How Many Questions Are on the Journeyman Electrician Exam?

Short answer: most journeyman electrician exams have 80 to 100 multiple-choice questions, with about 3 to 4 hours to complete them, and you typically need around 70% to pass. The exact numbers depend on your state and exam provider (usually PSI).

The details behind the number

The question count varies a little by jurisdiction, but the structure is consistent. Your exam is split between two types:

• Code-knowledge / lookup questions — roughly two-thirds. These ask you to find and apply a rule in the NEC.
• Calculation questions — roughly one-third. Conduit fill, box fill, ampacity, motor and load calculations.

Some states even break these into separate timed sections. Texas, for example, gives journeyman candidates a set of NEC-knowledge questions plus a separate calculations section with its own time limit.

How much time per question?

If you have 4 hours for 80 questions, that's about 3 minutes each — which sounds generous until you remember it's open-book and you have to find many of the answers. Calculation questions eat time, so the faster you are at code lookups, the more time you bank for the math.

What you actually need to pass

At a ~70% passing score on an 80-question exam, you can miss roughly 24 questions and still pass. So the goal isn't perfection — it's being fast and reliable on the question types that show up every single time.

The takeaway

Don't just memorize the count — train for the pace. Take full-length, timed practice exams so the clock feels familiar on test day. Our mock exams and verified question bank mirror the real format so you walk in knowing exactly how to spend your time.