Feb '26 Bar Exam Results

Bar Exam results from the February exam will begin rolling out this week. 

Once scores are publicly released, I'll post here in this post the pass percentages for each state. Listed, for comparison, will be the percentages for both February '26 and February '25. Also listed when available will be the number of examinees in each state who took the most recent exam. 

The results are color coded as follows:

Green  = a beat in 2026 compared to 2025 🙂

Red  = a beat in 2025 compared to 2026 ☹️

Blue = a tie in 2025 compared to 2026 😶

::Results will appear here:: 

Update: If no state releases scores today, then scores will begin to roll in tomorrow with Maryland scheduled to release. If it's made public tomorrow (March 27th), I'll begin to update this post with scores. 

NextGen UBE: Foundational Skills (Legal Writing & Drafting)

There are four categories of "foundational skills" that the NextGen UBE aims to test:

Group A: Issue Spotting and Analysis, Investigation, and Evaluation

Group B: Client Counseling and Advising, Negotiation and Dispute Resolution, Client Relationship and Management

Group C: Legal Research

Group D: Legal Writing and drafting 

This post will focus on Group D: According to the NCBE, the purpose of Group D is to assess the extent to which an examinee can complete a legal writing or drafting task based on the relevant rules and standards and consistent with a client's objectives, interests, and constraints. The specific tasks that will be tested to measure this purpose are as follows: 

~Draft or edit correspondence to a client explaining the legal implications of a course of action, updating the client on the status of a client's matter, and/or providing advice on the next steps to be taken in a matter. 

~Given draft sections of a complaint or an answer to a complaint in a matter, identify language that should be changed, and make suggestions on how that language should change, consistent with the facts, the relevant legal rules and standards, and the client's objectives, interests, and constraints. 

~Given draft sections of affidavits that must be submitted to the court or other tribunal in a matter, identify the best affiant and best language to support each element to be proved, consistent with the facts, the relevant legal rules and standards, and the client's objectives, interests, and constraints. 

~Given draft provisions of a contract or other legal document, identify language that should be changed, explain why it should be changed, and suggest how that language should change, consistent with the facts, the relevant legal rules and standards, and the client's objectives, interests, and constraints. 

~Given a collection of legal sources, draft specified sections of a document, such as a memo, a persuasive brief or letter, or another common document, demonstrating skill at formulating an original legal analysis. 

~Draft or revise discovery documents consistent with the facts, the relevant legal rules and standards, and the client's objectives, interests, and constraints. 

NextGen UBE: Foundational Skills (Legal Research)

There are four categories of "foundational skills" that the NextGen UBE aims to test:

Group A: Issue Spotting and Analysis, Investigation, and Evaluation

Group B: Client Counseling and Advising, Negotiation and Dispute Resolution, Client Relationship and Management

Group C: Legal Research

Group D: Legal Writing and drafting 

This post will focus on Group C: According to the NCBE, the purpose of Group C is to assess the extent to which an examinee can identify and implement legal research strategies, including preliminary issue-spotting, working with provided resources, developing and refining a theory of the case, and reaching closure on research questions. The specific tasks that will be tested to measure this purpose are as follows: 

~In a matter that requires legal research, identify the research questions that need to be answered. 

~Identify ambiguities in the language, standards, elements, or factors of a provided resource.

~Identify efficient legal research strategies, methods, or tools (including appropriate search terms) that are likely to uncover other legal sources or documents that are likely to assist in the interpretation of a provided resource to advance your understanding of a client's position.

~Given a collection of legal sources, identify the roles and characteristics of the sources, including their authoritative weight.

~Given one or more judicial opinions, identify the facts in a matter that are analogous to and/or distinct from the dispositive facts in the opinions.

~Given a collection of legal sources, identify other sources, search terms, or research strategies that might be used to update sources or find additional sources. 

~Given a collection of legal sources, identify which sources are relevant to or dispositive of a legal issue in the matter. 

