Reading has played 34 seasons in the divisions covered here since 1992/93: 3 in the Premier League, 22 in the Championship and 9 in League One. It has been in League One since 2023/24 (3 seasons), after 10 seasons in the Championship. Its best finish was 8th in the Premier League, in 2006/07. Its biggest climb took five seasons: from 2nd in League One in 2001/02 to 8th in the Premier League in 2006/07. It has been promoted 4 times and relegated 4 times.
Reading
2025/26: 12th in League One
How high can Reading realistically go?
Based on finishing 12th in League One in 2025/26
About 4 in 10
Of the 152 times a club finished in the top half of League One without going up between 2004/05 and 2020/21, 58 went up within five seasons.
58 of 152 (38%); likely range 26%–50%, 52 different clubs.
| Reached the top flight within ten seasons | about 1 in 6 17 of 108; range 5%–28% |
Reading itself: none of the last 10 seasons in the Premier League.
How do we know?
We took every season since 2004/05 in which a club finished in the same part of the same league, and followed each club forward. The figure is the share that reached each goal. Ten-year goals use finishes from 2004/05 to 2015/16, five-year goals from 2004/05 to 2020/21, so every case has had the full time to play out; results run to the end of 2025/26.
It describes what happened to clubs in this position, not a forecast for one club. A club with much more money or history than is usual for its position has better chances than the figure suggests, which is why the club's own record is shown underneath.
The likely range is a 95% interval worked out by resampling clubs rather than seasons, because the same club often appears several times. It is wide where only a few clubs have been in a position, and two leagues whose ranges overlap may not really differ. Reserve teams such as Barcelona B or Real Madrid Castilla are left out of these counts, because they cannot be promoted into their first team's division.
Counts: went up within five seasons: 58 of 152; reached the top flight within ten seasons: 17 of 108.
The story so far
Final position each seasonRinged dots are titles
How to read this chart
Every club in the divisions covered is placed on one ladder each season: the champions are 1st, and the top club of the second division comes straight after the bottom club of the first. Shaded bands are the divisions. Hover over or tap a dot for the season.
34seasons since 1992/93
3seasons in the Premier League
0league titles
0top-four finishes
4promotions
4relegations
Against the money
Finished 6 places below its money
Over 10 seasons, Reading finished on average 5.9 places lower than clubs with the same wage bill usually finish. The gap is too large to be put down to chance. It finished above its money in 1 of 10 seasons with published figures.
3 seasons followed relegation and came with parachute payments; they are included.
£24mwage bill, 2022/23
30thhighest of 39 clubs with published accounts
20thfinish in the Championship, 2022/23
Where Reading finishedWhere its wage bill normally finishes
Season by season
| Season | Finish | Wage bill | Wage rank | Places above its money |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022/23 | 20th, Championship | £24m | 30th of 39 | -6.0 |
| 2021/22 | 22nd, Championship | £25m | 29th of 38 | -9.0 |
| 2019/20 | 15th, Championship | £38m | 25th of 39 | -4.7 |
| 2018/19 | 20th, Championship | £41m | 26th of 37 | -12.8 |
| 2017/18 | 20th, Championship | £35m | 27th of 35 | -10.2 |
| 2016/17 | 3rd, Championship | £28m | 26th of 33 | +8.7 |
| 2015/16 | 17th, Championship | £31m | 24th of 36 | -9.1 |
| 2014/15 | 19th, Championship | £33m | 22nd of 38 | -12.4 |
| 2013/14 | 7th, Championship | £35m | 22nd of 36 | -2.4 |
| 2012/13 | 19th, Premier League | £46m | 17th of 34 | -1.1 |
How do we know?
For every season, we compare each club's wage bill with the average in the top two divisions, and work out the finish that wage bill usually brings, allowing for differences between seasons and assuming a bigger wage bill never lowers the expected finish. The gap between that and the actual finish, averaged over the seasons, is the figure above. An overall verdict needs at least eight seasons, and a signed number is given only when the gap is clearly larger than chance.
Wage bills are the staff costs in each club's statutory accounts at Companies House (all staff, not only players), read without any language model and checked against the note's own components and the next year's accounts. Seasons where two readings disagree by more than 2% are left out.
On average, most of a big over-performance fades: clubs that finished at least four places above their money (on average 6.4 places) were +2.0 places the next season, so about 69% of it disappeared and the rest persisted. Some clubs beat their money season after season. It mixes good management, luck and resources the measure cannot see, so it is not a score for how well a club is run.
Clubs with a similar path
Clubs whose finishing positions over the last 15 seasons were closest to Reading's, with recent seasons counting more.
In England
BarnsleyEngland · 15th in League One, 2025/26Wigan AthleticEngland · 16th in League One, 2025/26Queens Park RangersEngland · 15th in the Championship, 2025/26Cardiff CityEngland · 2nd in League One, 2025/26
Elsewhere in Europe
Valenciennes FCFrance · not in the divisions covered nowNancyFrance · 14th in Ligue 2, 2025/26CD LugoSpain · not in the divisions covered now
Compare Reading with another club
Sources
- Final tables to 2025/26. Top-flight positions follow the official classification, including head-to-head tie-breaks and point deductions. Lower-division positions before 2025/26 are worked out from match results and can differ from official tables where points were deducted.
- Relegations include dropping out of the divisions covered.
- All figures can be downloaded on the data page. Spotted a mistake? Report it with a source.