Five of the county's top schools have ranked highly in a prestigious schools guide.

The Sunday Times has listed the top performing schools in the South East in its Parent Power Schools Guide 2018.

This year's is the 25th edition of the list, which identifies the 2,000 highest achieving schools in the UK, ranked according to recent exam results.

Sevenoaks School has improved on previous performance and is now ranked as fourth in the top 10 independent schools in the South East.

In fact, it's improved so much that it jumped nine places in the national rankings, reaching eighth in the county for independent schools.

The Sunday Times editorial team has also selected the school as its Independent School of the Year, a national accolade it had previously won in 2007.

The High Street school is one of the oldest non-denominational schools in the county, having been founded in 1432.

It caters for students aged between 11 and 18, and pupils achieved impressive results this summer both at GCSE and A-level.

Almost 98% of exam entries achieved grades A* to B at A-level, and 94.2% attained A* and A grades at GCSE.

Sevenoaks School is the only independent school in Kent listed in the top 10 of the guide.

Alastair McCall, editor of Parent Power, said: "Consistent academic excellence lies behind Sevenoaks’ triumph in our premier independent schools’ award, 10 years on from its previous title success.

"Under the dynamic leadership of Katy Ricks, the school has gone from strength to strength and offers its pupils an outstanding environment in which they can develop, both inside the classroom out.

"Inspiration drives aspiration in this school, which thoroughly deserves its latest accolade."

As well as crunching the numbers of academic results on a school-by-school basis, the parent power part of the guide enables parents to compare the performance of a given school with other schools in the same town, local authority, or nationally.

Top performers in Kent in the state secondaries rankings include Tonbridge Grammar School, The Judd School, Dartford Grammar School, and Rochester Grammar School.

Tonbridge Grammar lost out on the top spot to Reading School, with 91.7% of exam entries at A-level getting A* to B grades, and 81.7% achieving A* and A grades at GCSE.

The girls school has slipped slightly in the national rankings this year, from fifth place last year to ninth place in 2017.

Another Tonbridge school performing well is the Judd School, which is placed third in the top 10 state secondaries in the South East.

The school has made good progress in the national rankings too, ranking 22nd in 2016 and 13th this year.

Dartford Grammar School enjoyed impressive results this summer, with 91% of A-level entries achieving a B or better, and 71.2% of GCSEs getting an A or A*.

The West Hill school ranks fourth in the top 10.

Rochester Grammar School is ninth in the South East state secondaries and 43rd nationally, with 81.2% of A-levels being A* to B grades, and 65.2% of GCSEs rated as an A* or A.

The full guide will be published in this weekend's Sunday Times or to see it now click here.