How Do You Get Admitted to the Georgia Bar?

Bar admission in Georgia is run by the Supreme Court of Georgia Office of Bar Admissions.

Two boards do the specialized work: the Board to Determine Fitness of Bar Applicants handles character and fitness, and the Board of Bar Examiners prepares and grades the four Georgia essays and grades the Multistate Performance Test.

NCBE prepares the MPT and develops and scores the multiple-choice MBE, while Georgia administers the exam and grades the written portions — so the admission decision rests with Georgia's office and boards, not with NCBE.

Georgia is not a UBE state.

Its two-day exam has three parts: the Multistate Performance Test (two items, on the morning of day 1), four essay questions prepared and graded by the Board of Bar Examiners (afternoon of day 1), and the MBE on day 2.

Essay subjects include Georgia Practice and Procedure, Federal Practice and Procedure, Family Law, Professional Ethics, UCC Articles 2 and 3 and the core MBE subjects.

The MBE is NCBE's six-hour, 200-question multiple-choice exam, and each MPT item runs 90 minutes.

The passing score is 270, the scaled MBE counts for 50% of the total, and a total score of 265–269 triggers an automatic regrade of all written answers during the initial grading process.

Applicants must have been awarded a J.D. from a law school approved by the American Bar Association, with a narrow exception for certain foreign lawyers holding an approved LL.M.

The process itself runs in two steps with separate deadlines and fees.

Certifications of Fitness expire after five years.

Georgia requires an MPRE score of 75 or higher, and the state sets no expiration date on MPRE scores.

For context, the MPRE itself is a two-hour, 60-question multiple-choice exam offered three times a year.

Character and fitness is the first gate: the Board to Determine Fitness of Bar Applicants certifies an applicant before a Bar Exam Application can follow.

NCBE plays no part in this — it makes no character and fitness decisions or recommendations, because each jurisdiction decides who is fit to practice.

Our research did not establish how the Fitness Board weighs individual issues, so questions about a specific history belong with the board itself.

Georgia does not take transferred scores: as of October 2026 it accepts no UBE score transfers and no transferred MBE scores.

The exam-free path is admission on motion, and it is narrow — only applicants from jurisdictions reciprocal with Georgia qualify, and the motion fee is $2,500.

California, Florida and South Carolina are not reciprocal with Georgia, so lawyers admitted there cannot be admitted on motion, and the Board of Bar Examiners does not consider typical document review to be practice of law for motion purposes.

Lawyers admitted by exam elsewhere who do not qualify for motion can instead sit for the one-day Attorneys' Exam — the MPT and Georgia essays, no MBE — and need at least 135 on the written portion to reach the 270 passing score.

Two applications mean two sets of fees.

The Fitness Application costs $450 if filed before the J.D. is awarded and $750 after; it is $1,200 for the Attorneys' Exam and $2,500 for admission on motion, and filing in the final period adds $500.

The Bar Exam Application costs $400 for a current law student or $550 for a graduate, plus a $107 NCBE fee and a $105 laptop/handwriting fee, with the same $500 final-period addition.

For the February 23–24, 2027 exam, the Fitness Application regular period ran March 25–July 1, 2026, and the Bar Exam Application regular period runs September 1, 2026–January 1, 2027, with a final period to January 15, 2027.

Our research did not confirm a current first-time pass rate or a results release month for Georgia; check the Office of Bar Admissions for both before you plan around them.

Georgia plans to give the NextGen UBE beginning with the July 2028 administration, and NCBE lists a Georgia-specific requirement alongside it.

NCBE lists Georgia's NextGen minimum passing score as TBA.

The NextGen exam itself runs over 1.5 days — two 3-hour sessions on day one and one 3-hour session on day two, 9 hours in total — and jurisdictions with local components may extend day two.