The Care Certificate online: the 16 standards, who awards it and what employers check

What the Care Certificate is

Skills for Care describes the Care Certificate standards as defining "the knowledge, skills and behaviours expected of specific job roles in health and social care". They are for people who are new to care, and they shape what an induction covers.

The standards were updated in March 2025. Skills for Care says the update aligned them "with sector developments and the introduction of the Level 2 Adult Social Care Certificate qualification". A sixteenth standard was added: awareness of learning disability and autism.

The Care Certificate is not a qualification. It does not sit on the Ofqual register. The related qualification is the Level 2 Adult Social Care Certificate, which Skills for Care says "is based on the same 16 Care Certificate standards but builds, deepens and consolidates the knowledge and understanding".

The 16 standards

• 1. Understand your role
• 2. Your personal development
• 3. Duty of care
• 4. Equality, diversity, inclusion and human rights
• 5. Work in a person-centred way
• 6. Communication
• 7. Privacy and dignity
• 8. Fluids and nutrition
• 9. Awareness of mental health and dementia
• 10. Adult safeguarding
• 11. Safeguarding children
• 12. Basic life support
• 13. Health and safety
• 14. Handling information
• 15. Infection prevention and control
• 16. Awareness of learning disability and autism

Standard 16 is the one added in March 2025. If you completed the Care Certificate before then, you covered 15 standards; many employers now ask existing staff to cover the new one.

Who awards it, and why online learning is only half of it

Skills for Care is direct about assessment: "Workers need to be assessed on what they know and what they do to show they understand and can carry out the standards in their role." Whoever assesses you "must have a thorough understanding of and direct experience in what you're assessing".

That gives the Care Certificate two parts:

• Knowledge. What each standard asks you to know. This can be taught and tested in many ways, including an online course with a knowledge check and final test.
• Practice. Anything a standard asks you to demonstrate, show or use. This is observed in your real work by your assessor, usually a senior colleague or manager.

When you have met all 16 standards, your employer awards the Care Certificate, normally on the national template that Skills for Care publishes. A training provider's certificate shows that you have done the knowledge part. It is evidence for your employer, not the Care Certificate itself.

What CQC expects

The Care Quality Commission does not inspect the Care Certificate as a qualification, but it does expect providers to use the standards. Its guidance on Regulation 19 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014 says: "It is expected that providers that employ healthcare assistants and social care support workers should follow the Care Certificate standards to assess their competence." The same guidance says providers "should have systems in place to assess the competence of employees before they work unsupervised in a role".

For you, that means a new employer will want to see that you have started, or completed, the Care Certificate standards, and will arrange the observed part in your first weeks. For an employer, it means keeping a record of each new starter's progress through the 16 standards, with the knowledge evidence and the observation record together.

What you can do online

Online, you can:

• Learn the knowledge for each of the 16 standards.
• Take a knowledge check on each standard and a final test.
• Get a certificate that records the standards covered, the learning hours and your completion date, which your employer files as knowledge evidence.

Online, you cannot:

• Be observed. Standards that involve moving someone, supporting someone to eat and drink, hand hygiene or basic life support need a competent person to watch you do it.
• Receive the Care Certificate itself. Your employer awards it.

Skills for Care publishes the standards, an assessor and employer guide, a self-assessment tool and the certificate template free of charge, so an employer can run the whole programme in-house. An online course is the quicker route to the knowledge part, with a test and a dated certificate at the end.

What the Lift College course covers

The Lift College Care Certificate course teaches the knowledge for all 16 standards in 16 short modules and 12 hours of learning, with a knowledge check after each module and a final test at an 80% pass mark with unlimited free retakes. Your CPD Standards Office accredited certificate (provider 51289) is issued the day you pass. It records the knowledge for all 16 standards, 12 hours of learning, your completion date and a refresh date three years on, with a unique number and a verification link. The certificate states plainly that it confirms knowledge training and that the Care Certificate is awarded by your employer.

It costs £19.99, pay once, with 14-day money back. Employers can put a team through it on a free organisation account, with a progress dashboard and a training matrix for their records.

How online Care Certificate courses compare

Here is what each provider showed on its own course page on 22 October 2026. Rival prices are as a buyer pays them.

Who it suits

• New care workers and support workers in their first weeks.
• Health care assistants and support workers new to the NHS.
• Personal assistants supporting someone at home.
• People moving into care from another sector who want the standards before they start.
• Staff who completed the Care Certificate before March 2025 and need the sixteenth standard.

Where to go next

• Weighing free against paid? Read our guide to free vs paid Care Certificate courses online.
• Comparing providers? See the best online Care Certificate courses in the UK.
• Starting in care? Our guide to mandatory training for care workers lists what else employers ask for.
• Browse all safeguarding training and care courses.

Ready for the knowledge part? See the Care Certificate course.