How do options work and how many subjects can they chose?

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Asking for a friend. Friends dd has sn so in year 8 is working at level 4/5 and is in mid to lower sets.
She wants to be a sound/light engineer and they are working at stuff outside of school and researching lower access pathways to start off on. They are looking at DT, drama and music. What subjects can they chose and how many please?

It differs from school to school so you'd need to wait to see what the school offers. Unlikely that she'll be able to take DT, drama and music though.

Your friend needs to look at the website for that particular school and see what they offer OP. options booklets for Y9s will usually be available from approx January.
Yes most schools will have some options that are for pupils who are on a less academic pathway. These may include some vocational subjects e.g. level 2 (or 1) BTECs. At dds school this group can select a DT subject (or Photography) or a vocational subject instead of one of the EBacc subjects and this would mean that Food Tech, Drama and Music options can all be taken to GCSE. Some schools may block Music and Drama together (so you can only take one subject) and other schools may offer BTEC Performing Arts which (I think) covers elements of both Drama and Music.
Hope that helps

every school is different and it alters year on year

It will vary but I would have expected only 2 of those 3 would normally be possible as they tend to be in same option blocks, also new gcse structure may not work to her benefit. Does the school allow flexibility or offer level 2 alternative courses ie. Btec.

As far as I can tell many schools are now insisting on one out of MFL/history/geography/Computer Science.

Other than that it varies. DD does music and drama tho not DT. Think she could have tho as long as she did one of the above.

At the school I work at you could do DT/music/drama and then one of the key subjects. Friend needs to check with her DD's school tho as some put options into blocks and eg insist on one (but only one) "creative".

I suspect the larger the school, the more flexibility. DD goes to a big school. She had to choose two subjects from seven choices in box A and was guaranteed to get them - MFL, humanities and computer science in that box. This didn't suit a friend, she had a word with school and didn't have to do these.

Then every subject available in Box B (even those again from Box A) and they had to choose four in order of preference, and would be given three.

Nothing is compulsory at all in DD's school - from Box B they could choose all DT options if wanted for example!

So DD could choose five options and has six compulsory subjects (triple science, maths, Eng Lang & Lit).

Options evening was a great help for us. We literally talked to a teacher from most subjects, saw examples of past work and exam papers and were told requirements for studying certain subjects at A level. DD could choose from three art subjects and she was advised which two would be better for a possible career choice.

Ds1 is year 8, they have a booklet on the school website detailing core subjects and then they choose 4 options. Full details are given for each subject.

There is an options evening in February of next year and then they choose in March.

Very little choice here- compulsory science, maths, English lit and Lang, so choice of one creative subject, a MFL or computer science, geog or history then one more if you aren't doing triple science! I got much more choice (and did more subjects- 11 or 12 at my school rather than 9 for my kids).

At my DCs school it is a choice of 4 subjects but one has to be History or Geography, and one more is normally MFL (if a DC struggles with language they may be allowed to drop MFL), But there used (new option booklet isn't out yet so I'm not sure what will be offered this year) to be alternatives for the less academic: other qualifications and college courses.

Just agreeing with everyone else - this varies school to school, and year to year. You need to wait to see what they are offering at your dc's particular school.