CeMAP Pass Mark: 70% in Every Unit, Marks Needed, Merit and Distinction

The CeMAP pass mark is 70% in each of the five units, and every unit has to be passed in its own right. In marks that is 28 out of 40 in each of the two CeMAP 1 units (FRE1 and FRE2), 35 out of 50 in MRT1 and 28 out of 40 in MRT2 (CeMAP 2), and 42 out of 60 in the CeMAP 3 assessment. The qualification as a whole is graded pass or fail; a pass “at merit level” (80%) or “at distinction level” (90%) is recorded unit by unit. All of this is in LIBF’s own qualification specification, and this page quotes it. ProSyllabus is an independent study site. It is not affiliated with LIBF or Walbrook Institute London, and nothing here is official. Every rule and fee below is quoted or summarised from their own pages and specifications, read on 14 October 2026.

CeMAP qualification specification (cover: Published April 2026), section “Assessment”, read 14 October 2026.

A note on names. The CeMAP pages now sit on walbrook.ac.uk (libf.ac.uk addresses redirect there), the specifications carry the copyright of Walbrook Institute London Limited, and Ofqual’s register lists the awarding organisation as The London Institute of Banking & Finance. The pages themselves still say LIBF, so this guide does too.

The sentence that sets the CeMAP 1 pass mark, in full: “Each unit comprises a 1-hour exam of 25 standalone multiple-choice questions (MCQs, 25 marks) and 3 case studies each with 5 linked MCQs (15 marks). You need to achieve at least 28/40 (70%) to pass each unit.” The FSRE specification says the same from the unit’s side: “A total of 40 marks are available” and “The unit pass mark is 70% and you must achieve the minimum pass mark for the unit.”

There is no module mark. CeMAP 1 is passed when FRE1 and FRE2 are both passed, and the specification gives a pass mark for each unit, never for the two together. Its words: “All components and units are mandatory and assessed.” The FSRE specification adds: “All assessments need to be passed to achieve a qualification pass.” It also describes the two exams as worth “a total of 80 marks”, but we found no pass mark out of 80 in it.

Our reading of those sentences, labelled as ours: a strong unit does not carry a weak one. Forty out of 40 in FRE1 and 27 out of 40 in FRE2 is 67 out of 80, more than 70% of the marks, and it is still one unit failed, so CeMAP 1 is not complete until FRE2 is resat and passed. The same holds between modules: nothing in the specification lets a mark in one unit count towards another.

Inside a unit there is one pass mark, not two. The FSRE specification splits each unit exam into Part 1 (25 questions, “This component is worth 25 marks”) and Part 2 (3 case studies with 5 linked questions, “This component is worth 15 marks”), and then gives a single pass mark for the unit. It states no minimum for either part. On that wording, marks from the standalone questions and marks from the case studies add up to one total, and 28 is 28 however it is reached. The table shows what that means in practice.

The CeMAP specification: “The overall qualification will be graded Pass/Fail only. However, you will be able to achieve passes at merit level and distinction level within each unit of CeMAP®.” Ofqual’s register entry for the qualification (501/0629/6) gives the grading type as Pass/Fail. So there is no distinction for CeMAP as a whole: the higher levels belong to a unit.

Because the exams are taken on demand, a resit is not tied to a sitting date. LIBF’s exam page says of on-demand multiple-choice exams: “you can sit it whenever you feel ready – day or night, during your registration period.” What limits you is the three-a-week and ten-a-year rule, the £120 each time, and the end of your registration period. The cost guide adds up what resits do to the total.

Pass marks were 70% under the old structure too, but they attached to different units. LIBF’s transition page sets the two side by side.

If you passed units before the change, they were carried across: the page says that on 13 January 2026 LIBF would “automatically transfer your current passes over to the new structure”. The modules and units guide has the equivalence table and a checker.

The specification says CeMAP “meets the education standard required by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) of anyone wishing to achieve a ‘licence to practise’ and work as a mortgage adviser.” LIBF’s 2022 article on the qualification adds that you will “also need to work under supervision in an advice firm to gain ‘competent adviser status’”. A pass mark is the exam part of that, not the whole of it. Nothing on this page is regulatory or career advice.

ProSyllabus has its own CeMAP Module 1 mock exam: 80 original questions in the current shape of the two FSRE unit exams, with 3 of them free to answer (1 in unit 1 and 2 in unit 2) and the reason for every answer shown. You will find it on the full web version of this page and on the mock exam’s own page. It is our own work: it is not written or endorsed by LIBF or Walbrook Institute London and contains no LIBF specimen or exam question. It marks each unit out of 40 against the pass mark of 28.