What Are the CLE Requirements for Oregon Attorneys?

Active Oregon attorneys must complete a minimum of 45 credit hours every three years.

The requirement is Rule of Licensure 8.1 in the Oregon State Bar's Rules of Licensure, the document that now carries Oregon's MCLE rules, so it is where the current hour totals, credit types and reporting deadlines live.

The cycle runs in three-year reporting periods rather than a single annual count.

The same rules set a lighter 15-hour first requirement for newly admitted attorneys.

Inside the 45 hours, at least 5 must be ethics hours.

The cycle also requires 1 hour on the duty to report child and elder abuse and 1 hour on mental health/substance use.

In alternate reporting periods, 3 hours must be access to justice.

Those are the credit types the rule text our research read names, and the pages we captured name no separate bias, wellness or technology requirement beyond them.

That is a statement about the pages our research captured, not a guarantee no other category exists, so confirm the current credit types with the Oregon State Bar before you build a cycle around a specific course.

Oregon's reporting periods are three years long and end April 30.

Each active licensee must electronically certify and submit a completed compliance report on or before May 31 of the year the reporting period ends.

A late fee applies to a late report; our research did not capture the amount, so check the current fee with the Oregon State Bar.

New attorney admittees complete 15 credit hours of accredited CLE in a first reporting period that runs from admission to April 30 of the next year.

Inside those 15 hours: a 3-hour Bar-approved access-to-justice course, 2 ethics hours, 1 mental health/substance use hour and 9 practical-skills hours.

Admittees who licensed through the Supervised Practice Portfolio Examination have a lighter mix.

The Bar's own admissions page still describes an older 10-hour practical-skills figure, while the rule text our research read sets 9, so confirm the current first-year breakdown with the Bar.

Our research captured one cap statement from the Oregon rules: active licensees may credit an unlimited number of hours earned through group (Category I) CLE activities.

The pages we read did not set out how online or on-demand programming is treated, and caps on the other credit categories were not extracted, so the treatment of any specific format is not established in our research.

Confirm how a recorded, webcast or on-demand course counts with the Oregon State Bar before you rely on it.

Our research did not find a carryover provision in the Oregon rules pages we read, so whether excess hours carry into a later reporting period is not established by our research.

We also did not capture a list of exemptions from the requirement.

Ask the Oregon State Bar what applies before you plan a cycle around either.

The rules our research read provide that a late fee applies when the compliance report is not filed on time, which means by May 31 of the year the reporting period ends.

The amount of that fee was not captured in our research, and the pages we read did not say what follows a continued failure to comply.

Both questions belong with the Oregon State Bar.

Yes.

Oregon licenses paralegals as Licensed Paralegals (LPs), who may do limited-scope legal work in family law and landlord-tenant matters under a program the Oregon Supreme Court approved in 2022, with licences issuing since 2024.

Each active LP licensee must complete a minimum of 40 credit hours every three years, including 5 ethics hours and 26 hours specific to each licensed practice area, under the same Rules of Licensure that carry the attorney requirement.