How Do You Get Admitted to the Virginia Bar?

The Virginia Board of Bar Examiners licenses Virginia lawyers.

The Board is an agency of the Supreme Court of Virginia and operates under the Code of Virginia, § 54.1-3919 et seq.

It administers the bar exam, the Character & Fitness Questionnaire and the decision to admit.

Virginia gives its own exam, not the UBE: a Virginia essay exam plus the Multistate Bar Examination (MBE), weighted 60% essay and 40% MBE, with a minimum combined passing score of 140.

The UBE is NCBE's exam, made up of the MEE, two MPT tasks and the MBE, and NCBE lists Virginia among the jurisdictions that never adopted it.

The MBE piece is NCBE's six-hour, 200-question multiple-choice test; the jurisdictions administer bar exams and grade the written portions, while NCBE develops the exams and scores the multiple-choice portions.

One practical note from the Board's rules: applicants are expected to dress in court-appropriate attire at the exam.

The Board approves applications for admission, and Virginia's rules provide one route to exam eligibility that stands out: the Law Reader Program, which can stand in for law school.

Law reader applicants must show a bachelor's degree or higher from an accredited institution and good character, and the Board may ask for an LSAT score.

Our research did not capture the Board's full eligibility rules for law-school graduates — which schools qualify and what the application requires — so read the Board's rules and application instructions before you file.

Virginia requires a scaled MPRE score of 85 or greater.

The MPRE is NCBE's two-hour, 60-question multiple-choice exam offered three times a year, and MPRE scaled scores range from 50 to 150, with each jurisdiction setting its own passing score.

NCBE's own jurisdiction page for Virginia lists the same minimum: 85.

Background investigations are part of the admission process in every jurisdiction, and NCBE — which runs investigations for many boards — makes no decisions of its own; each jurisdiction decides who is fit to practise.

In Virginia the review runs through the Board's own Character & Fitness Questionnaire, which carries a $575 fee, and per NCBE's jurisdiction pages Virginia uses NCBE's character and fitness services only for foreign legal consultant applicants.

Law reader applicants must separately show good character.

The Board pages we read do not lay out what the questionnaire asks or how individual issues are weighed; questions about a specific history belong with the Board.

Yes, through Virginia's own routes rather than the UBE.

Admission without examination under Rule 1A:1 requires 5 years' admission anywhere, full-time practice of at least 32 hours a week for 3 of the last 5 years, admission in a jurisdiction Virginia treats as reciprocal, and a reciprocity course; an applicant cannot have failed any bar exam in the last 5 years, or more than two ever.

The application costs $2,500, and lawyers admitted without exam under Rule 1A:1 must attend the Virginia State Bar's Carrico Professionalism Course.

Licensed attorneys who passed a bar exam elsewhere can instead sit for Option 3, the Virginia essay exam alone, passing at 64 of 100 raw points.

Separately, Virginia lets applicants reuse or transfer an MBE scaled score of 133 or greater taken within 5 years prior to the date of the exam applied for instead of retaking the MBE.

Virginia is not a UBE jurisdiction, and the Board materials we read describe exam routes built on the Virginia essay and the MBE — not legacy UBE score transfers.

From July 2028 Virginia plans to accept NextGen scores earned elsewhere, with transferees required to sit for the Virginia component.

The exam application costs $575 and the Character & Fitness Questionnaire another $575; admission without examination is $2,500, and the fees are non-refundable.

Filing deadlines are statutory — May 10 for the July exam and December 15 for the February exam, with no late filing period.

On results: the July 2025 exam produced a 79.54% overall pass rate, with 84.85% for first-time applicants, and February 2026 came in at 62.64% overall and 77.44% first-time.

An applicant who fails may be re-examined up to four additional times under the Board's rules, subject to statutory conditions.

The Board pages we read do not state when results are released; check with the Board for results dates.

Virginia is scheduled to start the NextGen UBE with the July 2028 exam; NCBE's adoption list includes it among the July 2028 starters.

The NextGen is given over one and a half days — two 3-hour sessions, then one 3-hour session on day two — and jurisdictions with local components may extend day two.

Virginia keeps a Virginia law component: a 2-hour essay exam with 5 questions on the afternoon of day two.

Virginia plans to accept NextGen scores earned in other jurisdictions, but transferees must sit for the Virginia component.

NextGen scores come back as one number on a 500–750 scale, and the Board notices we read do not state the minimum score Virginia will require — confirm it with the Board before you plan around a number.

Yes, through the Law Reader Program: approval by the Board and three calendar years of supervised study instead of law school.

A law reader studies at least 40 weeks a year, with a minimum of 25 hours of study each week, 18 of them in the supervising attorney's Virginia office, and gets at least 3 hours a week of one-on-one supervision.

The supervising attorney must have practised full time in Virginia for 10 of the last 12 years — or be a recently retired circuit judge — and may supervise only one law reader at a time.

Readers take a written exam set by their supervisor after each course and appear before the Board annually for an oral evaluation of their progress.

Applicants need a bachelor's degree or higher and must be of good character, and the application with the character questionnaire costs $2,500.

It is a Virginia eligibility route: the program substitutes for law school for the Virginia bar.

The essay subjects changed with the July 2025 exam: the Virginia essay exam no longer tests Business Organizations, Federal Practice and Procedure, Uniform Commercial Code Article 3 (Negotiable Instruments) or Personal Property.

The next scheduled change is the switch to the NextGen UBE with the July 2028 exam, covered above.

Check the Board's notices for the current subject list before you start studying.