Norway entered PISA in 2000 and has results across nine assessment cycles through 2025. The latest cycle places Norway below the OECD average in science, reading and mathematics, while the longer record shows that the steepest losses have been concentrated in reading and mathematics since the mid-2010s.
Norway’s PISA 2025 scores
The 2025 mean scores are below the OECD average in all three core domains.
Norway’s 2025 profile differs from much of its post-2006 record. The Norwegian Directorate for Education and Training reports that this is the first PISA cycle since 2006 in which Norway is below the OECD average in all three core domains at the same time. The point gaps are descriptive differences between published means; they are not an ordinal ranking.
The three 2025 means are also the lowest displayed values in Norway’s comparable trend series. Science is the highest of the three current domain means, but its 470 score remains 12 points below the 2025 OECD average.
Norway PISA scores from 2000 to 2025
The full comparable series shows a long period of relative stability followed by a much lower score level after 2018.
Historical mean scores by PISA cycle
Comparable national means reported by OECD for Norway.
Scroll horizontally to view all columns.
| PISA cycle | Reading | Mathematics | Science |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | 505 | — | — |
| 2003 | 500 | 495 | — |
| 2006 | 484 | 490 | 487 |
| 2009 | 503 | 498 | 500 |
| 2012 | 504 | 489 | 495 |
| 2015 | 513 | 502 | 498 |
| 2018 | 499 | 501 | 490 |
| 2022 | 477 | 468 | 478 |
| 2025 | 453 | 452 | 470 |
The long-run comparable trend scale begins with reading in 2000, mathematics in 2003 and science in 2006, when each domain first served as the main PISA assessment domain. An em dash therefore marks years outside the comparable trend series rather than an estimated score. The irregular cycle spacing after 2018 reflects OECD postponements of PISA 2021 to 2022 and PISA 2024 to 2025.
Norway’s three-domain performance trajectory
Reading, mathematics and science mean scores across each comparable PISA cycle.
The vertical scale starts at 430 rather than zero so the cycle-to-cycle pattern remains readable; exact scores are provided in the table.
- Reading reached 513 in 2015 and fell to 453 in 2025, a 60-point decline over ten years.
- Mathematics stayed within a narrow 489–502 band from 2003 through 2018, then moved to 468 in 2022 and 452 in 2025. Most of the long-run mathematics decline is therefore concentrated after 2018.
- Science moved down more gradually. Its 2025 mean is 28 points below 2015, while OECD does not identify the 8-point movement from 2022 to 2025 as statistically detectable.
The decade since 2015 changed Norway’s score profile
All three domains are lower than in 2015, but the size of the decline differs sharply by subject.
2015 to 2025 score change
Norway’s change compared with the OECD-average change reported for the same period.
| Domain | Norway 2015 | Norway 2025 | Norway change | OECD-average change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reading | 513 | 453 | −60 | −32 |
| Mathematics | 502 | 452 | −50 | −27 |
| Science | 498 | 470 | −28 | −11 |
Norway changes are calculated from the published 2015 and 2025 means. OECD-average decade changes are reported by Norway’s national PISA 2025 publication.
The largest shift is in reading. Norway’s 60-point fall from 2015 to 2025 is almost twice the 32-point decline reported for the OECD average over the same period. Mathematics follows a similar pattern, with a 50-point decline in Norway compared with 27 points for the OECD average. Science has moved less than the other two Norwegian domains, yet its 28-point decade decline is still larger than the 11-point OECD-average decline reported for the period.
What changed between PISA 2022 and PISA 2025?
The latest cycle extended the reading and mathematics decline, while science was statistically stable.
Latest-cycle movement
Published means and OECD-reported score changes for Norway.
| Domain | 2022 | 2025 | OECD-reported change | Interpretation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Science | 478 | 470 | −8 | No statistically detectable change |
| Reading | 477 | 453 | −24 | Lower in 2025 |
| Mathematics | 468 | 452 | −17 | Lower in 2025 |
The displayed mathematics means are rounded to whole points. Their visible difference is 16 points, while OECD reports a 17-point cycle change because the change is calculated from the underlying unrounded estimates.
This distinction matters for the shape of the trend. Mathematics had already dropped by about 33 points between 2018 and 2022, then fell again in 2025. Reading also declined in both post-2018 intervals. Science moved downward in the displayed means, but the OECD treats the 2022–2025 difference as within statistical uncertainty.
More students are below Level 2 than in 2015
The decline is visible not only in mean scores but also in the share of students below PISA’s baseline proficiency level.
Level 2 is used by PISA as the baseline at which students begin to demonstrate the knowledge and skills described for basic proficiency in each domain. It is a distribution measure, not a pass/fail rule for individual students. In Norway, the share below Level 2 rose in all three core domains between 2015 and 2025.
Students below Level 2: 2015 vs. 2025
Percentage of Norwegian 15-year-old students below the baseline proficiency threshold.
| Domain | 2015 | 2025 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Science | 19% | 29% | +10 percentage points |
| Reading | 15% | 34% | +19 percentage points |
| Mathematics | 17% | 38% | +21 percentage points |
The low-performing share expanded across all three domains
Percentage of students below Level 2 in 2015 and 2025.
Mathematics has both Norway’s lowest 2025 mean score and its largest below-Level-2 share, at 38%. Reading shows the largest decade score decline, while its low-performing share more than doubled from 15% to 34%.
Where the 2025 proficiency distribution sits relative to the OECD
| Domain | Norway below Level 2 | OECD below Level 2 | Norway Levels 5–6 | OECD Levels 5–6 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Science | 29% | 26% | 5% | 7% |
| Reading | 34% | 31% | 5% | 6% |
| Mathematics | 38% | 35% | 5% | 8% |
Percentages are rounded from the OECD country note. “Below Level 2” and “Levels 5–6” describe different parts of the performance distribution and should not be inferred from the national mean score alone.
2025 sampling caution for Norway
OECD marks Norway with an asterisk in PISA 2025 because one or more sampling standards were not met.
OECD reports that overall exclusions in Norway reached 10.4% in PISA 2025, above the tolerance in PISA technical standards and higher than the 7.3% recorded in 2022. OECD notes that a high level of student exclusions may bias performance estimates upward. The 2025 results are therefore official published estimates, but exact comparisons should retain the Norway* sampling caution.
The caution does not change the arithmetic of the published means or the 2015–2025 descriptive changes shown on this page. It does affect how precisely the 2025 level should be interpreted, especially when small differences are compared with another country, economy or benchmark.
Data sources and measurement
OECD PISA 2025 Results, Volume I: Norway country note provides the 2025 mean scores, proficiency shares, 2022–2025 comparisons and Norway’s sampling-quality note.
OECD PISA 2022 performance trends provides Norway’s comparable reading, mathematics and science means through 2022. The 2025 observations are added from the PISA 2025 release.
OECD long-term trend methodology explains why comparable trend reporting begins in 2000 for reading, 2003 for mathematics and 2006 for science.
Norwegian Directorate for Education and Training: PISA 2025 reports the 2015–2025 changes for Norway and the OECD average and the rise in the share of Norwegian students below Level 2.
PISA mean scores summarize the performance distribution of 15-year-old students in an education system. They are not individual pass/fail scores. Historical values on this page use the comparable OECD trend series; no missing cycle is interpolated. Score changes derived from displayed means are labeled as calculations, while OECD-reported latest-cycle changes use the underlying unrounded estimates.