Bar Exam Retaker Statistics: What the Pass Rates Actually Tell You
Updated October 3, 2026.
Retaker pass rates can be discouraging. Read them carefully: they describe particular groups, dates, and jurisdictions. They are not your personal probability of passing.
Start with a Defined Dataset
NCBE publishes annual examination statistics, including first-time and repeat-examinee results by jurisdiction and administration. Specify which year, sitting, and population a number describes before comparing it with another.
The 2025 first-time and repeater table is not a UBE-only dataset. It includes jurisdictions using other examinations. Its first-time/repeater classification is based on prior attempts in the reporting jurisdiction, so someone counted as first-time there may previously have tested elsewhere.
For a concrete example, the table reports July 2025 Colorado rates of 80% for first-time takers and 37% for repeaters. Those figures describe that cohort; they are not national rates or an estimate for a future candidate.
What the Aggregate Rate Cannot Explain
A repeater group can include people with different prior scores, numbers of attempts, educational backgrounds, available study time, and circumstances. A single pass percentage does not isolate any of those factors.
In particular, the published table does not record whether candidates changed courses, used flashcards, wrote more essays, or shifted from reading to practice. It cannot prove that a specific study method caused a higher pass rate.
That is why we do not treat aggregate pass-rate data as evidence that repeating a course necessarily fails, or that changing your approach guarantees improvement.
What Your First Attempt Can Tell You
Your own score report provides a more concrete starting point for planning. Read it using the jurisdiction's instructions.
Calculate the gap. Use the actual passing total for the jurisdiction and sitting. If the required score is 266 and you earned 255, the gap is 11 points. That is an example, not a nationwide cutoff.
Look at the components. Compare the MBE and written contributions. Subject-level detail, if released, may help identify questions to investigate. A combined written result does not isolate essay performance from MPT performance.
Test the diagnosis. Work through new practice under recorded conditions. Did you misunderstand the law, misread a fact, overlook an issue, or run out of time? Use the answer to choose the next exercise.
Practical Changes to Consider
These are study suggestions, not conclusions established by the pass-rate table:
- Add practice if your prior preparation rarely required you to produce an answer
- Review explanations and reliable rule sources when your errors cluster around a doctrine
- Include written work and MPT practice rather than relying entirely on an MBE bank
- Seek outside feedback when self-review does not reveal why an answer is weak
- Adjust the workload to your available time and the examination you will take
Our retaker study plan offers a framework to adapt. It is not a validated intervention with a claimed pass-rate increase.
The Bottom Line
Use published rates to understand the reported cohort. Use your own results and current practice to plan your preparation. Neither source provides certainty about the next attempt.
A prior unsuccessful result does not decide the next one. What you can do now is build a plan around evidence of your own gaps and check whether the work is addressing them.