zReports Research Institute · Updated August 2026
Texas has 14,353 active licensed daycares on the state's public file. zReports analyzed state child care licensing and enforcement records to produce a records layer grade for every one, the government's own verdicts, mapped through one fixed rule. No facility can pay to change a score, and the grade is free.
| Statistic | Value |
|---|---|
| Active licensed daycares | 14,353 |
| Cities covered | 829 |
| Statewide average records layer score | 80.9 |
| Grade A facilities | 7,188 (50.1%) |
| Grade B facilities | 2,915 (20.3%) |
| Grade C facilities | 3,784 (26.4%) |
| Grade D facilities | 450 (3.1%) |
| Grade F facilities | 6 (0%) |
| Facilities with a clean record (no deficiencies on file) | 2,795 (19.5%) |
| Serious (high severity) findings on the record | 29,879 |
| Moderate findings on the record | 87,984 |
| Combined licensed capacity | 1,177,173 |
| Licensed Center | 9,568 |
| Registered Child-Care Home | 1,804 |
| Licensed Child-Care Home | 1,585 |
| Listed Family Home | 1,396 |
Average records layer score by city (cities with 10+ facilities), against the statewide average of 80.9.
| City | Facilities | Avg score | vs state |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gainesville | 14 | 92.9 | +12 |
| Waxahachie | 44 | 92.7 | +11.8 |
| Nederland | 16 | 92 | +11.1 |
| Heartland | 11 | 91.1 | +10.2 |
| Glenn Heights | 11 | 90.6 | +9.7 |
| Nacogdoches | 22 | 90.5 | +9.6 |
| Orange | 21 | 90.5 | +9.6 |
| Mercedes | 13 | 90.5 | +9.6 |
| La Marque | 12 | 66.2 | -14.7 |
#1 Nhu Thien Thi Le Houston · A
#2 Little Hawks Learning Center Red Oak · A
#3 Alphabest @ Tibbals-Wylie Murphy · A
#4 Alphabest @ Cox-Wylie Sachse · A
#5 Spanish Schoolhouse Arlington · A
#6 Marble Falls Head Start 0-5 Marble Falls · A
#7 Montessori School At Starcreek Allen · A
#8 Saisd Learning Center San Antonio · A
#9 Campus Kids @ Mueller Elementary Spring · A
#10 Tenaha Isd Child Development Ctr Tenaha · A
#11 Tomorrow'S Promise Preschool Montgomery · A
#12 Butterfly Day Care El Paso · A
#13 Rhonda Taylor Snyder · A
#14 Heaven Sent Preschool Austin · A
#15 Kid'S Home Sugar Land · A
#16 Early Learning Center At Plano Senior High Plano · A
#17 Plano West Early Learning Center Plano · A
#18 Nancy Arellano'S Child Care Harlingen · A
#19 Zhinos Bahman Plano · A
#20 Lena Bennett Head Start Child Development Center Brownsville · A
#21 Kiddie Shack Preschool, LLC Fate · A
#22 First Baptist Church Preschool Lampasas · A
#23 Hope Rising Preschool Wylie · A
#24 Raegan Ellis Austin · A
#25 Fort Montessori Academy Murphy · A
Don't see a name? Search it. Every daycare has an answer.
The free grade on this page contains zero zReports judgment: it maps the state's own published licensing and enforcement verdicts through one fixed rule, applied identically to every daycare in America. Where the record and public reputation diverge, a highly reviewed facility with serious findings on file, the paid Consumer Intelligence Report™ surfaces it through the composite Consumer Z Score™ and our published ten point methodology. Facilities are never contacted and cannot pay to change a score. Read the full methodology →
Licensed child care in Texas is regulated by Texas Health and Human Services, Child Care Regulation, which licenses providers, conducts inspections, investigates complaints, and publishes enforcement actions on the public record. Those state filed records, not reviews, are what this page is computed from. One precision note: some programs are legally exempt from licensing in many states (certain school- or church-operated programs, and small home settings under the state’s size threshold) and therefore do not appear on the licensed register at all. This page covers every provider on Texas’s public licensing file.
Texas has 14,353 active licensed daycares on the state's public file, across 829 cities, with a combined licensed capacity of 1,177,173. Every one has a free records layer grade on zReports.
Houston, with 1,498 licensed daycares, followed by San Antonio (757) and Austin (572).
The free records layer grade contains zero zReports judgment. It maps the government's own published verdicts, state child care licensing and enforcement records, through one fixed rule, applied identically to every daycare in the country. The paid Consumer Intelligence Report™ adds the composite Consumer Z Score™, which audits the record against public reputation through our published ten point methodology.
Reviews and records are different surfaces. Reviews reflect what visitors chose to write, and can be managed by the business. Inspection and enforcement records are filed by the state, are mandatory, and cannot be edited by the facility. When the two diverge, the record is the surface worth checking. That divergence is exactly what zReports was built to surface.
Rankings refresh whenever Texas republishes its licensing data; facility pages carry the records-verified date for each provider. This page was generated from the current file as of August 2026.
No. Facilities are never contacted, never notified, and cannot pay to be listed, delisted, or re-scored. zReports has no business relationship with any facility it grades, independence is the product.
This report was generated from the zReports Consumer Records Database™, a continuously updated database that normalizes official government licensing, inspection, enforcement, ownership, and safety records across multiple federal and state agencies. Every statistic in this report is traceable to its originating public record. Facilities cannot pay to alter scores, rankings, or findings.
Data source: zReports Consumer Intelligence Database™ v2026.08 · Built from: Texas child care licensing, inspection & enforcement records · Public consumer review signals (audited, never trusted, in the composite Consumer Z Score™) · Proprietary Consumer Z Score™ methodology · Updated: August 2026
APA, zReports Research Institute. (2026). Texas Licensed Child Care Rankings & Safety Report (v2026.08). zReports.org. https://zreports.org/rankings/daycare/tx
MLA, zReports Research Institute. “Texas Licensed Child Care Rankings & Safety Report.” zReports.org, v2026.08, August 2026, zreports.org/rankings/daycare/tx.
Plain, Texas Licensed Child Care Rankings & Safety Report, zReports Research Institute, v2026.08, updated August 2026, zreports.org/rankings/daycare/tx