of children aged 0-4 using any childcare in 2024
  • 43% of children aged 0-4 using any paid childcare in 2024
  • 44% of children aged 0 -11 had not received any form of childcare provision
  • Children aged 0-4 spend on average 20 hours in childcare per week, compared to 9 hours for children aged 5-11
  • Of the most commonly used childcare types, 32% of children aged 0-11 used grandparents or relatives to provide childcare.
  • Afterschool clubs in school, breakfast clubs in school, registered childminders and day nurseries were also in the top five most commonly used childcare types.
  • £225 is the median monthly payment for childcare per child
  • £630 is the median monthly payment for full time childcare per child
  • 86% of households with children aged 0-4 said the quality of childcare is very or fairly good
  • 48% of households said childcare costs are very unaffordable or fairly unaffordable
  • The main reasons for households using childcare were mostly related to the needs of the parents. The most common reason was to allow attendance at work, other reasons included attending appointments, socialising, study and other caring responsibilities.
  • The second most common reason was to provide opportunities for the child to socialise with other children
  • Across all 11 local government districts, in urban and rural areas and across all measures of deprivation, households were more likely to say the quality of childcare was good or very good, than poor or very poor. This was also the case regardless of whether a child had a SEN statement, was on a SEN register or had no special educational needs
  • Among households, those with no special educational needs were more likely to say childcare provision meets all needs than those with a SEN statement or those on a SEN register without a statement

Further information on all the results is available in the full Childcare in Northern Ireland 2024 report. The full report also contains contact details for further queries

Northern Ireland Childcare Survey Results | Department of Education.

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