P1 Registration from 2027: What Changes for Property Buyers

On 10 September 2026 the Ministry of Education changed the rule behind a great many family property decisions in Singapore: the one-kilometre priority in Primary 1 registration. From the 2027 exercise, for children starting Primary 1 in 2028, most schools reserve more places for families with no connection to the school. At 12 named schools, living within 1km no longer puts you ahead of a family 1.9km away. If you are paying extra to live close to one of those 12, that premium now buys less than it did. This guide covers what changed, which schools are affected, what it means at each distance, and which projects sit inside the new 2km line. Every distance was measured, not read off a map.

Two changes, one announcement

More Phase 2C places at most schools

Phase 2C is the phase open to every child, whatever their connection to the school. Its reserved places go from 40 to 60. Schools with fewer than 180 Primary 1 places keep 40. Phase 2B keeps its 20. MOE says the extra 20 places come from those that would otherwise have gone to earlier phases. Families eligible for Phase 2A and 2B are still admitted ahead of Phase 2C.

A two-track Phase 2C at 12 schools

The second change applies at 12 schools where public housing is less than 40% of the homes within 2km. There, Phase 2C is split equally into two tracks: one for children living within 2km, one for children living beyond 2km. Neither track has any distance priority. An oversubscribed track goes to ballot, and places one track can't fill flow to Singapore Citizen applicants in the other. Families themselves never switch tracks.

Source: MOE, Annex B to the 10 September 2026 announcement. Singapore Citizens are admitted before Permanent Residents throughout. At the 12 two-track schools, PR children are considered only once every citizen in both tracks has a place. Any places Phase 2A leaves unfilled still go one-third to 2B and two-thirds to 2C, so the real number of 2C places can be higher than 60.

The 12 schools on the two-track list

Source: MOE, Annex A to the 10 September 2026 announcement. MOE will review the list periodically as the housing around each school changes, but says it does not expect frequent changes.

Why a family 500m away loses its edge

Under the current rules, Phase 2C admits Singapore Citizens in distance order: everyone within 1km first, then 1km to 2km, then everyone further out. A band only goes to ballot when it's oversubscribed. That ordering is what the premium on homes near popular schools has always paid for.

At the 12 schools, the ordering inside 2km is gone. The illustration below keeps the same 60 places and the same families, and changes only the rules:

Illustration only: 60 Phase 2C places, every applicant a Singapore Citizen, no places flowing in from Phase 2A. How many families apply to each track is the whole question, and nobody will know until the 2027 exercise runs.

MOE’s own example shows how places move between tracks. A school has 30 places in each. Forty citizens apply from within 2km and 25 from beyond. All 25 beyond-2km families are admitted, the 5 unused places cross over, and the 40 families within 2km ballot for 35.

The projects inside the new 2km line

A Huttons briefing on the change named new and recent projects near five of the 12 schools. “Within 2km” is easy to get wrong from a map, so I measured every one myself, block by block, using OneMap, the Singapore Land Authority’s mapping service that MOE also uses.

How to read the tables. Each figure is the straight-line distance in kilometres from the school to the project’s nearest block, with a range where blocks differ. MOE measures from the edge of the school’s grounds to the edge of your building, which always gives a shorter figure. So green figures, under 1.95km, are inside 2km on any measure. Amber figures, 1.95km to 2.5km, are too close to call from a map. A dash means more than 2.5km.

Checked against the official bands, in two places. I then ran every block through OneMap’s School Query, which holds MOE’s own home-school distances, and again through MOE’s SchoolFinder, which shows parents the same data. The two agreed on all 71 addresses. The current data dates from June 2026 and covers children entering Primary 1 in 2027. Where it settles an amber figure, the cell says OneMap: within or OneMap: beyond. All 26 green figures it covers are inside 2km there too, so the method held. Amber cells still marked “check” are addresses OneMap does not list yet. Bands can move between years, so check your own unit’s address in the year you register.

Bukit Timah and Holland

Amberwood at Holland, which I market, is 0.7km to 0.8km from Methodist Girls’ School (Primary) and 1.6km to 1.7km from Pei Hwa Presbyterian. Both are on the list. Under the old rules that would have put its address in MGS’s first-priority band. Under the new ones it sits in the within-2km track at both schools, level with every other family inside 2km. You should hear that from me before you pay for it, not after. Raffles Girls’ Primary, at 2.0km to 2.1km, is too close to call, and the official data cannot settle it yet: none of Amberwood’s twelve addresses is in the June 2026 data, and OneMap and MOE’s SchoolFinder both return nothing for them. Across the pairs in these tables that OneMap does settle, every one measured at 2.05km or less came back inside 2km, and every one from 2.12km came back outside. Amberwood’s nearest block to Raffles Girls’ is 2.05km, right where that line falls. Nanyang Primary, at 2.3km, is in the range where every checked pair came back beyond 2km.

