Falling birthrates will ease competition for primary school places, figures suggest ahead of the application deadline.

Parents who want to get their children into their first choice primary schools will face less competition this autumn because of falling birthrates coupled with an increase in places.

England's school system had been under pressure in recent years due to a rise in the school-age population, fuelled by a rise in the birth rate in the early 2000s.

But this has now made its way through primary schools and is moving into secondaries with primary school-age population since 2009 stabilising as births have fallen since 2013.

The nursery and primary school population reached 4.64 million in 2018 but was projected to plateau at 4.66 million last year before starting to fall.

However, many primaries expanded to keep pace with demand, with three more primary schools last year than in 2018 and 600 more classes, up from 158,278 in 2018 to 158,851.

The Department for Education had also previously said that it is creating more school places, in part through its free schools programme.

Parents have until today to register their child at their preferred school.

Department for Education (DfE) statistics show that in 2019, 90.6% of children got offered a place at their first choice of primary school.