The Published Pass Rate Figures
GARP (Global Association of Risk Professionals) publishes FRM exam results after each sitting. The figures are consistent across recent years: Part I pass rates have ranged from approximately 40% to 50%, and Part II from roughly 55% to 65%.
The asymmetry between Part I and Part II is worth noting. Part II has historically had a higher pass rate than Part I, which surprises many candidates who assume a harder exam should be harder to pass. The explanation is candidate selection: Part II candidates have already passed Part I and tend to be more committed, better-prepared, and more experienced in risk management. The pool is smaller and more filtered.
These pass rates apply to candidates who sat the exam, not everyone who registered. GARP does not publish no-show data, but preparation providers and candidate communities report that a meaningful portion of registered candidates do not sit in any given window, either because they feel unprepared or because professional commitments intervene.
Why Candidates Fail Part I
Part I covers four knowledge domains: Foundations of Risk Management, Quantitative Analysis, Financial Markets and Products, and Valuation and Risk Models. The exam is 100 multiple-choice questions, four options each, sat over four hours.
The most common reasons candidates fail Part I are not mysterious:
Underestimating the quantitative demand. The Quantitative Analysis domain covers probability, statistics, regression, time series, and simulation. Candidates whose backgrounds are primarily in credit or operational risk, or who qualified in a non-quantitative discipline, often find this domain harder than expected. The exam tests application, not just recall. Being able to state what Value at Risk means is not sufficient; you need to calculate it from given data under time pressure.
Covering material without practising questions. FRM candidates who read the GARP curriculum or a third-party study guide without working through exam-format questions regularly discover on exam day that reading and answering are different skills. The four-option MCQ format under time pressure (four hours, 100 questions, approximately 2.4 minutes per question) requires a specific kind of decision-making that only practice builds.
Inadequate preparation time. GARP recommends approximately 240 hours of study for Part I. Most candidates who fail report having studied fewer than 150 hours, often because they registered with ambitious intentions and then found the time was not available. A finance professional with a demanding workload may need five to six months to accumulate 240 hours around their job.
Poor domain coverage. The four Part I domains are not equally weighted, and candidates who invest most of their preparation in familiar areas while neglecting weaker ones pay for it on exam day. Foundations of Risk Management and Quantitative Analysis together account for approximately 35% of Part I.
Why the Part II Pass Rate Is Higher
Part II covers Market Risk, Credit Risk, Operational Risk and Resilience, Liquidity and Treasury Risk, Risk Management and Investment Management, and Current Issues in Financial Markets. It is a different and in some ways more complex exam than Part I, but it draws candidates who have already demonstrated they can pass a GARP-level MCQ exam.
The practical implication for Part II candidates is that the higher pass rate should not breed complacency. Part II covers risk measurement and management at greater depth and expects a higher level of analytical sophistication than Part I. Candidates who passed Part I comfortably and begin Part II preparation late often find that the additional depth of market risk models, counterparty credit risk, and Basel framework content is more demanding than they anticipated.
What the Data Tells You About Your Preparation
The pass rate statistics are most useful as a calibration tool, not as a prediction about your specific outcome.
If roughly half of Part I sitters fail, and the evidence from candidate surveys points consistently to preparation volume and question practice as the differentiating factors, then the preparation approach that puts you in the passing half is well understood:
Allow enough time. Two hundred and forty hours is GARP's guideline. For a finance professional studying in the evenings and on weekends, that is a four to five month commitment at approximately 15 hours per week. Candidates who register for the May exam and begin studying in April are generally not giving themselves enough time.
Start practice questions early. Part I Foundations of Risk Management questions are available free on passfrm.com without a subscription. Working through practice questions from the first week of your preparation gives you an immediate read on the gap between your current knowledge and exam-level expectations.
Review wrong answers systematically. The most expensive habit in FRM preparation is answering a question incorrectly and moving on without understanding why. Each incorrect answer points to a specific gap in your knowledge or your application of a concept. Systematic wrong-answer review is the mechanism by which practice questions actually improve your performance.
Weight your time toward high-weight domains. In Part I, the exam weights are published in advance. Quantitative Analysis receives 20% of the exam weight and is also the domain most candidates find hardest. Giving it proportional (or more than proportional) preparation time is a straightforward application of the data.
Retaker Strategy
A portion of candidates in any given exam window are retakers from a previous window. GARP permits retakes with no limit, and candidates who fail Part I may sit it again at the next available window (May or November).
The mistake that most reliably leads to a second failure is repeating the same preparation approach. If you studied 120 hours, read the material but did few practice questions, and found Quantitative Analysis difficult on exam day, repeating that approach with slightly more time will not reliably produce a different outcome. The preparation change needs to match the diagnosis of why the first attempt failed.
Retakers who add substantial practice question volume, particularly timed full-length mock exams, typically improve their outcome on the second attempt. Candidates who failed because of time management in the exam (not finishing all 100 questions) need to practise under strict time conditions before retaking, not just study more material.
The pass rate data, read honestly, shows that the FRM is achievable for candidates who prepare adequately. The exam is selective, but the selection is based on preparation quality rather than background. A candidate from a non-quantitative background who gives the Quantitative Analysis domain serious preparation time can pass. A candidate with a quantitative PhD who underestimates the preparation requirement can fail.
Start practising Part I questions and use your accuracy data by domain to identify where your preparation needs the most work before your exam date.