~Given a collection of legal sources, identify whether the sources are sufficient to complete an assigned research task or other lawyering task. 

NextGen UBE: Foundational Skills (Negotiation and Dispute Resolution, Client Relationship and Management)

There are four categories of "foundational skills" that the NextGen UBE aims to test:

Group A: Issue Spotting and Analysis, Investigation, and Evaluation

Group B: Client Counseling and Advising, Negotiation and Dispute Resolution, Client Relationship and Management

Group C: Legal Research

Group D: Legal Writing and drafting 

This post will focus on Group B: According to the NCBE, the purpose of Group B is to assess the extent to which an examinee can identify lawyering strategies within the lawyer-client relationship, based on the relevant rules and standards and consistent with a client's objective, interests, and constraints. The specific tasks that will be tested to measure this purpose are as follows: 

~Identify which claims to recommend bringing. which remedies to recommend seeking, which evidence to present, which arguments or defenses to raise, or how to respond to arguments or defenses, and in a transactional matter which provisions to recommend including, based on the relevant legal rules and standards and consistent with a client's objectives, interests, and constraints. 

~In a matter requiring review of provided materials, such as police reports, interview excerpts, or discovery, identify gaps in information obtained, suggestions for improvement, and/or grounds for objection (if applicable).

~Identify two factors that favor a client's position or two factors that favor an opposing party's position in a matter. 

~Identify two benefits or two drawbacks of a proposed resolution of a dispute, consistent with a client's objectives, interests, and constraints. 

~Identify potential terms of a contract or settlement agreement that could advance negotiation or resolution.

~In a matter in which a client has multiple stated objectives, explain why a legal rule or principle, as applied to the client's situation, may make one of those stated objectives attainable or unattainable. 

~Determine the best strategy to identify the client's needs and achieve the client's goal and objectives.

It's worth noting that the Group B skill is also where a small selection of the Model Rules of Professional Conduct will be tested. 

NextGen UBE: Foundational Skills ( Issue Spotting and Analysis, Investigation and Evaluation)

There are four categories of "foundational skills" that the NextGen UBE aims to test:

Group A: Issue Spotting and Analysis, Investigation, and Evaluation

Group B: Client Counseling and Advising, Negotiation and Dispute Resolution, Client Relationship and Management

Group C: Legal Research

Group D: Legal Writing and drafting 

This post will focus on Group A: According to the NCBE, the purpose of Group A is to assess the extent to which an examinee can apply fundamental legal principles and legal reasoning to analyze given fact patterns. The specific tasks that will be tested to measure this purpose are as follows: 

~Identify which legal concepts and principles are likely to affect the outcome of a matter based on the information provided.

~Identify which facts are likely to be relevant to or dispositive of a legal issue in a matter. 

~Identify the applicable standards of review and/or burdens of proof that will apply to legal issues in a matter.

~Identify the strengths and weakness's of a client's position or an opposing party's position based on the relevant legal rules and standards. 

~In a matter that requires additional factual development, identify which facts need to be investigated, or the best strategy for investigating or eliciting those facts, in order to be able to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of a client's position or an opposing party's position based on the relevant legal rules and standards. 

~Assess the probable outcome of a claim, motion, discovery matter, defense, or objection based on the relevant legal rules and standards.

~Identify the applicable or dispositive language, standards, elements, or factors of a provided resource (such as a statute, contract, or judicial opinion). 

The next post will focus on Group B!

The Structure of the NextGen UBE

There's plenty yet to learn about the NextGen UBE. But with a few jurisdictions administering the exam as early as this coming July, it's important to understand some basic facts about this test. Below are some fundamentals about this new exam. This post here focuses more on the structure of the exam; future posts will have a heavier focus on content. 

~ The test runs 9 hours. There are three sessions: a morning session of 3 hours, an afternoon session of 3 hours, and then one additional morning session of 3 hours. As for a second 3-hour afternoon session, that won't be a part of the NextGen exam, but I do expect some jurisdictions to take advantage of that time period to administer a state-specific component. 

