TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Azya Thornton on Dec 16, 2024

Virginia and South Dakota are now among 29 states that will use the new bar exam set to debut in July 2026, bringing the total number of jurisdictions to more than half of the 56 states and territories that rely on a bar exam for attorney licensing, Reuters reports. The "NextGen" bar exam is the first major redesign of the national lawyer licensing test in 25 years. It began development in 2021 with the goal of creating a test that emphasizes legal skills and relies less on memorization of laws. The Tennessee Supreme Court announced in April that, starting in July 2027, law school graduates seeking to be licensed in Tennessee will take the NextGen exam, rather than the Uniform Bar Examination (UBE), which has been used since 2019. Only two states — California and Nevada — have announced they will not adopt the NextGen bar exam.