HSC ATAR Calculator (New South Wales)

Calculate your NSW ATAR from your HSC scaled marks. Enter your English course and your other 2-unit courses — the calculator builds your aggregate from your best 10 units and estimates your ATAR, with the full working shown.

HSC ATAR Calculator

Enter scaled marks (0–100) for each 2-unit course. English is required — put your best English course in the English box.

How the HSC ATAR is calculated

Aggregate = your best 2 units of English + your best 8 units from your other courses. Each 2-unit course contributes its scaled mark to the aggregate, so the maximum aggregate is 500. UAC then converts that aggregate into your ATAR.

Worked example

English 82, plus courses of 88, 79, 91 and 74: aggregate = 82 + 88 + 79 + 91 + 74 = 414, which estimates to an ATAR of about 96.40 (planning range about 94.4–98.4).

HSC scaling

Scaling adjusts your HSC marks for the strength of the cohort that took each course, so marks can be compared fairly across courses. It changes every year and is published by UAC in the scaling report for your year. Which subjects scale the best changes with the cohort — check the current UAC scaling report rather than an old list. See the Subject Scaling Calculator for how scaling works.

HSC raw marks — what is the raw marks database?

Your raw HSC mark is the mark you actually earned in the exam before scaling. NESA publishes standards packages and raw-mark information for HSC courses, and UAC publishes the scaling that turns raw marks into scaled marks. There is no official public database that lists every student’s raw marks — if a site claims to show one, treat it with care. To understand your own result, compare your raw mark with the course’s published performance bands on the NESA website, and use scaled marks — not raw marks — in this calculator.

Last updated: November 2026.

NSW publishes HSC raw marks information — the HSC raw marks database — showing how raw exam marks relate to reported marks. HSC scaling graphs show the same relationship as a curve: raw marks on one axis, scaled marks on the other. This calculator uses scaled course marks, not raw marks, so enter your scaled marks above.

Common mistakes

  • Entering raw marks instead of scaled course marks. The aggregate is built from scaled course marks (0–100 per 2-unit course), not raw exam marks. Raw marks are adjusted for the difficulty of the exam and the strength of the cohort before they become course marks.
  • Counting more than 10 units. Only your best 10 units count, including 2 units of English. Extra units do not add to the aggregate, so entering all 12 or 13 units you studied will inflate the result.
  • Forgetting English. Two units of English must be included in your best 10 units. A calculation without English is not an HSC aggregate.
  • Counting an extension course as 2 units. Extension courses are 1-unit courses. Counting one as 2 units adds a whole extra course to your aggregate.

Extension courses

HSC extension courses — such as Mathematics Extension 1 and 2, and English Extension 1 and 2 — are worth 1 unit each, and they can be part of your best 10 units. A strong extension result can lift your aggregate, but it is still only one unit, so it cannot replace a full 2-unit course.

Related calculators

VCE ATAR Calculator • QCE ATAR Calculator • WACE ATAR Calculator • SACE ATAR Calculator • Study Score Calculator • Subject Scaling Calculator • Main ATAR Calculator

FAQ

HSC ATAR questions

UAC takes your best 2 units of English plus your best 8 units from your other courses — 10 units in total, out of 500 — then converts that aggregate into an ATAR.

A raw mark is the mark you earned in the exam. A scaled mark is that mark after UAC adjusts it for the strength of the course’s cohort. Your ATAR is calculated from scaled marks, not raw marks.

It changes every year with the cohort. Check the current UAC scaling report for your year — it lists the scaling for every course, and it is the only reliable source for that question.