Series 65 Exam Guide: Format, Cost, and Prep
The Series 65 is NASAA’s Uniform Investment Adviser Law Exam: 130 scored questions in 180 minutes, a $187 fee, and a passing score of 92 of 130. Passing it, plus registration with your state securities regulator, qualifies you as an investment adviser representative (IAR): a professional who gives investment advice for a fee.
What sets the Series 65 apart from every FINRA representative-level exam is what it doesn’t require. No sponsoring firm. No SIE®. No other exam, before or after. NASAA (the North American Securities Administrators Association, the organization of state securities regulators) owns the exam, FINRA administers it, and anyone can self-enroll. That makes it the rare path into the industry you can walk from your first step to your last exam question without a firm behind you.
Series 65 Facts at a Glance
All figures verified July 2026 against NASAA’s current published numbers; retake waits rechecked October 2026.
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| What is the Series 65? | NASAA’s Uniform Investment Adviser Law Exam, the standalone qualification for investment adviser representatives. |
| How much does it cost, and what’s the format? | $187. 130 scored questions plus 10 unscored, in 180 minutes. |
| What score passes? | 92 of 130 (about 70.8%). Stale sources still say 94: that threshold ended in October 2018. |
| Do you need sponsorship? | No. You can self-enroll through FINRA’s Test Enrollment Services System (TESS) with a Form U10. |
| Is the SIE required? | No. The Series 65 has no co-requisites of any kind (how it relates to the SIE). |
| What’s the pass rate? | NASAA doesn’t publish one. Prep-industry estimates run roughly 65–70%, estimates, not data. |
| How long does a pass last? | 2 years before registration, extendable to 5 in participating states through NASAA’s Exam Validity Extension Program (EVEP). |
| What are the retake waits? | 30 days, 30 days, then 180 days now. For enrollment windows opened on or after January 4, 2027, the wait after a third or later failure drops to 60 days (NASAA, announced August 10, 2026). |
Current-Fact Watch (July 2026; retake waits rechecked October 2026): Three places where stale copy circulates. First, the passing score is 92 of 130: the old 94 threshold has been gone since October 2018, and copies of it still rank in search results. Second, the fee is $187 and did not change in 2026: when FINRA raised its own exam fees on January 1, 2026 (SIE to $100, Series 7 to $395), NASAA’s exams weren’t part of the filing. A source claiming the Series 65 fee “just went up” has confused the two fee-setters. Third, retake waits: they’re 30/30/180 days today. NASAA announced on August 10, 2026 that the wait after a third or later failure drops to 60 days for enrollment windows opened on or after January 4, 2027, and the two 30-day waits stay as they are. FINRA’s separate cut to 15/15/60, effective January 19, 2027 under Regulatory Notice 26-18, covers its exams only, so a source promising 15-day Series 65 retakes has merged two regulators’ rules.
What’s on the Series 65
Don’t let the name fool you. It’s called the Uniform Investment Adviser Law Exam, but under the current NASAA content outline (effective June 12, 2023), law and ethics are 30% of it; the other 70% is economics, investment vehicles, and recommendation strategy:
| Content area | Weight | Scored questions |
|---|---|---|
| Economic factors and business information | 15% | 20 |
| Investment vehicle characteristics | 25% | 32 |
| Client/customer investment recommendations and strategies | 30% | 39 |
| Laws, regulations, and guidelines, including prohibition on unethical business practices | 30% | 39 |
The two 30% areas, recommendations and law, carry 78 of the 130 scored questions between them. The Series 65 study guide turns these weights into a study order.
Who needs it, and the path through it
The Series 65 is the exam for the advisory side of the industry, people paid fees for advice, rather than commissions for transactions:
- Pass the Series 65. Self-enroll via TESS with a Form U10 (or, if a firm employs you, it can open your window via Form U4), pay $187, schedule, and test.
- Register with the state. Passing alone confers nothing: you become an IAR when a state securities regulator registers you, typically through the registered investment adviser (RIA) firm you work for or found.
There’s one alternative route to the same registration: the Series 66 plus the Series 7 together cover the same ground as the Series 63 and 65 combined. That path makes sense for registered representatives at broker-dealers who already hold the 7; the Series 66 alone won’t register you without it. If you’re weighing the brokerage stack instead (SIE, Series 7, sponsorship) how the SIE and Series 7 fit together explains that track, and our securities careers map compares every path side by side.
How to Prepare
Our approach here matches our approach to the SIE and Series 7: original practice questions written from the public content outline, each one adversarially verified against current rules and cited to its source, free. The Series 65 practice exam page has the live 130-question bank, and the questions-by-topic page organizes it across the four outline areas. The study guide sequences the work.
The Series 65 tests current rules and current numbers (tax figures, retirement rules, regulatory thresholds) so the same warning applies as everywhere on this site: check when your prep materials last verified their facts. A source that still says the passing score is 94 hasn’t checked since 2018.