Longitudinal Education Outcomes data, produced jointly by the Department for Education and HMRC, links student records to tax returns. Unlike survey-based data, LEO captures earnings for virtually all graduates who are in UK employment - making it the most complete picture of what graduates actually earn.
How LEO is collected
HMRC matches the student record held by HESA to the individual's P60 tax return. This gives annualised earnings from PAYE employment. Self-employment earnings are also included where available from Self Assessment returns. The data is published in cohort groups, typically covering earnings at one, three, and five years after graduation.
What the five-year figure represents
The five-year median on CourseMap shows the earnings midpoint for graduates who completed their degree roughly five years before the data year. A median of £32,000 means half of that course's graduates were earning above £32,000 and half were earning below.
Tip: Always look at the lower quartile alongside the median. If the median is £32,000 but the lower quartile is £18,000, a significant share of graduates from that course are earning substantially less than the headline suggests.
LEO versus the GO survey
The Graduate Outcomes survey asks graduates to self-report their salary 15 months after finishing. Response rates vary, and some groups are more likely to respond than others. LEO avoids this bias because it comes from tax records rather than a voluntary survey. As a result, LEO five-year data tends to be more reliable than GO salary data for comparison purposes.
Limitations to keep in mind
LEO captures earnings in the UK only. Graduates who moved abroad, those in certain public sector roles paid via different schemes, and some self-employed people may not appear fully in the data. Subjects with high rates of overseas employment - international business, some engineering specialisms - may show lower LEO earnings than their true global market value.