A&P Exam Guide: The FAA Written, Oral and Practical Tests

The A&P Written Test: Three Knowledge Tests

The written half of the A&P exam is three separate FAA knowledge tests. The FAA treats “written test” and “knowledge test” as the same thing. Every question is objective multiple choice, each test gets its own score, and you take them at a commercial, FAA-approved testing center. The FAA points you to PSI to register and schedule.

Add them up and a candidate for both ratings answers 260 scored questions (60 + 100 + 100) in up to six hours of test time (3 tests × 2 hours). The question counts leave out validation questions, which are unscored items the FAA uses to try out new questions. The two-hour limit already includes time to answer them.

The FAA says many of the questions are based on its three AMT Handbooks (General, Airframe and Powerplant), which you can download free from the FAA. After July 31, 2023, the tests switched to being built on the Aviation Mechanic Airman Certification Standards instead of the old Practical Test Standards.

Your result comes back on an Airman Knowledge Test Report, or AKTR. Keep every one. The AKTR lists an ACS code for each area you missed, and those codes decide part of your oral test later.

What the ACS Covers on the Airframe and Powerplant Test

The Aviation Mechanic Airman Certification Standards (FAA-S-ACS-1) is the syllabus for every part of the airframe and powerplant test. It has three sections: General with 12 subject areas, Airframe with 15 and Powerplant with 13, for 40 subject areas in all (12 + 15 + 13).

Each subject lists knowledge elements (K), risk management elements (R) and skill elements (S), each with its own code. In Weight and Balance, for example, AM.I.C.K4 is knowing how to calculate arm, moment and center of gravity, and AM.I.C.S2 is actually performing a weight and balance calculation. The knowledge tests evaluate the K and R elements. The practical is where the S elements come in.

FAA-S-ACS-1, Aviation Mechanic General, Airframe, and Powerplant ACS, table of contents

The A&P Oral and Practical Test With a DME

Once you’ve passed the knowledge tests, you book the oral and practical, shortened to O&P, with a Designated Mechanic Examiner.

Bring your Form 8610-2 and your passing AKTRs. The DME uses them to build a test planning sheet in the FAA’s Mechanic Test Generator, which pulls oral questions for every ACS code you missed plus a minimum set of additional questions. Score 100% on the written tests and you get only that minimum set.

The Oral Test

The oral is closed book. You answer the examiner’s questions without any reference material, and the areas you missed on the written tests come back here. The ACS requires the examiner to keep the oral and practical portions separate, because references are allowed in one and not the other.

The Practical Test

The practical is a set of hands-on projects drawn from the skill elements, and you don’t know in advance which ones you’ll get. The examiner personally watches every project and asks questions as you work, and this time you can use reference material. Where it applies, your work has to meet an approval-for-return-to-service standard, and you have to find and apply the right maintenance data yourself.

Safety is part of the grade. The ACS says any disregard for safety “will result in a failure,” and it names eye and hearing protection and current maintenance publications among the things the examiner checks. And there are no DMEs outside the U.S., the FAA says, so the O&P has to happen stateside, even for service members stationed overseas.

A&P Exam Order and the 24-Month Window

The A&P exam runs in a fixed order. You pass each section of the knowledge test first and only then apply for the oral and practical (14 CFR 65.75). Everything, every knowledge test plus the O&P, has to be passed within a 24-month period (14 CFR 65.71). Here’s the sequence the FAA lays out.

Plan around that 24-month window. Passing the General test and then waiting more than two years for the O&P doesn’t meet the rule. The same limit applies later if you add a rating: a certificated mechanic adding Airframe or Powerplant has to meet the experience rules and pass that rating’s tests within 24 calendar months (14 CFR 65.71).

Who Can Take the A&P Exam: Authorization to Test

You can’t walk into a testing center and sit the A&P exam on your own say-so. The center needs written authorization, and the FAA testing matrix accepts three kinds: an FAA-approved school’s graduation document, an FAA Form 8610-2 signed by the FAA, or a military Certificate of Eligibility.

