Maryland electrician exam passing score

The passing score, tier by tier

Both Maryland tiers pass at 70%, set by the PSI Services bulletin and the MD Board of Electricians. The difference is the volume and the mix, not the line you have to clear.

• Journeyperson: 70 questions in 3 hours 30 minutes. At 70% that is 49 of 70 correct. The exam fee is $65.
• Master: 90 questions in 4 hours, and it is calculation-heavy. 30 of the 90 are calculations, so the master cut score lives or dies on whether you can set up load, feeder, and motor math fast. At 70% that is 63 of 90 correct. The exam fee is $65.

How hard is it, really

Maryland is one of the few states that publishes its numbers, so we do not have to guess. The Maryland Board's own meeting minutes report roughly a 27 to 28 percent pass rate across both tiers (182 of 684 passed January to September 2025; 2,549 of 8,948 since the exam's inception). Open book does not mean easy. That is the honest picture. Open book does not mean easy, and 70% is a higher bar than it looks once the clock is running.

The score report is reported to you at the test center, so you walk out knowing where you stand. What sinks people is rarely the cut score itself. It is two traps that have nothing to do with how much code you know.

• Speed under the clock. Journeyperson gives you 3 hours 30 minutes for 70 questions, which is three minutes each. If you have to hunt the book on every question, you run out of time before you run out of knowledge.
• The open-book trap. Open book on the 2020 NEC feels like a safety net, so people under-prepare and plan to look everything up. The candidates who clear 70% already know roughly where each rule lives and use the book to confirm, not to learn.

One more thing the cut score hides: Maryland law and rule (Business Occupations and Professions Article Title 6, section 6-304, and COMAR 09.09.01) is tested inside the single exam, not as a separate scored section. State code overrides the NEC where they conflict. A question that turns on Maryland law is scored the same as an NEC question, so it counts toward your 70% just as much.

How to cross the line

You do not get to 70% by studying everything evenly. You get there by finding the article families that are bleeding points and putting your hours there first. A handful of recovered questions is the whole gap between a pass and another $65 retake.

Start with the free 15-minute diagnostic. It projects your score against the article families the Maryland exam tests on the 2020 NEC and ranks the topics costing you the most, so you study to the score instead of to a feeling. Take the free Maryland diagnostic.