Rating characteristics are descriptions of what outstanding, good, requires improvement and inadequate care looks like in each sector. They are a genuinely new element in CQC's draft assessment frameworks, published 24 March 2026. They matter more than the change in question wording, because they carry the weight that numerical scoring used to carry — and CQC is removing scoring at the same time.
Why this is the change to watch
Most commentary on CQC's reform has focused on the visible things: one framework becoming four, and quality statements being replaced by key lines of enquiry. Those are real. But they are largely a re-organisation of questions that already existed.
Rating characteristics are different. Nothing in the current framework does this job. And they arrive precisely as CQC removes the mechanism that previously connected evidence to a rating.
For the full picture of what is changing and when, see our pillar guide to CQC's new assessment frameworks. This page goes deeper on the one element that has no predecessor.
How ratings are reached today — and what is being removed
Under the Single Assessment Framework currently in force, evidence is scored on a four-point scale. Those scores build a score for each quality statement. Quality statement scores build a score for each key question. Key question scores produce the rating.
It is a chain of arithmetic. Its great virtue is that it is traceable: a provider can, in principle, see which evidence category dragged which quality statement down.
CQC's March 2026 update records that consultation feedback "showed support for our proposal to remove scoring from our assessment methodology and make rating judgements directly at key question level. The rating characteristics will therefore support this change."
Read that second sentence carefully. Scoring is not simply being deleted — it is being replaced. Rating characteristics are the replacement.
Where they came from
CQC did not derive rating characteristics from the existing framework. It built them from the ground up: through online and in-person engagement it asked people what good quality care looks like, developed the rating characteristics for good from those answers, then defined the other three levels around that.
That order of construction is worth noticing. "Good" is the anchor, described in the words of people who use services. Outstanding, requires improvement and inadequate are defined by reference to it.
What this changes in practice
Three things follow, and none of them is cosmetic.
1. Judgement moves up a level
Ratings will be made directly at key question level. There is no longer an arithmetic path from an individual piece of evidence up to the rating. An assessor forms a judgement against a description.
2. "What good looks like" becomes a published document, not an inference
Today, providers reverse-engineer expectations from quality statements, evidence categories and published reports. Under the new frameworks, CQC will have written down what each rating level looks like in your sector. That is genuinely more useful to a provider than a score — provided you read it.
3. The nature of a challenge changes
Challenging a scored judgement means disputing a step in a chain. Challenging a characteristic-based judgement means arguing that your service matches a different description. That is a different kind of conversation, and it puts more weight on narrative evidence — what your service is actually like — rather than on whether a particular box was ticked.
They will differ by sector — and that is the point
There will be four frameworks: adult social care, mental health, primary care and community, and hospitals and specialist services. The five key questions stay common across all four. The questions beneath them, and the rating characteristics, will not be.
If you hold registrations in more than one sector, this is the item to plan for. Today one framework covers you. From implementation, the same organisation could be assessed against materially different descriptions of "good" depending on which registration is being looked at. Map those differences before implementation rather than after.
What to do now
- Read the draft characteristics for your sector when CQC publishes the finals. This is the single most direct statement of expectations the regulator has ever produced. Most providers will not read it. That is the opportunity.
- Stop optimising for the score. Any internal process built around predicting a numerical outcome has a limited shelf life.
- Strengthen narrative evidence. If judgements are made against descriptions of what care looks like, then what your care actually looks like — observed, described, evidenced by people who use the service — carries more weight than it did.
- If you are multi-sector, start the mapping now. It is the one piece of work that gets materially harder if left until implementation.
- Do not rewrite your evidence library yet. These are drafts, in pilot over summer 2026.
A caution on timing
Everything above is drawn from CQC's draft frameworks, published 24 March 2026, with the consultation closing 12 June 2026. CQC is piloting them over summer 2026 with implementation expected at the end of the year. Detail will change. We update this page monthly.
Our free CQC quality statements crosswalk maps all 34 current quality statements onto the four draft frameworks, so you can see what moves where — and we will rebuild it when the finals land.
Frequently asked questions
What are CQC rating characteristics?
Descriptions of what outstanding, good, requires improvement and inadequate care looks like in each sector. They are new in CQC's draft assessment frameworks and support rating judgements made directly at key question level.
Are rating characteristics replacing quality statements?
No. Quality statements are being replaced by key lines of enquiry framed as structured questions. Rating characteristics sit alongside those questions and describe what each rating level looks like. They are closer to a replacement for scoring than for quality statements.
Is CQC really removing scoring?
That is the proposal in the draft frameworks, and CQC's March 2026 update records consultation support for it, with rating judgements made directly at key question level instead. It is not yet implemented.
Will rating characteristics be the same for every service?
No. The five key questions remain common across all four frameworks, but the rating characteristics are sector-specific. Multi-sector providers should map the differences.
When does this take effect?
The frameworks are drafts published 24 March 2026, piloted over summer 2026, with implementation expected at the end of 2026. Until then the Single Assessment Framework remains in force.
Related: everything changing in CQC assessment 2026–27 · how CQC ratings work today · what the CQC is and how it regulates
Sources: CQC, our March update (draft sector frameworks, scoring removal and rating characteristics); CQC, May 2026 update; CQC, the assessment framework. All framework detail is from CQC's DRAFT documents. Last reviewed: 30 July 2026.