ATRS — The UK's Mandatory Public Register of Government Algorithmic Tools

The Algorithmic Transparency Recording Standard (ATRS) was piloted by the UK Cabinet Office in November 2021, developed with input from the Ada Lovelace Institute and the Open Data Institute after controversies such as the 2020 exam-grading algorithm that downgraded results for disadvantaged students.

Each ATRS record documents an algorithmic tool's purpose, the data it uses, its oversight arrangements and its risk tier, published in a standardised public template, so that citizens and researchers can see which algorithmic tools government bodies use and how they are governed.

In 2025, ATRS reporting became mandatory for UK central government departments and their arm's-length bodies, with a commitment to publish records for every identified in-scope tool by the end of the year.

Published records grew from a handful in the 2021-22 pilot to 59 by May 2025 and 125 by the end of 2025, according to the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and OECD.AI reporting.

Coverage still stops short of full government: local authorities and devolved administrations participate voluntarily rather than under mandate, and researchers have noted that the depth and quality of individual records vary by department, with publication sometimes lagging behind a tool's actual deployment.