You already sat the NBME's free 137-question practice exam once. Maybe the score came back lower than you wanted. Maybe you took two blocks untimed on a call night and never got a clean read. Maybe you have three weeks left, nothing else free on the shelf, and a retake feels like the obvious move.
A second pass is allowed and it can be useful. But the number it produces is not the same kind of information as the first one, and treating it as a fresh assessment is how people talk themselves into a false sense of readiness. Here is how to decide, and how to run a retake so you get something real out of it.
What a second score is actually measuring
The first time through, every item is new to you. That is the only condition under which percent-correct behaves like an assessment of what you know.
On a retake, part of your performance comes from recall rather than reasoning. You do not have to remember the answer letter for this to happen. Recognizing a stem, remembering that a lab value mattered, or having a vague sense that you got burned by this one last time is enough to shift your score upward without any change in your actual ability.
- Your second score will usually be higher. Expect it. It is not evidence that your studying worked.
- The inflation is uneven. Items you missed and then reviewed jump the most, which is exactly the subset you were hoping to measure honestly.
- Timing gets easier too. Familiar stems read faster, so a retake also overstates your pacing.
If you want an honest read on where you stand, see what your Free 137 score actually predicts before you put weight on either number.
How long to wait
There is no rule against retaking it the next day, but recall decays slowly for test items, and a short gap buys you almost nothing. If your goal is a semi-clean second read, put real distance and real studying between the two sittings, and accept that "semi-clean" is the ceiling.
If your goal is something other than a score, the gap matters less. Using the exam as a drill set two days later is perfectly reasonable, as long as you stop calling the output a score.
Retake, or spend the sitting on something else?
The question worth asking is what you actually want from the next few hours.
- You want a number you can trust. Do not retake. A never-seen question set is the only thing that gives you that, so spend the sitting on a self-assessment or fresh question blocks you have not touched.
- Your first attempt was not a real sitting. If you went untimed, took it across four evenings, or looked things up mid-block, your first number was never a baseline. A properly timed retake is genuinely more informative than what you have now. Run it the way the exam is meant to be sat.
- You want practice, not measurement. Retake freely. Just set the expectation up front that you are drilling.
- You want to know whether you will pass. A retake is the wrong instrument entirely. Nothing on this exam touches Day 2.
How to run a retake that is still worth something
If you do sit it again, change the job description. You are no longer collecting a score, so collect something else.
- Sit it timed, in one stretch, in four blocks. Non-negotiable if you want the pacing data.
- Flag by reason, not by difficulty. Mark each item you get right as "reasoned" or "remembered." The remembered pile is your real gap list, and it is invisible if you only look at percent-correct.
- Write down the next order, not the answer. For any stem describing a patient in front of you, say what you would order first and when you would advance the clock. That converts a multiple-choice item into something closer to the work Day 2 asks for.
- Ignore the composite. Compare your reasoned-correct count to last time. That is the only comparison that means anything.
You can sit any version of the exam, including the archived sets, from the Free 137 hub or straight from /free-137.
What a retake will never tell you
Every version of this exam is multiple choice. Day 2 is not. On the computer-based case simulations you type orders into a blank sheet, decide when to advance the clock, and get scored on sequencing and on what you failed to order. None of those skills are tested by picking the best of five options, so no amount of retaking moves the needle on the half of the exam people most often under-prepare.
If your retake score looks fine and you still feel unready, that instinct is usually correct and it is usually about Day 2. Work actual cases at /ccs-cases and drill order entry at /speedorder.
Quick answers
- Can I take it more than once? Yes. There is no limit and no penalty.
- Does my second score replace the first? Neither is an official score, so there is nothing to replace. Keep both and read them for different things.
- Should I retake the same version or an older one? An archived version you have never seen is a better assessment than a repeat of the current one. An older set is still useful practice even where the explanations no longer match the current exam.
- Will a retake tell me if I am ready? No. Readiness questions are better answered by a full readiness check and by how you perform on cases.
- Is a higher retake score worth anything at all? As reassurance, sometimes. As data, very little.