~Each of the three sessions of the exam has the exact same format: 40 multiple choice questions, 2 integrated question sets, and one performance task. Adding up the three sessions amount to in total 120 multiple choice questions, 6 integrated question sets, and 3 performance tasks. Not all multiple choice questions count towards the score: 100 of the 120 count, and 20 are used as experimental questions for future tests. 

~In each of the three sessions, test takers will have 72 minutes to answer the multiple choice questions (1.8 minutes per question), 48 minutes to answer the integrated question sets (24 minutes per set), and 60 minutes to answer the performance task.

~Multiple choice questions are presented in two formats; in one format you're asked to select 1 answer from a list of 4 answers; in the other format, you're asked to select 2 answers from a list of 6 answers. Partial credit is available when asked to select 2 answers. 

~Integrated Question sets are presented in two formats: drafting sets and counseling sets. Drafting sets contain a medium-answer question. There are two types of drafting sets: one type provides a draft document (or sections of a draft document), and asks candidates to identify errors while explaining the errors or suggesting revisions. The other type asks candidates to draft a document or portions of a document. Counseling sets contain both short answer questions and multiple choice questions. Partial credit is available except for multiple choice questions requiring only one answer. 

~Performance tasks are presented in two formats: standard performance tasks which focus on a single, longer writing assignment, and legal research performance tasks which include multiple choice questions and short answer questions, followed by a medium answer question. Partial credit is available except for multiple choice questions requiring only one answer. 

~The lowest scaled score that one can receive on the NextGen UBE is 500; the highest scaled score that one can receive is 750.  Multiple choice questions contribute to 49% of the score, integrated question sets contribute to 21% of the scaled score, and performance tasks contribute to 30% of the score. 

Look out for more on this exam, as more information is disclosed! 

Good Luck!

All best to those who are preparing for the February bar exam! Posting will resume soon after the exam to assist with the LSAT and the Bar Exam (including the NextGen UBE). Keep an eye out for a post organizing all of the February bar exam results as they come in. 

Conclusions on Essays

A student asked a question that I thought was important enough to address here. 

Definite conclusions are not necessary on a bar exam. There may be times when a conclusion is definite (I'm thinking of, say, an issue asking whether diversity jurisdiction is satisfied), but the fact that some conclusions are definite does not mean that you've done something wrong if some of your conclusions are indefinite. In fact, and this is something that over the years, I've seen students struggle with, the bar exam writers are looking for nuance: they are looking for answers that understand and respect the complexity in a given legal issue and aren't so quick to advocate for one side winning, even if the question tells you that you represent a specific party in the lawsuit. Most answers do have one side that is stronger than the other, and the conclusion is an opportunity to let the graders know that you recognize that. But not all answers. For some, the best conclusion is that more information is needed to draw a conclusion. When you get into advocacy mode and decide that in order to convince the graders that you've come up with the right conclusion you've got to downplay any strengths of the opposing side, you end up leaving many points on the table. Get those points; they'll benefit you more than they'll benefit the table.

Bar Exam Essay Writing Tips

The framework here does take time and effort to get good at. But, (and I don’t mean to say that this is the only way to write a bar exam essay), it’s the approach I teach to maximize scores.

Spot the legal issue. Let the graders know you’ve spotted it. Clearly and succinctly. Write down the legal rule(s) that will help you to analyze the legal issue. Here’s the part that takes practice. Although you’re writing down the full rule(s), you have to work on seeing the individual components of the rule. Not the engine, each component of the engine. Certain components might need their own definitions. In your mind, that rule has to break up into component parts, because legal analysis requires analyzing each component part of a rule. Might come naturally for some; others might need lots of practice. Analyze each component part of the rule by explaining how both sides will claim that the individual component benefits them. So, for example, “contact” is a component of battery in Torts. If it’s questionable if contact was made, explain what both sides will say about this. It may true that as to a specific component, the argument only runs one way. Don’t force those; that’s fine, too. Once you’ve analyzed each component (when applicable), bring all the components back together to draw a probable conclusion as to how the issue you’ve spotted will likely be resolved.

