How Do You Access Your HSC Results? NESA and UAC Guide

You access your NSW HSC results through NESA’s Students Online account. NESA also sends your results by email and SMS. Your ATAR, if you are eligible for one, is issued separately by the Universities Admissions Centre (UAC). You’ll need a different login to access it.

So, if you can see your HSC marks in Students Online, should you expect your ATAR to appear on the same page? No. NESA and UAC manage different parts of the results process, and each has its own account details.

For the 2026 HSC cohort, NESA lists Wednesday 16 December 2026 as the HSC results release date. UAC will make 2026 ATARs available from 9 am on the same day. If you’re reading this for another cohort, check the latest NESA HSC key dates and UAC ATAR information, rather than relying on an earlier year’s dates.

01Which website do you need?

The easiest way to avoid confusion is to start with the document or result you’re looking for.

The distinction is straightforward:

• NESA manages your HSC results, student records and HSC credentials.
• UAC calculates and issues your ATAR for university admissions.
• CredFolio provides an optional digital wallet for your ATAR credential.

You don’t need to submit a university application to have an ATAR calculated. UAC calculates ATARs for all students who meet its eligibility requirements.

Your HSC marks, performance bands and ATAR also represent different things. If you’re unsure how they relate, read HSC Marks, Performance Bands and ATAR: What Each Means.

02How to access your HSC results through NESA

Your main destination is Students Online.

NSW students in Years 10-12 are eligible for a Students Online account. NESA automatically creates the account once your school supplies the necessary details, but you need to activate it before you can log in.

It’s worth doing this before results day. Discovering that you’ve forgotten your PIN while thousands of other students are trying to access their results isn’t ideal.

Step 1: Activate your Students Online account

If you’ve never logged in before, visit the Students Online activation page.

You’ll need:

• Your NESA Student Number.
• The email address or mobile number registered with NESA.
• Your date of birth.

Follow the prompts to receive a verification code. Once your details have been verified, you can create your six-digit NESA PIN.

Keep your Student Number and PIN somewhere secure. You’ll need both to access your results.

If activation fails, contact your school. It may need to check that your email address has been entered correctly in NESA’s Schools Online system. Your given names must also match the details officially recorded by your school.

Step 2: Log in to view your results

If you’ve already activated your account, you can go directly to Students Online and log in using:

1. Your NESA Student Number.
2. Your six-digit NESA PIN.

Once results are released, you’ll be able to view your HSC results in your account.

NESA also sends results by email and SMS, but logging in is a useful way to access your full results rather than relying on a notification.

Step 3: What if you’ve forgotten your NESA PIN?

You don’t need to remember your original PIN forever.

If you’ve forgotten it, use the Students Online forgotten PIN service.

NESA can send a verification code to your registered email address or mobile number. You’ll use this code to create a new six-digit PIN.

For security reasons, NESA won’t simply display or email your old PIN.

If you no longer have access to either registered contact method, contact your school to check your details and ask NESA for assistance.

If you’ve forgotten your NESA Student Number, use the forgotten Student Number option on Students Online or contact your school.

You can also contact the NESA Student Enquiry Centre on 1300 13 83 23.

03Don’t confuse your NESA PIN with your UAC PIN

This is one of the easiest mistakes to make when preparing to access your results.

Both services use your Year 12 student number, but they require different PINs.

Your UAC PIN is not your NESA PIN. Entering your six-digit NESA PIN into the UAC login won’t work.

There is also a separate nine-digit UAC application number. If you’ve applied for university through UAC, you’ll receive this number after completing the relevant application details. It’s used when contacting UAC about your application, not as a replacement for your ATAR login credentials.

How to access your ATAR through UAC

Your ATAR is accessed through the UAC website.

For the 2026 HSC cohort, you’ll need:

• Your eight-digit NESA Student Number.
• Your four-digit UAC PIN.

UAC emailed the 2026 UAC PIN on 8 April 2026 to the email address registered with NESA.

If you can’t find it, check your inbox and junk folder for the original email from UAC. If you’ve lost the PIN, contact UAC on (02) 9752 0200.

For students completing the 2026 HSC, UAC has confirmed that ATAR access begins at 9 am on Wednesday 16 December 2026.

When you log in, you can view your ATAR and download your official ATAR Advice Notice.

If you have applied for university, remember that accessing your ATAR and receiving a university offer are separate processes. You manage your application, course preferences and offers through your UAC application. Individual universities and other institutions may also have their own course requirements.

You can find more information in UAC’s guide to undergraduate applications and offers.

Can you receive your ATAR through CredFolio?

Yes. UAC also offers a free digital credential through CredFolio.

For the 2026 cohort, UAC advises that students will receive an invitation email a couple of days before ATAR release.

