Grassroots football needs referees more than almost anything else right now. If you’ve ever watched a match and thought you could do a better job than the person holding the whistle, here’s exactly how to find out, step by step.

Step 1: Check You Meet the Basic Requirement

The entry bar is lower than most people expect. You need to be at least 14 years old, and that’s genuinely the only hard prerequisite. Age, gender, fitness level, and football background don’t matter beyond that. Oxfordshire FA puts it plainly: whether you’re 14 or 114, male or female, there’s an opportunity to become a referee. What you actually need is a positive attitude, a willingness to be involved, and a commitment to learning a new skill.

Step 2: Enrol on the FA Referee Course

Every referee in England starts the same way, through the FA Referee Course, delivered locally by your County FA. This is the course for anyone wanting to referee mini soccer, 9-a-side, or 11-a-side football, and it’s the foundation every referee, at every level, eventually builds on.

Enrolling through your local County FA’s website is the simplest route in. Course dates and exact pricing vary slightly by county, but you can expect to pay somewhere between £100 and £165, which typically covers your training materials and some basic starter equipment, like a whistle.

Step 3: Complete the Online Learning

Before any face-to-face training, you’ll need to work through online learning covering the Laws of the Game. It’s split into five modules and takes roughly 90 minutes total to complete, with videos demonstrating how laws apply in real match situations and short questions at the end of each section to check what you’ve absorbed. You’ll register through the FA’s FAN system to track this learning as you go.

Step 4: Complete Safeguarding Training

Alongside the Laws of the Game modules, you’ll also need to complete online safeguarding training before attending any in-person sessions. This applies regardless of whether you plan to referee adult or youth matches, and it has to be finished before you can move on to practical training.

Step 5: Attend Face-to-Face Training

This is where the course moves from theory into practice. Delivered over roughly one full day and one evening, face-to-face training combines classroom learning with genuine on-pitch scenarios, covering positioning, movement, signals, managing players, and how to actually apply the laws you’ve already studied online. Altogether, the full course, online and in-person combined, adds up to around 20 hours.

Step 6: Pass a Background Check

As a trainee referee, you’ll need to submit to a criminal record check as part of qualifying. This is standard practice across grassroots football and applies to anyone working around matches involving young players, which most new referees will encounter early in their refereeing careers regardless of which age groups they end up focusing on.

Step 7: Officiate Your First Five Matches

Qualification isn’t complete once the course ends. You’ll need to referee five matches under observation by a mentor before you’re considered fully qualified. This is a genuinely useful part of the process, not just a formality. It’s the stage where classroom knowledge turns into real, on-pitch confidence, with experienced guidance available while you’re still finding your feet.

Once you’ve completed your first six games as a referee, you’ll be awarded your own “Three Lions” badge, a small but genuine milestone marking your transition from trainee to qualified official.

What You Actually Get at the End

Successful completion of the course awards either a Level 7 Junior County Referee or Level 8 Youth Referee qualification, depending on the pathway you’ve taken. From there, English refereeing runs through nine defined levels, starting at Level 9 (Trainee) and running all the way up to Level 1, the Premier League and EFL. Most referees spend around a year at each level before progressing further, based on experience and assessment rather than a fixed timeline.

What Refereeing Actually Pays

It’s worth being realistic about the money here. Amateur grassroots referees typically earn between £20 and £40 per match. Semi-professional matches pay around £80. League-level referees can earn £300 to £500 per match, and it’s only at the very top of the pyramid that refereeing becomes a genuine full-time career, with Premier League officials now earning base salaries between £72,000 and £148,000 a year. For the overwhelming majority of grassroots referees, this isn’t about the money. It’s match fees on top of a normal working life, much like the players they’re officiating.

Beyond the Money: Why People Actually Do This

Many qualified referees describe officiating as the next best thing to playing itself. It keeps you genuinely involved in football, gives you a level of control and responsibility most weekend spectators never experience, and puts you directly at the centre of your local football community.

There’s also a wider context worth knowing before you start. England currently has around 37,000 active referees officiating matches each season, and the demographics behind that number are shifting. Over 3,000 female referees qualified in a single recent year alone, part of a genuine, ongoing push toward greater diversity in officiating at every level.

Why This Matters More Than Ever Right Now

Grassroots football across the UK is currently dealing with a genuine referee shortage, with more than 20% of clubs reporting cancelled fixtures specifically because no official was available. Every new referee who qualifies is a direct, practical answer to that problem, not just a personal hobby. If you’ve been on the fence about it, there’s rarely been a better moment to actually sign up.

Getting Started

The practical first step is simple: search for your local County FA’s referee course page, check upcoming course dates in your area, and enrol. Most counties run courses regularly throughout the year, not just at the start of a season, so there’s no need to wait for a specific window to get going.