Passing Standard | NCLEX (2024)

FAQs

Passing Standard | NCLEX? ›

The test will produce a minimum of 75 questions and a maximum of 265 questions. A candidate passes the test when the tester has answered enough questions correctly to stay above the pass line with a 95% confidence interval. The candidate will fail the test when they do not rise about the pass line with 95% confidence.

As mentioned earlier, the passing standard is determined by the candidate's ability to consistently demonstrate competency throughout the test. This means that a candidate may pass the NCLEX with fewer correct answers than another candidate, as long as they demonstrate a consistent level of competency.

'Near the Passing Standard' means a particular candidate's ability estimate is not clearly above or clearly below the passing standard in a content area. For more information, visit the Candidate Performance Report section.

The NCLEX-RN exam requires you to be above the passing standard in all of these areas. That means you could ROCK all of the above areas, except the Pharmacological and Parental Therapies section, and still fail this exam. The first step to passing the NCLEX-RN exam is knowing and understanding the exam itself.

To answer this question, we surveyed thousands of UWorld users just like you who recently utilized our NCLEX review course to prepare for their licensing exam. The result? 90% of users report that UWorld's questions are the same level of difficulty or more difficult than the questions they encountered on the NCLEX.

Is a D Considered Passing? A letter grade of a D is technically considered passing because it not a failure. A D is any percentage between 60-69%, whereas a failure occurs below 60%.

If these unofficial NCLEX results indicate that you have passed, they are not likely to change unless some question arises about cheating or other unethical behavior during the exam.

The CAT algorithm determines whether you pass or fail based on one of the following three rules: the 95% Confidence Interval Rule, Maximum-Length Exam Rule, or the Run-out-of-time (ROOT) Rule. These are sometimes also referred to as the exam “stopping rules” that indicate when the exam will end.

The only definitive way to know if you've passed the NCLEX is to wait for your official score. You will be able to access unofficial results shortly after taking the exam, which means you can look online to see if you passed or failed.

The Candidate Performance Report (CPR) is an NCSBN official report detailing your performance in each test plan's topic areas. If you receive it, that means you failed the exam. To prepare for retaking the exam, you can utilize the CPR as a reference.

Does the last question on NCLEX matter? ›

If the last question is above the level of difficulty needed to pass, the candidate passes. If you took a test longer than 75 questions and failed, you were probably familiar with most of the content you saw on the exam but you may have difficulty using critical thinking skills or taking standardized tests.

A candidate that asks, how many questions do you need to pass NCLEX, will not receive a definite answer. Candidates must answer at least 75 questions in the five available hours or fail the test. The maximum number of questions in both exams is 145.

Unlike your math exams where everyone had to answer the same questions, the NCLEX is dynamic. It's a test that watches you, reacts to you, and tailors itself to you, which means it's very unlikely any two test takers will have the same NCLEX experience.

The use of CAT also means that the NCLEX-RN has a variable length. To pass the test, you must answer at least 75 questions correctly, and you will not be asked more than 265, which means the test may be comprised of anywhere from 75 to 265 questions.

If it means "60 percent of the questions answered correctly," the passing score represents an absolute standard. If it means "better than 60 percent of all the test-takers," or "two standard deviations below the average score of the test-takers," the passing score represents a relative standard.

However, there are some schools that consider a C the lowest passing grade, so the general standard is that anything below a 60% or 70% is failing, depending on the grading scale. In college and universities, a D is considered to be an unsatisfactory passing grade.

So, for example, where the possible grades are A or distinction (for the highest range of marks), B or credit (for the middle category), C or pass (for a range of marks which are no more than satisfactory), and F or fail, a pass grade may refer to a C or simple pass, or, depending on the context, may be taken to ...