The email address depends on your circumstances:

• If you’ve submitted a UAC application, the invitation goes to the email address in your UAC application.
• If you haven’t submitted a UAC application, the invitation goes to the email address registered with NESA.

The invitation contains instructions and a unique registration code. Once you’ve registered, you can access your digital wallet through the CredFolio app or web application.

On ATAR release day, UAC will issue your ATAR credential to your wallet and send a confirmation email.

This is an additional way to access your ATAR. You can still log in through the UAC website and download your official ATAR Advice Notice.

04Check your contact details before results day

Having the correct login details is only half the job. You also need to make sure NESA and UAC can contact you.

Your school email address might stop working after you finish Year 12. If that’s the only email address attached to your account, you could miss important communications.

Log in to Students Online and open your personal details.

Check these four things:

NESA allows you to update your email address, mobile number and postal address yourself through Students Online.

There is one important exception: your school must update your name for you. If your name is incorrect, contact your school rather than assuming you can edit it yourself.

Also check your UAC contact details separately if you’ve applied for university. Updating your NESA email address does not mean you should assume your UAC application contact details have also changed.

This matters particularly if you’re expecting your CredFolio invitation, which goes to your UAC application email if you’re a UAC applicant.

A practical account preparation checklist

Before results are released, work through the following:

• [ ] Activate your Students Online account if you haven’t already.
• [ ] Confirm that you can log in using your NESA Student Number and six-digit PIN.
• [ ] Check your personal email address and mobile number.
• [ ] Confirm that your postal address is correct.
• [ ] Ask your school to correct any errors in your recorded name.
• [ ] Locate your four-digit UAC PIN if you’re part of the 2026 cohort.
• [ ] Check that your UAC application contact details are current, if applicable.
• [ ] Bookmark the official NESA and UAC results pages.
• [ ] Keep your login details somewhere secure.

Don’t share your student number, PINs or date of birth publicly. Only enter these details on the official NESA and UAC websites.

05What happens after your HSC results are released?

Once results are available, there are a few different documents you might want to download.

Your NESA HSC credentials

Through Students Online, open the Certificates/eRecord section.

You can download your NESA and eligible VET credentials as free PDF documents.

Your HSC credentials include:

• Your HSC Testamur, which is your official HSC certificate.
• Your Record of Achievement (RoA), showing your Year 10, Year 11 and Year 12 results.
• Personalised course reports for your HSC subjects.

Eligible students also receive a hard copy of their HSC Testamur by mail, with delivery beginning from the end of January.

If you need additional printed or certified copies, you can order them through the Results Services section of Students Online for a fee.

Download your documents before your account closes

This is an important detail that students sometimes overlook.

Your Students Online account remains active until 30 June of the year after you complete your final HSC course.

For the 2026 HSC cohort, this means your account closes on 30 June 2027.

Download and save your HSC credentials before then. Keep copies somewhere you can access independently of your school account.

If you need replacement results or certificates after your account closes, you’ll need to follow NESA’s separate replacement and results services procedures.

06What if you have trouble accessing your results?

The best next step depends on which service is causing the problem.

The relevant contact details are:

• NESA Student Enquiry Centre: 1300 13 83 23.
• UAC Customer Service: (02) 9752 0200.

If you need to provide your results to a university, scholarship provider or another organisation, check exactly which documents it accepts. An official NESA PDF or UAC ATAR Advice Notice is preferable to assuming that a screenshot of your results page will meet its requirements.

07Questions and solutions

The following scenarios test whether you can identify the right account, recover access and distinguish between the different results documents.

Question 1

Mia has finished her HSC and wants to check her English Advanced HSC mark and performance band. She also wants to download her full Record of Achievement.

Which website should she use, and where should she look for the downloadable document?

Solution 1

Mia should use NESA’s Students Online account for both tasks.

She can log in using her NESA Student Number and six-digit NESA PIN to access her HSC results.

To download her Record of Achievement, she should open the Certificates/eRecord section of the account.

She doesn’t need to use UAC because UAC provides ATAR information, not the subject-by-subject HSC results and credentials.

Question 2

Daniel can remember his eight-digit NESA Student Number and has successfully logged in to Students Online before.

However, he’s forgotten his six-digit NESA PIN. His registered email address is still accessible, but his mobile number has changed.

He also has a four-digit UAC PIN saved from an earlier email.

Explain how Daniel should regain access to Students Online and whether his saved UAC PIN can replace his forgotten NESA PIN.

Solution 2

Daniel should use the Students Online forgotten PIN service and verify his identity through his registered email address.

He can then create a new six-digit NESA PIN. Once he has done this, he should log in and update his mobile number.

His four-digit UAC PIN cannot replace his NESA PIN.

The two PINs belong to different systems. Even though both accounts use the same student number, each service checks its own PIN.

