Which Leaving Cert Subjects Have the Highest H1 Rates?

Physics returned the largest share of H1 grades among the Leaving Cert subjects with more than 5,000 Higher Level candidates in 2025, at 18.8 per cent of 6,592 candidates. Chemistry came next, at 17.8 per cent of 8,577. English was lowest of the big subjects, at 5.0 per cent of 46,193. Rates above 60 per cent appear in two language subjects with small candidatures. None of those numbers measures how hard a subject is. An H1 rate depends on who sits the subject, and the students who sit Physics are not the students who sit English. The table below compares cohorts as much as it compares subjects.

All figures on this page come from one file, the State Examinations Commission's Leaving Certificate 2025 Provisional National Statistics with more than 10 candidates, a CSV published in the statistics section of examinations.ie. It gives the percentage of candidates at each grade, for each subject and level, for 2023, 2024 and 2025. The word provisional means the figures are those issued on results day, before appeal outcomes.

H1 rates by subject, Higher Level, 2025

Every row is Higher Level in 2025. Sat is the number of candidates who sat that subject, and H1 % is the percentage of them awarded an H1. H1 or H2 % adds the published H1 and H2 percentages together. On a phone the table scrolls sideways to reach the last column.

For a benchmark, 11.7 per cent of all Higher Level grades awarded in 2025 were H1s. RTÉ reported that figure on results day, Friday 22 August 2025. It matches what the SEC file gives across 304,399 Higher Level sittings, weighting each subject by its own candidate numbers. 65,444 candidates sat the 2025 Leaving Cert in total.

The base size changes what a percentage means

Mandarin Chinese has the highest H1 rate in the 2025 file, at 89.5 per cent. That rate is calculated on 429 candidates, which is 0.7 per cent of the 65,444 who sat the Leaving Cert. Biology's 15.7 per cent is calculated on 30,650 candidates, or 47 per cent of that same total. The Biology rate summarises most of a year group. The Mandarin Chinese rate summarises a few hundred people.

Small groups also move a lot from year to year without anything about the exam changing. Higher Level Latvian ran at 3.4 per cent H1 on 59 candidates in 2023, 36.5 per cent on 52 candidates in 2024, and 28.4 per cent on 95 candidates in 2025. Three swings that large in three years tell you about the size of the group, not about Latvian.

Eligibility rules explain part of the pattern among the smallest language cohorts. The SEC runs examinations in non-curricular EU languages, including Croatian, Czech, Dutch, Hungarian, Latvian, Modern Greek, Romanian, Slovakian, Swedish and, from 2025, Ukrainian. To sit one, a candidate must speak that language as a mother tongue, must have followed a programme of study leading to the Leaving Certificate, and must be taking Leaving Certificate English. A subject whose entry rule requires fluency will report grades from fluent candidates.

The same subject moves between years

An H1 rate describes one year's results in one subject. Grades fell across the system in 2025 as the post-pandemic adjustment was wound down. RTÉ reported that H1s made up 11.7 per cent of Higher Level grades in 2025, against 14.3 per cent in 2024. It also reported that 52.4 per cent of grades were adjusted upwards after marking in 2025, against 68 per cent in 2024.

Individual subjects moved with it. Higher Level Biology went 19.2, 19.5, 15.7 per cent H1 across 2023, 2024 and 2025. Chemistry went 23.2, 22.4, 17.8. Geography went 12.9, 11.6, 8.3. Irish went 15.7, 14.5, 11.0. Maths went 11.2, 12.9, 11.0. Chemistry's rate fell 4.6 points between 2024 and 2025, which is more than twice the 2.1-point gap between Chemistry and Biology in 2025.

H1 rate and H1 or H2 rate rank subjects differently

Higher Level Music returned 14.8 per cent H1 in 2025, below Physics and Chemistry. Adding H2 grades, 53.7 per cent of Music candidates got an H1 or an H2. That is ahead of Physics at 36.3 per cent, and ahead of every other subject in the table with more than 5,000 candidates. Applied Maths shows the same gap in a different place, with 25.4 per cent at H1 and 49.8 per cent at H1 or H2.

Which column you read decides the ranking, and the CAO scale gives you a reason to care about both. An H1 is worth 100 points and an H2 is worth 88, so the two grades are 12 points apart, as our post on how CAO points work sets out. The grade bands behind them are the same in every subject, and Leaving Cert grades explained covers what each band requires.

What the table cannot tell you

The table above answers one question, which is what share of candidates in each subject got an H1 in 2025. It does not tell you what share of you would get an H1, because you are not the average of a self-selected cohort.

Three things that bear on your own grade are absent from the CSV.

Course requirements. A course can name a specific grade in a specific subject at a specific level, and points do not substitute for it. Check each course on cao.ie and on the college's own page for that course, for the year you are applying in.

Whether you can sustain the subject. You will study it for two years. Interest and existing ability do real work over that time.

Your teacher and your school. Subject availability is set by your school's option blocks, and the teaching you get is part of what your grade comes from. Neither appears in a national rate.

Our guide to choosing Leaving Cert subjects works through the choice with those inputs. If the question is really about level rather than subject, should I drop to Ordinary Level covers the points and requirement side of that.

A better test than the rate table

Open the actual paper. A Physics paper asks for calculations, definitions and experiments. A History paper asks for long evidence-based essays. Those are different kinds of work, and the paper is where you can see which one you are signing up for.

Every paper is free. The Leaving Cert Biology past papers page carries the Higher and Ordinary papers by year with their official marking schemes, and Leaving Cert Physics works the same way. Read the paper first, then read the marking scheme to see how the marks are actually given out.

FAQ

Which Leaving Cert subject has the highest H1 rate? In the SEC's 2025 provisional statistics, Higher Level Mandarin Chinese, at 89.5 per cent of 429 candidates. Among subjects with more than 5,000 Higher Level candidates, Physics was highest at 18.8 per cent of 6,592.

What are the easiest Leaving Cert subjects? The published statistics cannot answer that. They report how one year's candidates in each subject did, and each subject has a different set of candidates, so a high H1 rate can come from the group rather than the exam.

What percentage of students get an H1? 11.7 per cent of all Higher Level grades awarded in 2025 were H1s, down from 14.3 per cent in 2024.

Which big subject has the lowest H1 rate? Of the subjects in the table above, English, at 5.0 per cent of 46,193 Higher Level candidates in 2025. Nearly every candidate sits English, so its cohort is close to the full year group.

Where do the official figures come from? The State Examinations Commission publishes a national statistics file each year in the statistics section of examinations.ie. The 2025 Leaving Certificate CSV gives the percentage at each grade for every subject and level with more than 10 candidates.

Should I pick a subject because of its H1 rate? The rate describes a cohort you are not part of. Course requirements, whether you can sustain two years of the subject, and what your school offers all bear more directly on your own result.

Read a paper before you commit to a subject. Open the Leaving Cert past paper finder, pull a recent Higher Level paper with its marking scheme, and see what two years of that subject builds towards.