Madrid’s school system runs on three parallel tracks — fully public, state-subsidised (“concertado”), and fully private — all following the same national curriculum framework, and it is organised by the regional government, the Comunidad de Madrid, which administers admissions, school zoning and much of the day-to-day funding.
How is schooling structured, stage by stage?
Spain’s national education law (currently LOMLOE, the Ley Orgánica de Modificación de la LOE) sets the same stages everywhere, and the Comunidad de Madrid applies them across the region. The structure is straightforward:
- Educación Infantil (ages 0–6): a first, non-compulsory cycle (0–3) largely fee-based even in public settings, and a second cycle (3–6) that is free in public and concertado schools.
- Educación Primaria (ages 6–12): six compulsory years, the core “colegio” stage.
- ESO — Educación Secundaria Obligatoria (ages 12–16): four compulsory years, usually in an “instituto” rather than a primary colegio, though many concertado and private schools run infant-through-secondary on one site.
- Bachillerato (ages 16–18): two non-compulsory years leading to university entrance exams, or Formación Profesional (vocational training) as the alternative track.
Compulsory education in Spain runs from age 6 to 16. Everything either side of that — nursery and bachillerato — is optional, though in practice the large majority of families in Madrid use both.
What is the difference between public, concertado and private schools?
The three categories differ in funding and admissions, not in the curriculum they teach, since all follow the same national and regional syllabus.
- Público (public): fully funded by the Comunidad de Madrid, free of tuition fees, and zoned by residential address — where a family is registered (empadronado) largely determines which schools it can apply to.
- Concertado: privately run, often by religious orders or foundations, but part-funded by the regional government under a “concierto” agreement, meaning tuition is nominal or covers only extras (materials, some activities, extended hours). This sector is unusually large in Madrid compared with much of Spain — concertado schools educate a substantial share of pupils in the region, a point the Comunidad de Madrid’s own education statistics confirm.
- Privado (private): independently funded through fees, with no regional subsidy and generally more freedom over admissions, calendar and curriculum add-ons.
None of these categories map neatly onto quality — a family’s practical starting point is usually the district they live in, since it shapes which public and concertado schools are within the assigned catchment. Anyone weighing up where to settle before enrolling children will find that question overlaps heavily with the choice covered in what Madrid’s districts are like to live in.
What are bilingual programmes, and how common are they?
A large number of Madrid’s public and concertado schools run under the Comunidad de Madrid’s official bilingual programme, which teaches a set proportion of subjects — typically natural science, arts and some others — in English alongside Spanish, from primary through secondary. The regional education department certifies schools into this programme and publishes the list on its own site, since coverage varies by school and by year.
This is distinct from international schools (below), which are private institutions built around a foreign curriculum from the outset rather than a bilingual add-on to the Spanish one.
What about international schools?
Madrid has a longstanding cluster of international schools serving diplomatic families, foreign residents and Spanish families seeking a non-Spanish track — following curricula such as the British national curriculum leading to A-Levels, the American high-school diploma, the French Baccalauréat, or the International Baccalaureate (IB), whose diploma programme is offered by a number of Madrid schools accredited directly by the IB organisation. These are private institutions, generally with their own admissions timelines that run separately from the region’s public escolarización calendar, and families researching a specific school should confirm accreditation and curriculum directly on that school’s own site rather than through a third party.
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How does school admission actually work?
For public and concertado places, the Comunidad de Madrid runs a centralised annual admissions process known as escolarización, usually opening in spring for the following academic year. Families submit a ranked list of preferred schools, and places are allocated by a points system rather than first-come application. The criteria the region publishes typically weight:
- Proximity of the family’s registered address (empadronamiento) to the school
- Whether a sibling already attends the school
- Family income, in some brackets
- Disability or specific support needs
Because address weighting is central to this system, the registration step covered in what empadronamiento is and why it matters is not incidental for families with school-age children — it is one of the mechanisms that determines which schools are realistically reachable. Families new to the city, particularly those still resolving residency paperwork, will also find the process intersects with the steps described in what the NIE is and what it’s needed for, since some school and registration procedures ask for it.
Private schools and international schools set their own admissions independently of this regional calendar, generally on a rolling or fixed-deadline basis set by the school itself.
How does the academic calendar shape the year?
The Comunidad de Madrid sets the school calendar annually, and while exact dates shift by a few days year to year, the shape is consistent: the academic year runs roughly from early September to late June, broken by a Christmas holiday of about two weeks, a shorter break around Easter (timed to Holy Week, which moves with the religious calendar), and a long summer holiday from late June to early September — considerably longer than the summer break in many other European systems. Regional and local public holidays sit within term time and can create the short midweek closures known locally as a “puente,” a pattern also relevant to anyone tracking how Madrid’s public holidays work more broadly, since school closures often follow the same dates as the wider city calendar. August in particular reshapes daily life far beyond schools, a pattern covered separately in coverage of what happens to Madrid in August.
What does this mean for a family actually moving to Madrid?
For a resident family, the school system is one more institution that runs on registration, zoning and paperwork rather than walk-in enrolment — closer in logic to the healthcare and housing systems than to a simple marketplace of schools to choose from. The practical sequence tends to be: settle on a district, register the address, then apply within the regional escolarización window if aiming for a public or concertado place, or approach a private or international school directly on its own timeline.
That sequencing connects naturally to other resident logistics — securing a flat, understanding how renting a flat in Madrid actually works, and registering for services covered in how healthcare access works for residents — since address, registration and school zone are bound together administratively in a way that a newcomer often underestimates. Families researching specific figures — application deadlines, subsidised fee bands, or a given school’s bilingual certification — should confirm current details directly on the Comunidad de Madrid’s education portal, since these details are updated annually and are not the kind of fact that stays fixed from one year to the next.
Broader context on how Madrid’s neighbourhoods differ in character, density and services is set out in the site’s neighbourhoods coverage, and the wider set of questions a resident faces on arrival — from utilities to registration — sits in the living in Madrid hub.
Access Madrid is an independent guide written from published, checkable sources. We have not visited the places described here and we do not publish personal recommendations or invented ‘local favourites’ — where something is singled out as notable, we say who says so. Opening times, fares, closures and prices change at short notice, so treat everything here as a starting point and confirm with the museum, operator or venue directly before building a day around it. We give no advice on visas, insurance, health or safety; use your own government’s official guidance for those.
Featured image: Photo by Harvey Barrison from Massapequa, NY, USA, source, CC BY-SA 2.0
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