Homeschool Statistics 2026: How Many, Who, Why, and Where It Is Growing

The headline numbers

The 3.4 million figure is an estimate, not a count: the Johns Hopkins Homeschool Hub compiles enrollment from the states that publish it (roughly half do, with varying definitions) and researchers extrapolate to the rest. The National Home Education Research Institute (NHERI), a homeschool advocacy research body, publishes similar estimates. Treat the range 3 to 3.7 million as the honest answer for 2025–26.

Growth since 2020

Before the pandemic, homeschooling grew at about 2% a year and sat somewhere around 3% of students. In autumn 2020 the Census Bureau's Household Pulse Survey found 11.1% of households with school-age children homeschooling (up from 5.4% that spring), though that figure included many families doing remote public school and was not comparable to earlier counts. State data then showed a genuine step change: enrollments roughly doubled in many states between 2019 and 2021, fell back somewhat in 2022–23 as schools stabilised, and have grown again since.

For 2024–25, the Johns Hopkins Hub reports an average growth rate of about 5.4% across reporting states, nearly three times the pre-pandemic rate, with 36% of reporting states at all-time highs, above even their pandemic peaks. Louisiana, North Dakota, South Dakota and South Carolina have grown every year since 2020 without a post-pandemic dip. The picture is of a permanent shift in the size of the homeschool population, still growing.

Who homeschools

Federal surveys (the NCES National Household Education Survey, most recently with usable detail from 2019, and the Census Pulse data from 2020–21) show a population that is more diverse than its reputation. In the Pulse data, homeschooling rates were similar across income groups and rose fastest among Black families, from about 3% to 16% of households during 2020. Homeschool families are more likely to have two parents, more likely to have three or more children, and more likely to live in the South and West, but the differences have narrowed each decade.

Religious motivation remains common but is no longer the majority reason, and the secular homeschool community has grown fastest since 2020. Homeschooled children are spread across all grades, with the largest share in elementary school and a growing share in high school as families stay the course.

Why families homeschool

The NCES surveys ask parents to choose reasons. The most-cited are concern about the environment of other schools (safety, drugs, negative peer pressure), dissatisfaction with academic instruction, a desire to provide religious or moral instruction, and a child's special needs, health or mental health. Since 2020, flexibility (for travel, work, sport, and a child's pace) and mental health have risen sharply in surveys by state associations and researchers. Very few families cite a single reason; most cite three or four.

Outcomes

The available research says homeschooled students score at or above average on standardized achievement tests, are admitted to college at comparable rates to their peers, and report similar or better social and emotional wellbeing. The caveat is large: almost every study uses self-selected samples of families who chose to be studied, and homeschool families differ from the average in ways (parental education, family stability, income) that predict good outcomes regardless of schooling. The defensible conclusion is that homeschooling, done with engagement, does not harm academic or social outcomes and often helps; the variation between families is much larger than the average difference from school.

The UK, Australia, Canada and New Zealand

England: the Department for Education's local-authority census estimated roughly 100,000–120,000 children in elective home education in recent years, up from about 50,000 before 2020, with a national register due under the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 that will produce the first reliable count. See the UK guide. Australia: state registrations passed 40,000 children nationally and have roughly doubled since 2019, with Queensland and New South Wales the largest and fastest-growing. See the Australia guide. Canada: no national count; provincial figures suggest well over 100,000, with Alberta and British Columbia having the highest rates because of funding and flexible enrolment options. See the Canada guide. New Zealand: Ministry of Education exemption data show around 10,000–11,000 home-educated children, roughly double the pre-2020 figure. See the New Zealand guide.

How to read any homeschool statistic

• Ask who counted. States with no notification requirement (Texas, Illinois, Michigan, Idaho and others) do not count at all, so national totals are partly extrapolation.
• Ask what counted. Some states include public online school students or umbrella-school enrollees; some exclude them. Rates jump when definitions change.
• Ask who was surveyed. Outcome studies recruit through homeschool networks and over-represent engaged families. They show what is possible, not what is typical.
• Ask when. 2020–21 figures include emergency remote learning and are not comparable to 2019 or 2024.
• Prefer the Johns Hopkins Homeschool Hub and NCES for US numbers, the DfE and ADCS for England, state regulators for Australia, and the Ministry of Education for New Zealand. Advocacy bodies on both sides publish real data with a thumb on the scale.