The Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) used by UK students to see their A-Level results has gone down on the day grades have been announced.

The system is used to track university applications, so would let students know if they have gotten into their first choice of university.

For many students, the A-Levels (equivalent to AP examinations in the US) were their first standardized test due to Covid-19 lockdowns. Grades in England fell over previous years as the country has begun to enforce stricter marking in an effort to stop grade inflation. Scores in Wales and Northern Ireland have a phased return to pre-pandemic grading, and were not impacted.

But many students in all three countries have been unable to see whether harsher marking has impacted their own scores, with the website intermittently down.

UCAS warned that "high traffic volumes [means that] it takes a little longer than normal" for the website to load.