The percentage of entries gaining an A grade at A-level has risen by 0.8% to 33.2%, Northern Ireland's awarding body, the Council for the Curriculum Examinations and Assessment (CCEA) has said.
The news followed Thursday's release of figures for the performance of Northern Ireland students in this Summer's GCE examinations. The improvement has been driven by excellent performances in mathematics, languages and sciences.
However, for the second year running, there has been a slight decrease in A level entries, dropping to 30,815.
Girls have maintained the performance gap over boys and, once again students here have outperformed their counterparts in England and Wales.
Commenting on the figures, the CCEA's Chief Executive Neil Anderson said: "Having had a close look at the detail of the results, it is clear that the steady improvements we're seeing across the grades has once again been driven by exceptional performances in subjects such as mathematics, languages and sciences".
He expressed well done to all the young people receiving results, and he hoped their hard work and application had been rewarded.
"I would also like to recognise the work of CCEA's many examiners and markers. Together, it has been our job to ensure standards have been maintained and appropriately rewarded, and I firmly believe they have."
This year's 0.8% rise in entries gaining the grade A was the smallest increase in Northern Ireland for more than 10 years. However, Northern Ireland performance remains well ahead of the rest, with 33.2% of entries gaining a grade A as set against the equivalent national figure of 25.3%. The overall A-E pass rate in Northern Ireland is 98.0% compared to 96.9% nationally.
Girls have maintained the gap over boys at GCE A level, performing better in the great majority of subjects. At Grade A, girls outperformed the boys by 3.9 % (34.9 % female, 31.0% male), while across the A – E grade range, the gap is narrower with girls outperforming boys by 0.6 % (98.2 % female, 97.6 % male).
The good news for boys is that at the top grades they outperform girls and boys in England and Wales.