Katong and Marine Parade

Three things stand out in the east. First, Ardor Residence is 160m from Tanjong Katong Primary and The Line @ Tanjong Rhu is 1.9km away, yet they are now in the same Phase 2C track for that school. Second, Grand Dunman straddles the 1km line, and OneMap confirms it: six of its nine addresses are within 1km of Tanjong Katong Primary, and the three at 2, 4 and 6 Dunman Road are between 1km and 2km. Under the old rules the block you chose would have decided your band; for Tanjong Katong Primary it no longer does. Third, Claydence is inside 2km of all four schools in the table, within 1km of CHIJ (Katong) and Tao Nan on OneMap. That gives a family four within-2km ballots to consider.

Orchard, and the other projects I market

Upperhouse at Orchard Boulevard is 2.05km from Anglo-Chinese School (Junior), 2.12km from Singapore Chinese Girls’ Primary and 2.23km from Anglo-Chinese School (Primary). OneMap settles all three: within 2km of Anglo-Chinese School (Junior), and beyond 2km of the other two.

The other five projects I market are Newport Residences, W Residences Marina View, One Marina Gardens, Hudson Place Residences and Thomson Reserve. On the same measurement, every one is more than 3km from each of the 12 schools; the closest pairing is W Residences Marina View, 3.1km from St. Margaret’s. Buyers there fall in the beyond-2km track at all 12, and from 2027 that track holds half of Phase 2C. Thomson Reserve is also within 1km of Ai Tong School, which is not on the list, so that priority works exactly as before.

Timing: when a new launch address counts

Most of the projects above are still under construction. MOE accepts the address of a property you have bought but not yet moved into only if its vacant or delivery possession date is within two years of your child entering Primary 1. That is the date in your Sale and Purchase agreement, not an expected completion date. MOE’s example: a child registering in 2026 needs a possession date no later than 31 December 2028. On the same rule, a child registering in the 2027 exercise needs one no later than 31 December 2029.

If your child wins a place through home-school distance using that address, you must live there for at least 30 months from the day you move in. Otherwise MOE transfers the child to a school of its choosing. The announcement does not say how this rule applies to the two tracks. Until MOE says otherwise, I would plan as if it applies in full.

What I would tell you over coffee

Check the list before you pay for proximity. Near one of the 12 schools, a home at 500m and a home at 1.9km now stand level in Phase 2C. Whether prices adjust to that gap is something we will only see in transactions over the next year. The rule itself has already changed.

At every other school, 1km matters as much as ever. The first-priority band now has 60 reserved places behind it at most schools instead of 40. If your target school is not on the list, the old logic still holds.

Phase 2C is not the only door. A sibling in the school, an alumni link, or a Phase 2B route still comes ahead of any address. For some families that is worth more than the location of the flat.

Do not buy a home for one ballot. Citizenship, your child’s registration phase, how popular the school has been, and what you can comfortably afford all matter more than a line on a map. A ballot is a ballot. A home is a ten-year decision.

The list can change. MOE will review it as the housing around each school changes. It expects that to be slow, but a home bought mainly for one school on the list carries that risk too.

Frequently asked questions

Sources: MOE, Enhancing the Primary One Registration Framework for Greater Access and Inclusivity (10 September 2026), with Annex A (the 12 schools) and Annex B (the revised framework). MOE, Changes to the P1 Registration Framework (updated 11 September 2026), which also carries the two-track example. MOE, Address used for P1 registration, for the possession-date and 30-month rules. OneMap’s School Query, June 2026 data, queried for every block in the tables on 11 September 2026, and cross-checked the same day against MOE’s SchoolFinder, which agreed on all 71 addresses. The briefing that prompted this article was a Huttons presentation on the change. All were checked on 11 September 2026. Distances in this article were measured by Andee Ching on 11 September 2026 from OneMap’s geocoded points for each school and each block. They are not MOE’s official home-school distance, which is measured from the school boundary to the building outline, is published only on the OneMap School Query, and can change from year to year. Always check your exact address there in the year of registration. The admission illustration is arithmetic on stated assumptions, not a forecast. This article is general information only and does not constitute advice. Registration rules are set by MOE and can change; confirm the current position at moe.gov.sg before you rely on it. Andee Ching, CEA No. R071050B, Huttons Asia Pte Ltd, Licence No. L3008899K.