PE Civil Exam Specifications to be Updated in April 2024

The National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying (NCEES) announced that PE Civil PE Civil Exam Specifications will change effective April 2024. The updated exam specs will better emphasize testing engineers on their specific discipline. If you are preparing to take one of the PE Civil Exams in April 2024 or later, you should be aware of the exam changes so you can modify your study plan accordingly. Read on for more information about what’s changing on the PE Civil Exams–and what’s staying the same.

What is changing on the PE Civil Exam?

The NCEES will eliminate the existing common knowledge areas that test engineers on general civil engineering ‘breadth’ content. As of April 2024, all five PE Civil Exams—including Construction, Geotechnical, Structural, Transportation, and Water Resources & Environmental—will only test ‘depth’ content for their area of practice. The removal of breadth content will lead to updated topic and subtopic question distribution to reflect focused exams. The focused topics and subtopics tested will include updated industry terminology. Transportation & Water is the only discipline that will add a new subtopic to their exams.

In addition to the discipline-specific content that is already tested on PE Civil Exams, more exam elements will remain unchanged in 2024, including test length, exam interface, and testing dates.

Despite the 2024 test change, the PE Civil Exams will still…

• include 80 total questions.

• last 9 total hours.

• be computer-based.

• be administered year-round for engineers with 4+ years of post-college professional work experience in most states.

Why are the PE Civil Exam Specifications being updated? 

The ‘P’ in ‘PE’ stands for ‘Professional’. Simply put, the PE Civil Exam specs are being updated in 2024 to focus the exams on engineers’ professional experience. NCEES wants to evaluate engineers on their specific discipline more effectively by eliminating the general knowledge areas currently tested on the PE Civil exams.

How will the new PE Civil Exam Specifications impact prep practices?

Because PE Civil Exams are offered to engineers with 4+ years of post-college professional work experience in most states, the new focus on specific disciplines should simplify the study process. Proven engineers will just need to prepare for topics, subtopics, and terminology relevant to the industry they work within. They will no longer need to spend additional time studying general civil engineering information that may not be as prominent in their day-to-day profession.

Determining which version of the PE Civil Exam to take

If you have already begun to prepare for your PE Civil exam discipline, we recommend that you continue on with your studies so as to not delay taking the exam by several months. The updated version of the PE Civil exam will not be easier, so you are not guaranteed to get a higher score if you wait to take the test. You should take the PE Civil exam when you feel prepared and while your skills are sharp. Remember: You can only take the exam three times in a year if you don’t pass, and only once within each of the the 3-month testing windows. 

Learn more about preparing for the PE Civil Exam by exploring our PE Exam prep options, including Live Online courses fully tailored for the updated exam as of January 2024.