BEIJING -- China's gross enrolment ratio in pre-primary education was 81.7 percent in 2018, registering a 2.1 percentage points increase from the previous year, official figures showed Wednesday.

According to a statistical report on China's education in 2018 issued by the Ministry of Education, the country had 266,700 kindergartens in 2018, up 4.6 percent year on year.

The total number of children in kindergartens across the country was 46.56 million in 2018, 562,800 more than in the previous year.

Staff in kindergartens totalled 4.53 million in 2018, an increase of 338,600 from the previous year, according to the report.