Original data study
What does the customs broker exam pass rate and question mix actually look like across recent administrations?
How this was collected
Every row is one administration of the U.S. Customs Broker License Examination (CBLE), administered by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on the fourth Wednesday of April and October. Question counts per category are transcribed from the category table printed at the front of the public exam paper CBP posts for that administration, so each count is an official figure rather than our own classification. Pass rates are the "prior to appeal decisions" figures CBP publishes on its License Examination Notice page. Each administration in exam-history.json carries its own verified date recording when we last checked its CBP source, and every row in this dataset currently shares the 2026-07-24 compile date because the whole file was re-checked against CBP in one pass. An administration is included once CBP has posted its paper; nothing here is estimated or filled in.
Newest row in this dataset verified .
What the data shows
Administrations analyzed
5
With a published pass rate
3
Lowest published rate
12%
Highest published rate
30%
Average of published rates
21.3%
3 of 5 administrations in this dataset carry a pass rate, because CBP posts only the three most recent on its License Examination Notice page. The lowest, highest, and average above are computed from those 3 figures only. Administrations with no published rate are listed in the table as not published; they are not counted as zero and they are not dropped.
The question mix is not fixed
All 5 papers run to 80 questions, but the split across the six exam categories has moved. These are the categories whose question count or name changed within this dataset, oldest paper first:
- Category I (Broker Compliance): May 2024 15, October 2024 15, April 2025 15, October 2025 20, April 2026 17
- Category II (Practical Exercise): May 2024 5, October 2024 5, April 2025 5, October 2025 5, April 2026 9
- Category III (Modernized Drawback, then Quota): May 2024 5, October 2024 5, April 2025 5, October 2025 5, April 2026 4
- Category IV (Classification): May 2024 15, October 2024 15, April 2025 15, October 2025 10, April 2026 10
A candidate budgeting study time by the old mix would be weighting a category that no longer carries the same number of questions. Counts come from the category table printed at the front of each CBP paper, so they are official figures rather than our own classification.
Full data table
| Administration | Date | Pass rate prior to appeal | Question mix | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| April 2026 | 22% | I Broker Compliance 17; II Practical Exercise 9; III Quota 4; IV Classification 10; V Entry / Entry Summary 25; VI Valuation, Appraisement and Duty Assessment 15 (80 total) | CBP published exam paper | |
| October 2025 | 12% | I Broker Compliance 20; II Practical Exercise 5; III Quota 5; IV Classification 10; V Entry / Entry Summary 25; VI Valuation, Appraisement and Duty Assessment 15 (80 total) | CBP published exam paper | |
| April 2025 | 30% | I Broker Compliance 15; II Practical Exercise 5; III Modernized Drawback 5; IV Classification 15; V Entry / Entry Summary 25; VI Valuation, Appraisement and Duty Assessment 15 (80 total) | CBP published exam paper | |
| October 2024 | not published Not published on CBP's current License Examination Notice page (only the three most recent administrations are posted). | I Broker Compliance 15; II Practical Exercise 5; III Modernized Drawback 5; IV Classification 15; V Entry / Entry Summary 25; VI Valuation, Appraisement and Duty Assessment 15 (80 total) | CBP published exam paper | |
| May 2024 | not published Not published on CBP's current License Examination Notice page (only the three most recent administrations are posted). | I Broker Compliance 15; II Practical Exercise 5; III Modernized Drawback 5; IV Classification 15; V Entry / Entry Summary 25; VI Valuation, Appraisement and Duty Assessment 15 (80 total) | CBP published exam paper |
Limitations
- CBP posts pass rates only for the three most recent administrations on its License Examination Notice page, so older administrations show as not published rather than being guessed at or quietly dropped.
- This dataset is 5 administrations. Treat the lowest, highest, and average as a plain description of those few papers, not as a statistically robust trend or a forecast of the next exam.
- The published rate is the figure prior to appeal decisions. Because examinees within three questions of passing may appeal, the final rate for an administration can end up higher than the number shown here.
- Question counts describe how each paper was structured, not how difficult any category was. A category with fewer questions is not automatically easier.
- Every figure comes from CBP's own published documents. If CBP revises or removes a document, the row is re-verified against the new source rather than kept as it was.
Read the methodology behind this data, or go to the Customs Broker Sim tool this study supports.