The NextGen bar exam differs from the UBE it replaces in length, subjects, question types and scoring.
NCBE’s own comparison puts the legacy UBE at twelve hours over two days and the NextGen UBE at nine hours over 1.5 days, scored as a single 500–750 number rather than a 400-point total.
This NextGen vs UBE comparison covers each difference, and how to tell which exam your jurisdiction gives you.
How long is each exam?
| Legacy UBE | NextGen UBE | |
|---|---|---|
| Total testing time | Twelve hours | Nine hours |
| Days | Two days | One and a half days |
| Day structure | MEE and two MPT tasks on the Tuesday; MBE on the last Wednesday | Two 3-hour sessions on day one; one 3-hour session on day two |
NCBE’s own comparison puts the legacy UBE at twelve hours over two days and the NextGen UBE at nine hours over 1.5 days.
The legacy exam — the MEE, two MPT tasks and the MBE that make up the UBE — runs its essay and performance components on the Tuesday and the MBE on the last Wednesday of February and July.
The NextGen UBE compresses the schedule: two 3-hour sessions on day one and one 3-hour session on day two, with day two falling on the last Wednesday and day one on the Tuesday before it.
Jurisdictions with a local component may extend day two.
The NextGen UBE is taken on the examinee’s own laptop at in-person, proctored testing locations using NCBE’s secure testing browser — not at commercial test centers.
What subjects does each exam test?
The legacy UBE’s multiple-choice component is the MBE, whose 175 scored questions split evenly — 25 each — across seven subjects: Civil Procedure, Constitutional Law, Contracts, Criminal Law and Procedure, Evidence, Real Property, and Torts.
Around it sit the essay and performance components: six 30-minute MEE essays and two 90-minute MPT tasks.
NCBE describes the MPT as a skills test rather than a test of substantive knowledge.
For administrations from July 2026 through February 2028, the NextGen UBE tests eight foundational subjects — business associations and relationships, civil procedure, constitutional law, contract law, criminal law and constitutional protections of accused persons, evidence, real property, and torts — plus seven foundational lawyering skills: legal research, legal writing, issue spotting and analysis, investigation and evaluation, client counseling and advising, negotiation and dispute resolution, and client relationship and management.
Two differences matter for study planning.
Set against the MBE’s seven multiple-choice subjects, the NextGen’s foundational list adds business associations and relationships — a comparison with the MBE only, not with the subjects the legacy MEE essays can cover — and the NextGen tests the seven skills as content in their own right, alongside the eight subjects.
And three areas are off the NextGen’s foundational list entirely — Conflict of Laws, Secured Transactions and Trusts & Estates; NCBE says examinees are not expected or required to develop a base of knowledge in those areas.
The list is still growing: family law becomes a tested foundational subject with the July 2028 NextGen UBE, and until then family law and trusts & estates appear only in skills questions with legal resources provided.
How do the question types differ?
The legacy exam’s structure is familiar: a six-hour MBE of 200 multiple-choice questions (175 scored, 25 unscored pretest) with four answer choices and no penalty for wrong answers, six 30-minute MEE essays, and two 90-minute MPT tasks.
| Component | Legacy UBE | NextGen UBE |
|---|---|---|
| Multiple-choice | MBE: 200 questions, 175 scored, four choices each | 120 standalone questions, 40 per section — select one of four or select two of six |
| Written sets | Six 30-minute MEE essays | Six integrated question sets, two per section |
| Performance tasks | Two 90-minute MPT tasks | Three performance tasks, one per section |
Two format changes stand out.
The select-two-of-six multiple-choice option is new — the MBE’s questions all have four answer choices.
And each NextGen section mixes all three component types: 40 standalone multiple-choice questions, two integrated question sets and one performance task, where the legacy exam keeps its essays and performance tasks on the Tuesday and the MBE on the Wednesday.
Weights and pacing differ as well.
Standalone multiple-choice counts for 49% of the NextGen score, integrated sets 21% and performance tasks 30%.
NCBE’s expected pacing is 1.8 minutes per multiple-choice question, 24 minutes per integrated set and 60 minutes per performance task.
Twenty of the 120 multiple-choice questions and one of the six integrated sets are unscored pretest items that look like scored ones.
How do scoring and score portability differ?
On the legacy UBE, three separately scored components combine into one total on a 400-point scale: the MBE weighted 50%, the MEE 30% and the MPT 20%.
NCBE scores the MBE, each jurisdiction grades its own MEE and MPT, and NCBE calculates the UBE total.
Jurisdiction minimums on that scale run from 260 to 270.
The NextGen UBE reports a single number on a 500–750 scale, with no separate multiple-choice and written component scores.
Scores are equated, not curved — NCBE states a score does not depend on how other examinees performed.
Most jurisdictions have set their passing scores between 610 and 620: announced minimums run from 610 in Iowa, Missouri, New Mexico, North Dakota and Washington up to 620 in Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Vermont, with Oregon at 615 for the July 2026 exam only and 620 afterward.
Those numbers are not comparable.
NCBE says legacy and NextGen scores should not be compared directly — a 616 and a 270 sit on different scales, not a ranking.
Portability rules split too.
A portable legacy UBE score requires taking the MEE, MPT and MBE in the same jurisdiction in the same administration; each jurisdiction’s minimum applies to test-takers there and to people transferring scores in; a score that missed one jurisdiction’s cut can still transfer where it clears another’s; and a transfer never skips character and fitness.
How long a transferred score stays valid varies by jurisdiction, from 2 years to 5 — most use 3.
NextGen scores are portable to jurisdictions that accept them, and some jurisdictions still giving the legacy UBE already accept transferred NextGen scores.
Two limits NCBE lists: Florida and New York will not accept NextGen transfer scores from any administration before July 2028, and Hawaii is listed as not accepting them.
NCBE’s adoption table — last updated September 25, 2026 — lists each jurisdiction’s transfer date and minimum transferred score.
Which exam will you take?
You do not pick between the two — the jurisdiction and your exam date do.
The NextGen UBE was first administered in July 2026 in ten jurisdictions: Connecticut, Guam, Idaho, Maryland, Missouri, the Northern Mariana Islands, Oregon, Palau, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Washington.
The waves behind it: twelve jurisdictions in July 2027 (Arizona, Iowa, Kentucky, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Vermont, Wyoming), four in February 2028 (Delaware, the District of Columbia, Illinois, Montana) and twenty-five in July 2028 — a group that includes California, Florida, New York and Texas — with Mississippi’s date still to be determined.
As of October 2026, only four jurisdictions show no NextGen adoption on NCBE’s map: Arkansas, Louisiana, Nevada and Puerto Rico.
The switch also reaches beyond former UBE states — California, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii and Virginia, which NCBE lists as never having adopted the UBE, all sit in the July 2028 NextGen wave.
NCBE says the legacy UBE will be administered through February 2028, with the final MBE, MEE and MPT administration at the February 2028 exam; the remaining legacy dates — February 23–24, 2027; July 27–28, 2027; February 22–23, 2028 — match the NextGen’s published dates.
Two practical notes if you are choosing timing.
NextGen examinees pay a $149 exam software and technology fee through their NCBE Account, on top of the jurisdiction’s application fee; legacy laptop software fees typically ran $90 to $150.
And NCBE is not releasing the constructed-response questions from the July 2026 administration, so check what practice material exists for your exam before you lock in a date.
Career information, not legal advice. The schedules, scores and rules above are as NCBE published them when this page was last reviewed in October 2026 — confirm anything that affects your plans with NCBE and the bar admission authority in the jurisdiction where you will sit.
Confirm the exam where you will sit