Self Defense

A helpful way to learn self defense is to separate the defense into situations in which non-deadly force is allowable from situations in which deadly force is allowable. There's more to say about deadly force, but first, non-deadly force. 

A person who is not initially at fault may use such non-deadly force as the person reasonably believes is necessary to protect against the imminent use of unlawful threat upon that person. There is no duty to retreat prior to using non-deadly force. 

It's worth noting the word "reasonably" above. A word like that turns this test into one that focuses not on the subjective perception of the person claiming self defense, but instead asks whether a reasonable person would have believed that the non-deadly force was necessary. This objective standard also applies when deadly force is involved. You'll see the word "reasonably" used often in this post. 

The use of deadly force for self defense has a bit more complexity to it. A person may use deadly force  only if the person is without fault and is confronted with unlawful force. Further, the person claiming self defense must reasonably believe that imminent death or great bodily harm is threatened upon that person. 

There is generally no duty to retreat before using deadly force (and this is the majority rule to apply by default on the UBE), but the minority view is that a person must retreat before using deadly force if retreat can be done safely. But even the minority view does not require retreat if the attack occurs in the victim's home, the attack occurs while the victim is making a lawful arrest, or the assailant is in the process of robbing the victim.

Occasionally, an initial aggressor will claim the privilege of self defense. If one is the initial aggressor, one may not use force (deadly or non-deadly) in defense unless the initial aggressor withdrew from the confrontation and communicated to the other the desire to withdraw, or if the victim of the initial aggressor suddenly escalates a confrontation by the initial aggressor and the initial aggressor has no opportunity to retreat. 

The above sets forth all the rules for self defense that you'll need to know, but there are a few topics that are adjacent to self defense, and worth noting. Occasionally someone might claim a privilege to defend others rather than oneself. A person can defend others if the person reasonably believes that the other has the legal right to defend himself. The person defending the other can use the degree of force that the person reasonably believes the other has the legal right to use. 

Lastly, a person can use non-deadly force to defend their dwelling if the person reasonably believes that such conduct is necessary to prevent or terminate another's unlawful entry into or attack upon the dwelling. Deadly force is never allowable to defend the dwelling, but it may be used to prevent a violent entry into the dwelling if a person reasonably believes that the use of force is necessary to prevent a personal attack on themself or on others or to prevent a felony in the dwelling. 

A Common UBE Trap:

An agent will inform a third party that the agent is acting for the principal, even though the agent has no actual authority to act for the principal. It might seem, then, that the agent has apparent authority to act since it would be reasonable for a third party to think that the agent, apparently, has the right to act. But it's important to remember that apparent authority exists only if the principal holds out the agent as possessing that authority to act. The trap here, used time and again on the UBE, is to treat apparent authority as having been met because of words or conduct by the agent towards a third party.  

The policy here that will help you to remember this distinction is to remember that the principal will be bound by the agent's apparent authority. Because the principal will be burdened, the principal will need to be the cause of that burden. 

A Note on Homicide

Words like “first degree murder,” “second degree murder, “premeditation,” and etc., shouldn’t even enter your thoughts when answering a homicide question on the UBE. Of course, a statute (or the Model Penal Code, or etc.) can appear in a question which modifies things, but if applying the default, common law, rules, those classifications do not exist.

Rather, there are four ways to commit murder and they don’t deal with degrees.

~You can intend to kill someone and the person dies as a result.

~You can intend to cause serious bodily harm towards someone and cause the person to die.

~You can act recklessly and cause the person to die. (Check your heart; it might be depraved!)

~You can engage in an enumerated felony and kill someone during that engagement (felony murder).

