The Best Prep Schools in Surrey: A Guide to 11+ and 13+ Entry

Surrey doesn't have state grammar schools any more (they were phased out through the 1970s), so most families here are choosing between two routes: sitting for one of Surrey's selective independent senior schools, many of which now screen with the ISEB Common Pre-Test, or crossing the county border for the super-selective state grammars in Sutton and Kingston. Either way, the prep school your child attends from around age four has a real bearing on which door is realistically open to them at eleven or thirteen. This guide walks through ten well-known Surrey preps, from Oxshott to Guildford to Woking: age range, co-educational or single-sex, roughly what it costs, and which senior schools each one typically feeds into. There's no official ranking of prep schools in England, so treat the order here as an editorial blend based on reputation and what parents actually ask us about, not an objective league table.

Why Surrey works differently from Kent or Buckinghamshire

Parents moving to Surrey from a county with grammar schools sometimes assume there's an 11+ test that leads to a free selective place, the way there is in Kent or Buckinghamshire. There isn't. Surrey's grammar schools were phased out in the 1970s, and the county has run a comprehensive system ever since. So when people in Surrey talk about "selective" schools, they almost always mean independent ones: schools that set their own entrance assessments and charge fees.

There are two realistic routes for a family wanting a selective education here. The first is Surrey's own independent senior schools, among them Guildford High School, Royal Grammar School Guildford, Reigate Grammar School, Caterham, Epsom College, Cranleigh, St John's Leatherhead, City of London Freemen's, Reed's, Woldingham and Tormead. Most now use the ISEB Common Pre-Test as first-stage screening, though a couple, Reigate Grammar and City of London Freemen's included, still set their own papers. The second is the super-selective state grammar schools just over the county line, in the London boroughs of Sutton and Kingston, including Tiffin, Sutton Grammar, Wilson's, Nonsuch High School and Wallington. Plenty of Surrey families research these alongside the independent options. A good Surrey prep school is really preparing your child for one or both of these routes, not for a single county-wide test.

How entry points actually work: Reception, 7+, 11+ and 13+

Surrey preps generally offer several entry points, and it helps to know what each one actually involves before you start touring schools. Reception, sometimes called 4+, is normally non-selective: an informal "stay and play" session rather than a test. Year 3 entry, known as 7+, is often the first assessed point, usually a short maths and English task alongside some informal observation. Year 7 entry, the familiar 11+, is for children leaving prep at eleven, either for a Surrey senior independent school (via the ISEB Common Pre-Test or the school's own papers) or for one of the Sutton or Kingston grammar schools. Year 9 entry, 13+, is for children who stay at their prep school through to the end of Year 8 and then move on via Common Entrance or scholarship examinations, often to boarding or semi-boarding senior schools.

A large share of Surrey prep traffic actually runs on the 13+ timetable rather than 11+, particularly at schools that keep pupils to the end of Year 8 and feed into schools such as Eton, Cranleigh, Epsom College and St John's. It's worth asking any prep school you're considering which entry point most of their leavers actually use, because the answer shapes your child's last two or three years there.

Danes Hill School, Oxshott: a large co-ed prep with a wide spread of leavers

Danes Hill is one of the largest and best known co-educational day preps in the country, set on a 55 acre site near Oxshott, close to Leatherhead and Cobham, taking children from age three through to thirteen. What stands out is the sheer spread of destinations: leavers have gone on to around 37 different senior schools over the last two years, according to the Good Schools Guide, and in 2025 around 20 percent of the leaver cohort won a scholarship of some kind, with roughly 11 percent of the whole cohort winning academic scholarships specifically. Most children leave at 13+ for Common Entrance or scholarship entry, though around a fifth of girls leave at 11+. Top destinations named include Reed's, Epsom College, St John's Leatherhead, Cranleigh and City of London Freemen's. If you want a prep that keeps options open across the whole Surrey independent-school landscape, rather than funnelling towards one or two senior schools, this is the kind of profile to look for.

Cranmore School, West Horsley: co-ed early years, then boys only from seven

Cranmore, near Guildford in West Horsley, has an unusual structure worth flagging before you fall in love with the nursery. It takes both boys and girls from two and a half to seven, then becomes a boys-only prep school from age seven through to thirteen. Families with daughters need to plan for a move elsewhere at 7+, while families with sons can stay put right through. It's well regarded, with a consistent Good Schools Guide review, but the single-sex switch at seven is the detail that catches some parents out. Worth confirming directly with the school how the transition is handled and what leaver destinations look like for their boys-only cohort.

