MA-ME Pass Rate 2026: What the Data Shows

What the State Actually Publishes About Pass Rates

Anyone searching for a specific MA-ME pass-rate percentage for 2026 will run into a wall: neither the Massachusetts Board of State Examiners of Electricians nor PSI, the testing provider, publishes a public pass/fail statistic for the Class A Master Electrician technical examination. That's a deliberate contrast to some other trades and credentials, where a state or association releases annual pass-rate tables. For the Massachusetts Master Electrician License Exam, the closest thing to public performance data is structural: the passing threshold, the question count, the time limit, and the retake escalation rules written into the PSI Candidate Information Bulletin and the board's regulations.

That means the honest way to answer "what does the data show" is to look at the mechanics that determine outcomes rather than manufacture a number that doesn't exist. This article walks through every piece of real, sourced data available - passing score, domain weighting, retake consequences, and fee structure - and uses it to explain who tends to struggle and where. For a broader look at difficulty overall, see How Hard Is the MA-ME Exam? Complete Difficulty Guide 2026.

The Passing Score Mechanics Behind the Numbers

Part 1, the technical examination for the Class A license, consists of 90 questions with a 4-hour limit. The passing requirement is 70%, which works out to exactly 63 correct answers. There's no partial credit and no curve - you either land on 63 or higher within four hours, or you don't.

The separately required Business and Law Part II is shorter: 50 questions, a 2-hour limit, and the same 70% passing requirement, equivalent to 35 correct answers. Both parts must be passed within 12 months after your application is approved. Missing that window doesn't just mean rescheduling - it can mean re-establishing eligibility.

Because the passing bar is fixed rather than adjusted against other test-takers, your outcome depends entirely on your own mastery of the content - not on how anyone else in your test window performed. For the exact breakdown of what "passing" requires in practice, see MA-ME Passing Score 2026: Exactly What You Need to Pass.

Domain Weighting and Where Candidates Lose Points

The 90 questions on Part 1 aren't spread evenly across the 14 content domains. The official allocation, in Domain 1-14 order, is 4, 6, 11, 10, 15, 7, 1, 2, 10, 6, 2, 6, 6, and 4. That distribution is itself the closest thing to predictive "data" available to candidates, because it tells you exactly where points are concentrated - and where a weak spot will do the most damage to your score.

At the other end of the scale, Transformers (Domain 7) carries just 1 question and Low-Voltage Distribution (Domain 8) carries 2. That doesn't mean you can skip them - every point matters against a 63-point target - but it does mean your study hours should be allocated proportionally rather than evenly. A full breakdown of all 14 domains, including the smaller ones like Alarm Systems, Photovoltaic, and Energy Storage Systems, is available in MA-ME Exam Domains 2026: Complete Guide to All 14 Content Areas.

Retake Rules: The Real Consequence of Failing

Because there's no public pass-rate figure, the retake policy is the clearest signal of how the board expects candidates to perform on the first try - and what happens when they don't. After three unsuccessful attempts on either part, the candidate must complete additional board-accepted education before being allowed to sit again. After six unsuccessful attempts, the full required education must be repeated from scratch - not just a supplemental course.

That two-tier escalation tells you something important: the board treats repeated failure as a signal of an underlying knowledge gap, not bad luck on a given day. It's a strong argument for treating your first attempt as the one that matters most, rather than planning to "learn the test" through trial and error.

The Business and Law Part II Factor

It's easy to fixate on the 90-question technical exam and treat Part II as an afterthought, but the data on requirements doesn't support that approach. Business and Law carries its own 50-question exam, its own 2-hour limit, and the same 70% passing bar (35 correct). Both parts have to be cleared within the same 12-month window tied to your application approval - failing one doesn't pause the clock on the other.

Candidates who treat Part II as "easy" because it's shorter sometimes underprepare for it precisely because they're pouring all their study time into the 15-question Wiring Methods domain and the other technical content. For a dedicated walkthrough of what Part II actually tests, see the guidance in MA-ME Study Guide 2026: How to Pass on Your First Attempt, and use our practice test platform to run timed Business and Law drills separately from your technical practice sets.

Who Is Actually Sitting for This Exam

Understanding pass-rate dynamics also means understanding the candidate pool. To even apply, a candidate needs a Massachusetts journeyman electrician license, at least one year actively engaged in electrical work as a licensed journeyman, and 150 hours of approved master-electrician education, along with the required code-update and CORI documentation. That's a meaningfully experienced population - these aren't entry-level test-takers guessing at basic terminology.

Because Class A licensure authorizes running an electrical business (while a Class B journeyman license is what's needed for personal hands-on work), most candidates are journeymen preparing to take on business ownership, supervisory, or contracting responsibilities. That shift in scope is part of why Business and Law appears as a standalone, equally-weighted requirement rather than a handful of questions folded into the technical exam. If you're weighing whether the credential is worth pursuing given your career stage, Is the MA-ME Certification Worth It? Complete ROI Analysis 2026 covers that decision in more depth, and MA-ME Jobs looks at where Class A license holders typically work.

A Domain-Based Prep Timeline

Since the exam's weighting is public and fixed, the most defensible prep strategy is to allocate study time roughly in proportion to question count, front-loading the heaviest domains while still touching every domain at least once before test day.

This sequencing mirrors the logic laid out in more detail in MA-ME Cheat Sheet 2026: One-Page Review of Must-Know Facts, which condenses the highest-yield facts from each domain into a single reference page for final review.

The Cost of Failing, In Dollars

Pass-rate data isn't just about pride - it's about money. The initial application and examination package runs $276 total: $75 for PSI processing, $80 for the technical examination, $55 for the Business and Law examination, and $66 in state application charges. Initial license issuance adds another $155 once you've passed both parts.

If you fail Part 1, a retake costs $80. A Part II retake costs $55. Those aren't catastrophic sums individually, but they add up quickly if repeated failures push you toward the three-attempt threshold that requires additional education - which comes with its own tuition cost on top of the retest fee. A full accounting of every fee in the process, including scenarios where multiple retakes are needed, is broken down in MA-ME Certification Cost 2026: Complete Pricing Breakdown.

The 2026 Code Adoption Wrinkle

One data point worth flagging for anyone testing in 2026: Massachusetts adopted its 2026 Electrical Code on April 24, 2026, and the board's May 18, 2026 meeting minutes anticipated examination changes by November. That's a meaningful timing detail, because it means the code edition PSI is actually testing on your appointment date may not automatically match whatever the newest adopted code is at the moment you start studying.

Don't assume code adoption equals an immediate exam change. Confirm the PSI-tested edition for your specific appointment before you commit to a study reference set - the Candidate Information Bulletin is the authoritative source for which edition applies to your test date. Preparation should still center on the NEC, the Massachusetts amendments in 527 CMR 12.00, and NFPA 72, but double-check the edition year rather than guessing based on the adoption date alone. For a rundown of testing windows and how this kind of transition period is typically handled, see MA-ME Exam Dates 2026: Testing Windows, Deadlines & Scheduling.

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