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State Bar Announces February 2025 Bar Exam Results

The State Bar of California reported Monday that 55.9 percent of exam takers passed the California February 2025 General Bar Examination (GBX). In addition, the State Bar also announced that 76.5 percent of those who completed the one-day Attorneys' Examination passed. If the 2,172 individuals who passed the GBX, along with the 264 who passed the Attorneys' Exam, satisfy all other requirements for admission, they will be eligible to be licensed by the State Bar to practice law in California.

The GBX pass rate is the highest spring pass rate since 1965 (57.1 percent), and the Attorneys’ Exam is the highest since February 1992 (78.2 percent).

The two-day GBX is normally given twice a year, in February and July. The exam consists of three sections: a 200-item multiple-choice (MCQ) examination, five essay questions, and a performance test that are designed to assess an applicant's ability to apply general legal knowledge to practical tasks. The mean adjusted scaled MCQ score in California was 1393 compared with the mean score on the February 2024 exam of 1327. The unadjusted mean scaled MCQ score was 1387.  With respect to the written portion of the exam, the total raw first-read mean score of the February 2025 GBX cohort was 423, compared to 408 and 411 for the 2024 and 2023 February cohorts respectively.

“The State Bar extends its congratulations to these test takers during what was a difficult experience for many,” said Leah Wilson, State Bar Executive Director. “Given the technical and other issues this cohort faced, the perseverance applicants showed is commendable and impressive. Particularly notable is that, despite these challenges, February 2025 test takers appear to have performed well, with mean written scores that suggest positive performance as compared to prior year February cohorts.” 

Preliminary analyses show that of the 3,886 applicants who completed the GBX, 29.9 percent were first-time exam takers. The passing rate for 1,162 first-time applicants was 62.1 percent overall. The passing rate for the 2,724 applicants repeating the exam was 53.2 percent overall.

Preliminary analyses show the first-time and repeat percent passing the GBX (rounded to the nearest tenth) by law school type as follows:    

School Type	First-Time – Unadjusted	First-Time – Adjusted*	Repeat – Unadjusted	Repeat – Adjusted*
ABA Accredited - California	75.4%	77.4%	66.5%	67.2%
ABA Accredited - Out-of-State	72.9%	72.9%	63.4%	64.7%
CBE Accredited	50.8%	53.8%	41.9%	43.4%
Unaccredited - Correspondence	66.7%**	66.7%**	54.5%	63.6%
Unaccredited - Distance Learning	53.3%	53.3%	30.4%	37.7%
Unaccredited - Fixed-Facility	0.0%**	100.0%**	58.3%	58.3%
Not Registered / Closed	N/A	N/A	31.4%	32.9%
Others	57.7%	58.1%	41.0%	43.1%
All Applicants	60.9%	62.1%	51.7%	53.2%

*Adjusted percentages are based on incentive scoring adjustments for applicants who participated in the State Bar’s November Special Session. Applicants who answered at least 28 of the 49 experimental questions correctly were eligible to receive an adjustment of 40 scale score points on the multiple-choice section of the bar examination. This section level adjustment results in an effective 20 scale score point adjustment to the overall scale score.    

**Values based on fewer than 11 applicants  

The Attorneys' Exam, which consists of the written section (i.e., essay and performance test) of the GBX, is open to lawyers who have been admitted to the active practice of law in good standing for at least four years in another U.S. jurisdiction. 

The State Bar filed a petition with the California Supreme Court on April 29, advancing the Committee of Bar Examiners (CBE) recommendations for score imputation and raw passing score. The Court issued an order on May 2 agreeing with those recommendations.  

The publicly available pass list will be posted Tuesday, May 6, at noon.  

Per the Supreme Court’s order and directives, the July 2025 bar exam will be in-person and utilize the Multistate Bar Exam for MCQs. 

*Please note that these are preliminary statistics. Law schools will be required to confirm the students allocated to their law school and, as a result, these statistics may change. 

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The State Bar of California's mission is to protect the public and includes the primary functions of licensing, regulation and discipline of attorneys; the advancement of the ethical and competent practice of law; and support of efforts for greater access to, and inclusion in, the legal system.