The Experience Route: FAA Form 8610-2

Without a school diploma, your authorization comes from a Flight Standards District Office (FSDO). Book an appointment and bring two completed copies of Form 8610-2 plus all your documentation. If the Aviation Safety Inspector finds your experience adequate, they sign the 8610-2 and you’re cleared for the knowledge tests. Keep both originals. The testing center scans the form and hands it back.

The paperwork has to prove real maintenance time: pay receipts, or logs signed by a certificated supervisor showing hours, tasks and aircraft registration numbers. The FAA counts only time spent actually performing maintenance, on a 40-hour work week. Training time doesn’t count, and packing 18 months of hours into one year doesn’t shorten the calendar requirement.

Our aircraft mechanic apprenticeship guide covers how people build those hours, and the military aircraft mechanic guide covers service credit.

The School Route: Graduation Document

Graduates of an FAA-approved aviation maintenance technician school skip the FSDO visit. Your school’s authenticated graduation document is your authorization, and a document showing an Airframe or Powerplant curriculum covers the General test too. Students at these schools can also start testing before graduation:

• General written early. Once you finish the general portion of the curriculum, the school can issue a document that lets you take the General knowledge test (14 CFR 65.75(c)).
• O&P during final subjects. If the school shows the FAA you’ve made satisfactory progress, you can take the oral and practical during your final subjects, before meeting the experience rules and before passing every written section (14 CFR 65.80).

Schools have a stake in your exam results. The FAA’s school rule requires at least 70% of students who take an FAA mechanic test within 60 days of graduation to pass, measured over the most recent three years. A failed test counts against the school unless the student passes it inside that same 60-day window.

Some schools keep testing on campus. Spartan College’s Los Angeles campus runs an on-site PSI testing center and hosts DMEs for the O&P, and SIU Carbondale’s Aviation Technologies program says all testing can be done on site with its own examiners. You can compare every certificated program in the aircraft mechanic school directory.

Retesting After You Fail Part of the A&P Exam

The FAA’s retest rule is the same for the knowledge tests and the O&P. You can apply to retest 30 days after the date you failed. Or you can go sooner with a signed statement from a mechanic who holds the certificate and rating you’re after, certifying that they gave you additional instruction in each failed subject and consider you ready.

To retake a failed knowledge test, the FAA lists Form 8610-2 and your failed test report (AC Form 8080-2) as the documents to bring. Missed areas also follow you to the DME, since every ACS code on your AKTR comes back as an oral question. And retests still have to fit inside the same 24-month window as everything else.

What the A&P Exam Costs

The FAA doesn’t charge to issue the mechanic certificate itself. The tests are different. The FAA confirms the knowledge tests carry a fee charged by the commercial testing centers, and refers you to PSI for current pricing. It also confirms the oral and practical carries a fee, since DMEs conduct it.

For one published figure, Guilford Technical Community College in North Carolina lists O&P testing with a DME at $1,400 for both ratings: $800 for General plus one rating and $600 for the second (retrieved September 22, 2026). That’s one school’s local figure, so confirm the price with the examiner you book.

Some people test for free. Under an FAA agreement with the Joint Service Aviation Maintenance Technician Certification Council, active-duty, guard and reserve members, their dependents, military retirees, DoD civilians and DHS civilians can take the AMT knowledge tests at no cost.

Wilson Technological Center, run by Western Suffolk BOCES in New York, lists a free waiver for the DME oral and practical. For the whole budget, see what aircraft mechanic school costs.

After You Pass

Pass the O&P and you leave with a Temporary Mechanic Certificate. The permanent certificate is valid until it’s surrendered, suspended or revoked, so there’s no renewal exam. To keep using it, you need to have worked as a mechanic, or supervised mechanics or maintenance, for at least six months within the preceding 24 months (14 CFR 65.83).

The next test many mechanics aim for is Inspection Authorization, which requires holding both ratings for at least three years. See what the A&P license lets you sign off, how the work looks day to day in the aircraft mechanic career guide, and current pay in the aircraft mechanic salary data. If you’re still choosing a route, how long aircraft mechanic school takes is the next question.