CFA Level I practice questions

What the exam actually measures, why there is no reason to leave a question blank, and how to practise so it moves your score.

Last updated: 2 November 2026

The single most reliable predictor of a Level I pass is not how many hours you have read, but how many questions you have worked through under exam conditions. The exam does not test recognition of concepts: it tests whether you can apply them in about 90 seconds each.

What you are practising for

About the pass rate. The 43% figure is published by CFA Institute in its press release of 24 September 2026 on the August 2026 Level I results. The method is CFA Institute’s own: the percentage of candidates examined in that window who passed. It is the most recent Level I result available; the November 2026 window has not yet reported. The full 2026 series, with sources for every window and level, is on our CFA pass rates page.

No negative marking changes your strategy

This is worth internalising early, because it differs from many other professional exams. Since wrong answers carry no penalty, leaving a question blank can only cost you. With three options, a blind guess still carries a one-in-three expected return, and eliminating one option lifts that to one in two.

The practical consequence: budget the last few minutes of each session to make sure nothing is unanswered. It is the cheapest marginal gain available on exam day.

The ten topics

Questions are drawn from ten topic areas with published weight ranges. For 2027 the weights are unchanged, with Ethics at 15–20%, and Financial Statement Analysis, Equities and Fixed Income each at 11–14%.

• Ethical and Professional Standards
• Quantitative Methods
• Economics
• Financial Statement Analysis
• Corporate Finance (formerly Corporate Issuers)
• Equities (formerly Equity Investments)
• Fixed Income
• Derivatives
• Alternative Investments
• Portfolio Construction (formerly Portfolio Management)

Note the renamed topics: three areas were relabelled for 2027. Same subject matter, clearer names — but worth knowing when you compare older study material against the current outline.

How to practise so it counts

• Time everything. Untimed practice trains knowledge but not the skill the exam actually measures. Ninety seconds per question is the benchmark.
• Review the ones you got right by luck. A correct answer you could not justify is a future wrong answer. Flag them.
• Work Ethics through scenarios, not definitions. Ethics is the largest single topic and it is examined through applied situations, not recall of the Standards.
• Do full-length mocks late. Two 135-minute sessions in one day is a stamina problem as much as a knowledge one, and you only find that out by doing it.
• Track by topic, not overall. An aggregate score hides the topic that will sink you.

A question routine in three phases

Question practice works best when its purpose changes as the exam gets closer. Doing the same kind of practice for the whole study period wastes the early weeks and under-prepares you for the last ones.

Phase one: questions while you learn

Start doing questions on a topic as soon as you have read it, not once you have finished the whole curriculum. At this stage the aim is diagnosis rather than speed: a short untimed set at the end of each reading shows you whether you understood the material or only followed it on the page. Expect low scores and do not let them discourage you. A wrong answer now is cheap information.

Phase two: mixed and timed sets

Once you have covered several topics, move to mixed sets that jump between them, and start timing yourself. Mixed practice is harder and feels slower, but it is closer to the exam, where nothing tells you which topic a question belongs to. This is also the point at which you start working to the 90-second benchmark and noticing which topics consistently push you over it.

Phase three: full exam conditions

In the final weeks, the priority shifts to full-length mock exams sat as the real thing: two sessions on the same day, timed, without notes and with a break of the same kind you will have on exam day. Each mock is followed by a proper review, which usually takes longer than the mock itself. Between mocks, return to targeted sets on whatever the last review exposed.

Keep an error log

The value of a practice question is mostly in the review. The simplest way to make reviews count is a running error log: a list of every question you got wrong, or got right without being able to explain why, with a single line on what went wrong.

Classify each entry by cause rather than by topic alone:

• Knowledge gap. You did not know the concept. The fix is to go back to the reading.
• Misread question. You knew the material but answered a different question from the one asked. The fix is slowing down on the stem, especially on negatives such as “least likely”.
• Calculation slip. The method was right and the arithmetic was wrong. The fix is practising with the same calculator you will use on exam day until the keystrokes are automatic.
• Time pressure. You would have got it right with more time. The fix is more timed practice on that topic, not more reading.

After a few weeks, the log shows patterns that an overall score hides. If most of your errors are misreads, more study will not help; a change in how you read the question will.

Practising for the 2027 curriculum

February 2027 is the first window tested on the 2027 curriculum, and roughly a quarter of Level I changes, concentrated in Quantitative Methods and Equities, with a restructured Ethics section and a new module on data science and artificial intelligence. If you are sitting in 2027, make sure the questions you practise on match the 2027 outline. Older question banks remain useful for unchanged fundamentals such as Fixed Income or Derivatives, but for the changed areas they can train you on material that is no longer examined, or leave out material that now is. Our guide to the 2027 curriculum changes sets out what moved.

Common practice mistakes

• Measuring progress by volume. A thousand questions done quickly and reviewed badly teach less than three hundred reviewed properly.
• Repeating the same bank until you remember the answers. Once you recognise a question, it stops measuring understanding. Rotate sources or leave long gaps before repeating.
• Leaving mocks until the last week. One mock reveals stamina and timing problems that need weeks, not days, to fix.
• Skipping the topics you dislike. They are usually the ones with the most room for improvement, and every topic carries weight on the day.
• Treating a good mock as a guarantee. CFA Institute does not publish the passing score, so aim for a margin above it rather than for a particular number.

Do not forget the Practical Skills Module

Frequently asked questions

How many questions are on the CFA Level I exam?

The exam has 180 multiple-choice questions split across two sessions of 135 minutes each, sat on the same day.

Is there a penalty for wrong answers on the CFA exam?

No. There is no negative marking, so every question should be answered even when you are unsure.

How many practice questions should I do before the exam?

There is no official number, but candidates report spending over 300 hours preparing, and question practice is where most of that time delivers the highest return.

What was the recent CFA Level I pass rate?

43% in the August 2026 window, according to CFA Institute’s press release of 24 September 2026. The figure is the percentage of candidates examined in that window who passed.

Are 2026 practice questions still useful for a 2027 exam?

For unchanged topics, largely yes. For Quantitative Methods, Equities and Ethics, which change most in 2027, practise on material that matches the 2027 outline.

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