That’s it: nothing more, nothing less. Unless there’s a statute.

Contract Law Tip

x owes money to y.

y forgets to collect, such that the statute of limitations has run. x, for moral reasons or otherwise, puts in writing that he’ll pay the debt even though he’s no longer legally obligated to do so. You might be thinking that x owes nothing to y. The theory might be that when x promised to pay a debt he no longer owed, that was a gift, not a contract. Everything you’ve ever learned about consideration in contract law would lead you to that result. Not so much. If a debtor promises to pay a debt that’s been barred by the statute of limitations, the debtor will be bound to pay the amount promised (which could differ from the amount of the original debt) provided the promise is in writing. Filed under “contract law is weird.”

Past Recollection Recorded vs Refreshing Recollection

There are some concepts on the bar exam that are so similar that students tend to confuse one for the other. The concepts of refreshing recollection (sometimes referred to as present recollection revived) and past recollection recorded would make that list. Although they have some similarities, it's far more likely that the differences will be tested.

Refreshing Recollection:

Witnesses may use any writing or object for the purpose of refreshing their recollection in order to testify. To avoid hearsay obstacles, witnesses generally may not read from the writing while testifying. By not reading from the writing while testifying, they are not introducing the writing into evidence, and that avoids the potential hearsay problem. 

Whenever a witness has used a writing to refresh his/her memory while the witness is testifying, an adverse party is entitled to have the writing produced at trial, cross examine the witness about the writing, and introduce portions of the writing relating to the witness's testimony into evidence. If, instead, the witness refreshed his/her memory at some time other than while testifying, an adverse party is entitled to the above only if the court allows it. That's to say, these safeguards are mandatory if the memory is refreshed while testifying; if not, they are discretionary. 

In a criminal case, if the prosecution fails to produce or deliver a writing that the prosecution used to refresh a witness's recollection, the judge must strike the witness's testimony. A mistrial might also be appropriate, at the discretion of the judge. 

Past Recollection Recorded: 

There will be instances when witnesses state that they have insufficient recollection of an event to testify truthfully about that event even after they have consulted a record in an attempt to remember the details. In these instances, the record itself may be offered into evidence, but now we've also got a hearsay issue since the record is an out of court statement and it's offered for the truth of the matter asserted (the content of the record). 

The hearsay problem is avoided (that's to say, there's an exception), provided a proper foundation is laid. The foundation must include all of the following:

~ The witness has insufficient recollection to testify fully and accurately even after consulting the record. 

~ The witness had personal knowledge of the facts in the record when the record was made. 

~ The record was made by the witness, under the witness's direction, or adopted by the witness. 

~ The record was made when the matter was fresh in the witness's mind. 

~ The record accurately reflects the witness's knowledge. 

When a proper foundation is laid, the record may be read into evidence and heard by the jury. The record may not, however, be admitted into evidence as an exhibit unless offered by the adverse party. 

Evidence Tip

When answering Evidence questions:

What evidence was offered?

Why was the evidence offered?

By the above, what I mean is that although some evidence is always admissible or always inadmissible, mostly the same evidence will be admissible for some purposes, and inadmissible for others.

A statement might be admissible to impeach but not to prove the truth of the matter asserted. A person’s predilections might be admissible to prove motive but not to prove character. The fact that someone fixed something after another was injured by that thing might be offered to prove ownership of the thing, but not to prove negligence.

Etc., etc., etc.

If you’re not asking “why,” you’re missing the ball on this subject. You’ll get some questions right, regardless, but the traps that the NCBE has set will ultimately get the best of you

Essays on the UBE

People often spend time trying to figure out what the writers of the UBE are looking for on the essays. This is right from the horse's mouth (the horse is the NCBE).

Note the adjective "probable" in "probable solution." This isn't a calculus test. Don't exert a lot of mental energy trying to come up with the absolute correct answer: the path to getting to a likely answer is where most point are earned.