As of 2023 it was ranked by The Sunday Times as the ninth-best state school in the country, and the second-best in the South West.

In 1546 a group of 20 yeomen and merchants petitioned the Crown to buy back the confiscated property of the executed Earl of Devon.

They were granted this land and property in a Royal Charter in 1546 by a deed of enfeoffment there by becoming the Feoffees of Colyton, one of the 80 oldest charities in England still operating today.

Their first act was to endow a grammar school in the later half of the 16th century and by a second Royal Charter granted by Elizabeth I directing a school be maintained with a grant of £5.00 a year "for the goodly and virtuous education of 20 poor boys forever".

The school began a program of development and expansion in 1991, adding and renovating many buildings over the subsequent two decades.

Following these redevelopments, in 2022 the East Wing of the school was renovated to install a new Drama Studio named after former teacher and benefactor Sid Bradbeer.

[6] At the beginning of the 2023/2024 school year several classrooms had to be closed due to RAAC concrete, including the recently renovated east wing.