BSB Centralised Assessments 2026–27: Dates, Results and Resit Rules

The next BSB centralised assessments fall on 10, 15 and 17 December 2026, with results sent to course providers by the end of January 2027. After that come 26, 28 and 30 April 2027 and 16, 18 and 20 August 2027. The BSB expects all students attempting a centralised assessment to sit it “on the same day and at the same time” (AETOs may ask for alternative start times for candidates needing adjustments or sitting overseas), but you book and sit the papers through your course provider (your AETO), and it is your AETO, not the BSB, that tells you your results. This page lists the remaining 2026 sitting and all 2027 sittings (the BSB’s list runs on into 2029), the format of each paper, the three ways to challenge a result with their deadlines and fees, and the resit rules. Independent — not affiliated with the Bar Standards Board. ProSyllabus is an independent study site and nothing here is official. Every exam fact and figure below is quoted or summarised from the BSB’s own documents, read on 27 October 2026.

BSB Bar Qualification Manual Part 3C and Part 4, Chair’s Report Part 1, read 27 October 2026.

The Bar Qualification Manual, Part 3C, lists the dates below. It sets the three exam rows out in the order Criminal Litigation, Civil Litigation (paper 1), Civil Litigation (paper 2), and puts the three dates in a single cell beside them. It does not say in words which date belongs to which paper.

Read in row order, the Winter 2026 dates would give Criminal on 10 December, Civil Paper 1 on 15 December and Civil Paper 2 on 17 December. Do not rely on that: the order has changed before. In December 2025 Civil came first, and Criminal was sat six days after Civil Paper 1. Check your timetable with your AETO.

All students “are expected to sit the exam on the same day and at the same time”, the Manual says. AETOs may ask the BSB for alternative start times for candidates who need adjustments or are sitting overseas; some AETOs allow overseas venues, at their discretion.

The BSB sets and marks the centralised assessments but does not run the sittings. Its page “Bar training: who does what” says: “We are not responsible for arranging and administering the exam sittings for centralised assessments taken during the vocational component – this is the job of students’ AETOs.” And: “the providers make all the necessary arrangements for you to sit your exams. Please contact them about this rather than us.”

Two rules catch people out. First, Civil Litigation is one assessment in two parts: “you are required to attempt both parts of the exam and meet the pass standard in order to be considered Competent. You cannot bank your result for part of the attempt.” Second, the pass mark is across all 90 Civil questions: Chair’s Report Part 1 says candidates “simply need to achieve a pass mark across the 90 questions. There is no requirement to achieve a minimum number of marks on either paper 1 or paper 2.” Paper-and-pen sittings use an optical mark read sheet, and the Manual is blunt: “Only answers given in the OMR sheet will be accepted and marked.”

The results dates in the table are when the BSB sends results to AETOs. For each sitting the Manual adds: “Students should contact their AETO to find out the specific date on which the results will be released to them. The BSB cannot correspond with individual candidates about their results; all queries must be directed to the AETO.”

Between the exam and your result, the BSB marks every script, a Subject Board and a Final Board review how each question performed, and the Board can intervene, for example by crediting a second answer or disregarding a defective question. The pass standard is set for each sitting by standard setting, and “the pass marks are translated and reported as 60% to AETO’s”. So a result of 60% means you reached that sitting’s standard, whatever the raw mark was. Our pass marks guide has the raw standards for the three sittings with published Chair’s reports we saved (August 2025, December 2025 and April 2026).

“Examination answers are not re-marked”, the Manual says, but you may ask for a clerical error check, an enhanced clerical error check, and/or a request for review. Each has its own deadline. Only the enhanced check depends on another: the Regulations say “You may only request an ECEC after having received a response to a clerical error check from your AETO.” A request for review has no such condition; its deadline runs from the publication of the Chair’s report.

Three details matter. The clerical check deadline: the Manual says “within 10 days of results release (date of despatch, not receipt)” and the Regulations say “within 10 working days of your AETO notifying candidates of results”; ask your AETO which date it counts from, and do not leave it late. The review deadline runs from the Chair’s Report being published, not from your result, and the Regulations say a request is accepted only after that report is out. And the review ground is narrow, though the two documents word it differently. The Manual says: “There is only one ground on which a request for review can be considered: breach of natural justice by the CEB.” The Regulations (section 4.1) give the fuller wording: “The only permissible ground for a request is that, in exercising its discretion to confirm cohort marks, the CEB acted irrationally and/or in breach of natural justice.” If you are considering a review, work from the Regulations’ full wording and the Chair’s report. The Manual adds: “There is no further appeal process in place.”

Payment for the BSB’s review processes must be made with the request. If it is declined, the BSB tries once more; if the second attempt is declined, the application is treated as void.

Since the 2020 reforms the BSB does not cap attempts. The Bar Qualification Manual says: “We no longer prescribe the number of attempts available for each element of Bar training other than to say that we permit unlimited attempts over a period of 5 years, although individual providers of Bar training may have different regulations prescribing the number of resits for their own academic awards.” The old BPTC allowed three attempts at each assessment.

A resit is a real hurdle. In April 2026, candidates classified as first sit passed Criminal Litigation at 71% and resit candidates at 41%; in Civil Litigation the figures were 67% and 43% (Chair’s Report Part 2, April 2026, sections 2.7 and 3.7). The report counts as first sit a “first ever attempt at the examination, or previous attempts discounted on the basis of accepted extenuating circumstances”. That gap is a reason to change how you prepare, not just to sit again.

For a countdown plan to the next sitting: the BSB litigation resit bundle, three free questions first. What official mock material exists is in our mock papers guide; the full exam page is the BSB centralised assessments exam page.