Downsend School, Leatherhead: prep routes and a newer through-school option

Downsend, based in Leatherhead with pre-prep sites in Ashtead and Epsom, is part of the Cognita group and has historically operated as a straight prep school feeding Common Entrance and scholarship entry to senior independents at 13+. In 2020 it added a through-school option, Downsend Senior, covering Years 7 to 11 with a three-year GCSE route, so families who want to can now keep their child at Downsend right through to sixteen rather than moving them at eleven or thirteen. Both routes sit side by side, which is genuinely useful for families who aren't sure yet whether they want their child to leave the school system at 11 or 13. It does mean the exact entry-point mix varies by family choice rather than being fixed, so if Downsend is on your list, ask the admissions team directly which route most families in your child's year are actually taking, since this has shifted since the 2020 change.

Reigate St Mary's and Micklefield: two names in the Reigate Grammar feeder group

Reigate St Mary's Preparatory and Choir School, a co-educational prep in Reigate for ages two and a half to eleven with more than 350 pupils, is one of the schools most consistently named as a feeder into Reigate Grammar School, alongside Chinthurst and Micklefield. As a choir school it also has a strong music tradition, worth knowing about if that matters to your family. Micklefield, also based in the Reigate and Redhill area, is named locally as part of the same Reigate Grammar feeder group and is understood to have joined the Reigate Grammar School group formally in 2024; it has a good reputation for performing arts. If Reigate Grammar School is a target for your family, both are worth a visit, though it's sensible to confirm Micklefield's current age range and admissions details directly with the school, since the 2024 group change is fairly recent.

Hall Grove and Feltonfleet: co-ed preps with day and boarding options

Hall Grove School in Bagshot, in west Surrey towards Woking and Camberley, is a co-educational prep for ages three to thirteen set on 40 acres, offering both day and boarding places. Feltonfleet School in Cobham follows a similar shape: co-educational from three to thirteen, with day and flexi-boarding options, starting children in its pre-prep house, Calvi House, from Nursery to Year 1 before they move into the main prep through to Year 8. Both are useful options for families who want the flexibility of boarding a night or two a week as children get older, without committing to full boarding from the start, and both prepare children for the same mix of 11+ and 13+ senior school routes as the day-only schools on this list.

Milbourne Lodge, Esher: selective from Year 3, with a strong scholarship record

Milbourne Lodge, housed in a Victorian mansion on 8.5 acres in Esher, takes children from four to thirteen. Entry into the pre-prep is non-selective, but admissions from Year 3 (7+) onward are academically selective, with assessments in maths and English. The school has built a strong record preparing pupils for scholarship entry to top senior schools, including Eton, which makes it worth a look for families targeting a scholarship-level exam at 13+ (Eton itself only takes boys at 13+). If your priority is stretching an academically strong child towards scholarship-level entry, this one is worth a closer look.

RGS Prep, Guildford: boys only for now, turning co-ed from September 2027

RGS Prep is the preparatory department of Royal Grammar School Guildford, taking boys from age three to eleven with main entry points at Nursery, Reception (known as Shell) and Year 3. It feeds directly into Royal Grammar School Guildford's senior school. The genuinely newsworthy fact here: from September 2027, RGS Prep is set to become co-educational, admitting girls from Nursery, Reception and Year 3 for the first time in its history. For families with daughters who like everything else about RGS, this is worth watching closely as the change approaches, since it will open up a route that hasn't existed before.

Ripley Court School, Woking: part of the Reed's group, with published fees

Ripley Court, a co-educational prep for ages three to eleven near Ripley outside Woking, merged into the Reed's School group in November 2019 (Reed's is a senior independent school in Cobham). There's no automatic or guaranteed progression from Ripley Court into Reed's senior school, so it still needs to be treated as a normal application, but the group link is a natural connection for families considering both. Ripley Court is also useful for giving a concrete, published sense of what Surrey day-prep fees actually look like: for 2025/26, fees run from £4,695 a term in Reception, rising to £6,880 a term by Year 6.

