Children will be assessed by their teachers during their first six weeks of starting Reception.
The providers have been chosen after a competitive tender process.
The 'baseline' will be used to assess children starting Reception in September 2016, but a pilot year of the scheme will start in September.
Schools that want to use the baseline assessments from September must sign up before April.
The Standards and Testing Agency has approved six providers.
They are: the Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring, Durham University (CEM); Early Excellence; GL Assessment; Hodder Education; National Foundation for Educational Research; Speech Link.
The assessments offered by the different providers vary in approach from computer and tablet-based, to paper-based, ongoing observation, and task-based activities.
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