Daniel should retain both credentials separately:

• Six-digit NESA PIN for Students Online.
• Four-digit UAC PIN for accessing his ATAR through UAC.

Question 3

Sophie is completing the 2026 HSC. On 16 December, she logs in to Students Online and can see her subject results.

At 9:15 am, she still can’t find her ATAR anywhere in her NESA account. She assumes something has gone wrong with her results.

What should she do next? Explain which login details she needs and what it means if UAC reports that she is not ATAR-eligible.

Solution 3

Sophie should access her ATAR through UAC, not Students Online.

NESA and UAC provide separate results. Seeing her HSC marks in Students Online does not mean that her ATAR will appear there.

For the 2026 cohort, UAC makes ATARs available from 9 am on 16 December. Sophie needs her eight-digit NESA Student Number and four-digit UAC PIN.

If UAC reports that she is not ATAR-eligible, this does not necessarily indicate a technical problem. UAC calculates ATARs for students who meet its eligibility requirements. Students who don’t meet those requirements will have their status recorded as not eligible.

She should check the relevant eligibility information with UAC and speak to her school if she believes her course entries or eligibility details are incorrect.

Question 4

Jack checks his Students Online personal details and discovers three problems:

• His school email address is no longer accessible.
• His postal address has changed.
• His surname is spelt incorrectly.

He also wants to make sure his hard-copy HSC Testamur is delivered to the correct address.

Which changes can Jack make himself, and which one requires his school?

Solution 4

Jack can update his email address and postal address himself through Students Online. He should also check and update his mobile number if necessary.

However, he must contact his school to correct the spelling of his surname.

NESA requires the school to update a student’s name in its records. Jack shouldn’t assume that changing his other personal details will automatically correct his name.

His postal address is particularly important because NESA uses the address recorded in Students Online when sending the hard-copy HSC Testamur.

He should resolve the spelling error before his credentials are finalised, as incorrect details can cause problems with official documents and may require a replacement.

Question 5

Ella is completing the 2026 HSC and has already applied to university through UAC.

She can log in to Students Online using her NESA Student Number and six-digit PIN. In November, she changes her NESA email address from her school email to a personal account.

However, her UAC application still has her old school email address. She also cannot find the four-digit UAC PIN that was emailed to her in April.

On results day, Ella wants to access her HSC results and ATAR, register for CredFolio, and send official evidence of her results to a scholarship provider.

She makes three assumptions:

1. Updating her NESA email automatically updates her UAC application email.
2. Her six-digit NESA PIN should work for accessing her ATAR.
3. Her HSC documents will remain available in Students Online indefinitely, so she doesn’t need to download them immediately.

Identify the errors in Ella’s assumptions and explain the correct sequence of actions she should take.

Solution 5

Ella needs to manage her NESA and UAC details separately. None of her three assumptions is correct.

The important issue is that the same student number is used across both systems, but the accounts, PINs and contact details serve different purposes.

First, she should check both email addresses.

Changing her NESA email address does not automatically update the email associated with her UAC application.

She should log in to her UAC application and check that its contact details are correct.

This is particularly important for CredFolio. Because Ella has submitted a UAC application, her CredFolio invitation will be sent to the email address recorded in that application, not necessarily her updated NESA email address.

Second, she needs to recover her UAC PIN.

Her six-digit NESA PIN is only for Students Online.

For the 2026 cohort, UAC emailed the four-digit UAC PIN on 8 April to the email address registered with NESA at that time.

Ella should check the inbox and junk folder of her previous school email account for that message.

If she cannot recover the PIN, she should contact UAC on (02) 9752 0200. She must use the separate four-digit UAC PIN with her eight-digit NESA Student Number to access her ATAR.

Third, she needs to access each result through the correct service.

On 16 December 2026, she should:

• Log in to Students Online to access her HSC results.
• Open the Certificates/eRecord section to download her HSC credentials.
• Log in to UAC from 9 am using her NESA Student Number and UAC PIN to access her ATAR and download the official ATAR Advice Notice.
• Follow the CredFolio invitation instructions sent to her UAC application email.

She should then check the scholarship provider’s instructions to determine which official documents it requires. She shouldn’t assume that a screenshot or one document will satisfy every evidence requirement.

Finally, she needs to save her documents before her NESA account closes.

For the 2026 HSC cohort, Students Online closes on 30 June 2027.

Ella should download and securely save her HSC credentials well before that date. Her official ATAR Advice Notice can also be downloaded through UAC.

The key lesson is that sharing a student number does not make NESA and UAC one account. Each organisation manages its own information, access arrangements and documents.

Once you’ve accessed and saved your results, the next useful step is understanding what each number actually tells you. Your HSC marks, performance bands and ATAR have different purposes, particularly when you’re considering university admission. You can explore that distinction in HSC Marks, Performance Bands and ATAR: What Each Means.