A Kingston-fringe option: Rokeby School

It's worth mentioning Rokeby School, a boys-only prep for ages four to thirteen, because plenty of Surrey families use it despite its address technically sitting in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, part of Greater London rather than the modern county of Surrey, even though it carries a KT postcode and sits on land that was historically part of Surrey. If you're specifically targeting the Sutton or Kingston super-selective grammar route at 11+, a Kingston-fringe prep like this is worth knowing about. Just factor in that it's genuinely a London school rather than a Surrey one when you're planning catchment or transport.

Comparing the schools at a glance

Here's a rough side-by-side of the ten Surrey-based schools covered above (Rokeby included, with its Kingston-fringe caveat). Ages, structure and feeder relationships are as described by each school. Always check the current position directly with the school before applying, since intakes and group affiliations do shift.

What Surrey prep school fees actually look like

Day fees at Surrey preps typically run somewhere between £14,000 and £27,000 a year, roughly £4,700 to £9,200 a term, rising as children move up through the year groups. Boarding or flexi-boarding options at schools like Hall Grove and Feltonfleet add several thousand pounds more per term on top of day fees. To put a real number on that range: Ripley Court's published 2025/26 fees start at £4,695 a term in Reception and rise to £6,880 a term by Year 6, while Shrewsbury House in nearby Surbiton, a useful Kingston-fringe comparator, charges between £6,390 and £9,186 a term depending on year group. Fees now include 20 percent VAT, introduced from January 2025, so any figures you see quoted should already reflect that. Treat any specific fee figure as a snapshot rather than gospel: schools typically republish fee schedules every academic year, so check the current figure on the school's own admissions page before budgeting, especially since most will have updated schedules again for 2026/27.

The ISEB Common Pre-Test and 13+ Common Entrance, explained

Two different assessment systems come up constantly when Surrey parents research senior school entry, and it helps to know which is which. The ISEB Common Pre-Test is an online, adaptive test covering English, maths, verbal reasoning and non-verbal reasoning, typically sat in Year 6 ahead of 11+ entry, or registered in Year 6 for a 13+ place confirmed later via Common Entrance or scholarship papers. Many Surrey independent senior schools use it as first-stage screening rather than setting their own paper. Common Entrance, by contrast, is the traditional 13+ examination sat at the end of Year 8 by children moving from a prep school into a senior school at Year 9, often alongside scholarship papers for academically strong candidates. A prep school that keeps children to the end of Year 8, like several on this list, will typically be preparing them specifically for Common Entrance and scholarship exams rather than the Pre-Test. Worth asking any school you're touring which system their leavers actually sit, and when.

Choosing between the 11+ and 13+ route for your child

There isn't a universally right answer here, and a lot depends on the individual child and the senior school you have in mind. Some families prefer the 11+ route because it means one fewer transition to plan for and gets the selective assessment process over with earlier. Others feel a child benefits from two extra years of maturity before a scholarship-level exam at 13+. If you're aiming specifically at the Sutton or Kingston super-selective grammar schools, that route is effectively 11+ only, since those are Year 7 entry state schools. If you're targeting a traditional boarding or semi-boarding senior school such as Eton or Cranleigh, the 13+ Common Entrance route via a prep school that runs to Year 8 is usually the natural path. Either way, verbal and non-verbal reasoning practice is worth starting early and keeping consistent rather than cramming in the final year, whichever exam your child ends up sitting. Our free 11+ practice app is built for exactly that kind of steady, low-pressure practice, the sort that fits around normal school life rather than taking it over.

Registration, open days and starting mid-way through

Most Surrey preps run open days in the autumn and spring terms, and registration for competitive entry points like 7+ and 11+ often needs to happen well over a year in advance, so it's worth starting the research earlier than feels necessary. It is possible to join many of these schools mid-way through rather than only at the standard entry points, particularly into pre-prep years or when a place happens to come up, but competitive entry years like Year 3 and Year 7 are the ones where places are scarcest and assessments most rigorous. If bursaries or scholarships matter to your family, ask about them directly at the open day. Schools like Danes Hill publish meaningful scholarship figures, and most independent Surrey preps and their senior-school partners run some form of means-tested bursary alongside academic and other scholarships.

Frequently asked questions

Written by Arielle Phoenix SEO & Organic Marketing Manager at Pip

Arielle handles SEO and AEO growth at Pip, with over 10 years in the digital marketing space working with brands and founding her own projects.

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