NLN NEX Exam Prep: 145 Scored Questions, Two Score Columns, and Your School's Real Rule

By the Castleport Test Prep Editorial Team · Published and last verified: August 21, 2026

NLN NEX exam prep starts with one fact most study guides get wrong: the exam changed. The current Nursing Entrance Exam has three separately timed subject tests—Verbal, Math, and Science—with 163 questions shown, 145 scored, 18 unscored, and 60 minutes per subject. There is no NLN passing score. Your nursing program decides which score column, minimum, retake rule, and validity window it will use.

Here is the part almost nobody tells you.

Since November 1, 2025, the score report shows your result twice—once against RN applicants and once against LPN/VN applicants. Same test. Same answers. Two different numbers. In the NLN's own worked example, one candidate's identical performance produces a composite of 151 in one column and 110 in the other. A school that reads the wrong column can turn the same sitting into two completely different admissions conclusions.

Your school picks the column. The current rules we verified across 12 institutions and 14 program rows run from a direct composite minimum of 88 to 160, with retake waits from 30 days to six months and score windows from one to three years.

Start with your own numbers.

Free NLN NEX score translator and target builder

Free. No sign-up. Nothing saved or sent.

What it does:

1. You choose RN, LPN/VN, or both.
2. You enter the composite minimum your program publishes—or use the school-rule checklist when it does not publish one.
3. You enter your official percent-correct scores or scored-question counts from practice.
4. It returns both comparison-group composites, both national percentile ranks, and the shortest raw-question path through the NLN's published lookup tables to the target you entered.

The path is exact for the published tables; it is not an outcome promise. Pilot items are hidden on the live exam, the score tables are norm-referenced, and your program—not this tool—decides what it will accept.

The tool runs on the complete current Appendix A data: 301 composite rows, 51 Verbal rows, 41 Math rows, and 56 Science rows—449 rows total. Every row was compared programmatically against the January 26, 2026 NEX Technical Brief.

The current NEX at a glance

Source: NLN NEX Technical Brief, Table 2, last updated January 26, 2026. Verified August 21, 2026.

What changes this answer

Four things, and all four are covered below: which kind of program you're applying to, which score column your school reads, whether you tested before November 1, 2025, and your own program's minimum, attempt rule, wait, venue, and expiry window.

Best for you if / not for you if

This page is for you if your nursing program requires the NEX, calls it “the NLN exam,” or gave you a score report you cannot make sense of.

This page is not for you if you're taking the ATI TEAS or HESI A2. Those are different exams with different owners and blueprints. It is also not for you if you're already in nursing school and looking for an NLN NACE, Achievement Series, or NCLEX Readiness assessment. Those are not the Nursing Entrance Exam covered here.

Who wrote this, and what Castleport actually offers for the NEX

Castleport Test Prep is an independent exam prep publisher. For this page, the Castleport Test Prep Editorial Team read the current NLN technical brief, technical manual, student resources, virtual-testing instructions, allowed-materials rules, March 2026 price sheet, and the current admissions or testing pages behind every school row below.

And now the part we'd rather you hear from us than figure out later: Castleport has no paid NEX product. No NEX book. No NEX question bank. No NEX course. No NEX diagnostic. No access term, price, pass guarantee, Version Match assurance, or Material Update assurance for this exam. The score translator on this page is free and belongs to Castleport. No school or prep product named here pays Castleport.

That's worth knowing before you read further, because the next section is about study material that still teaches the retired PAX blueprint.

The right prep path isn't the same for every candidate. It depends on the exam version you'll sit, the comparison column your program reads, your test date, and how far you are from your program's actual rule. Use the free translator above before you spend anything.

Independence and ownership disclosure: Castleport Test Prep is an independent publisher and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or approved by the National League for Nursing or any nursing program named on this page. Exam and program names are used descriptively. Castleport claims no ownership in those names or marks. Read our independence policy, editorial standards, and verification methodology.

Is the NLN NEX the same as the NLN PAX?

No. The NEX replaced the PAX. The NLN released the NEX on February 11, 2024. Its historical price sheet kept the PAX available only through May 31, 2024.

This trips people up more than any other single thing about this exam, and it's easy to see why. The two exams have the same three broad subjects. They come from the same organization. A PAX book on a shelf does not announce that its timing, weighting, and content map are retired.

But don't assume every school that says “NLN exam” means the NEX. The NLN sells several assessments, and a school can require a NEX, NACE, Achievement Series, or another product. Confirm the exact exam name on your current application page.

Which NLN exam is this, anyway?

The NLN describes the NEX as one component in an institution's evaluation of an applicant. It does not set the admission decision, and it does not establish a national pass/fail mark. Your program can use the score as a gate, a ranking input, or one factor among several.

Who requires the NEX

The exam appears at ADN, practical-nursing, diploma, and four-year programs. But the list moves. Shoreline College, for example, says it will accept either the TEAS or NEX through the Fall 2027 admission period and will accept only the TEAS beginning with Winter 2028. A current NEX requirement is not proof that the same exam will govern your later application cycle.

Decision rule: use the exam named on the application page for the cycle you are entering. Never substitute a similar nursing entrance exam because a book title or old school PDF looks close enough.

Is my study guide still current? What changed from the PAX to the NEX?

A lot changed, and the parts that changed are the parts that decide what you study. The NEX removed physics, removed the old standalone geometry allocation, cut chemistry, expanded anatomy and physiology, added Data and Information, increased the section clocks, and stopped weighting Math at 1.5 times the other sections.

The NLN published the change map in its NEX Technical Manual. Here is the candidate-facing version.

The PAX → NEX change map

Source: NLN NEX Technical Manual, Table 2 and §4.2. Verified August 21, 2026.

The five changes that actually change your study plan

1. Math stopped being worth extra. On the PAX, Math had extra weight. On the NEX, one Verbal percentile rank, one Math percentile rank, and one Science percentile rank are added. Do not keep a PAX plan whose central strategy is “Math counts one and a half times.”

2. The Math content flipped. Numbers and Operations fell from 29 items to 12. Measurement rose from 9 to 14, and Data and Information arrived as a seven-item area. The NLN says the shift better aligns with nursing curricula and notes that candidates have calculator access.

3. Physics is gone. The NLN says physics was removed because it is not a prerequisite in nursing programs or a consistent high-school graduation requirement.

4. Chemistry shrank while anatomy and physiology grew. A guide that devotes a PAX-sized share to chemistry and only 14 combined A&P items is not mapped to the current blueprint.

5. You get 60 minutes per subject instead of 40. The NLN's stated purpose was to reduce speededness. Practising against the old clock trains a materially different timing problem.

Is your PAX book actually worthless?

No—and this is where “throw it out” advice overshoots.

The technical manual says the initial NEX rollout used eligible high-performing items from the PAX item bank after blueprint alignment and review. That supports continued use of accurate subject instruction. It does not mean current live NEX questions are the same questions, and it does not justify recalled-item claims.

What's dead is the old strategy: the section weighting, timing, removed physics allocation, retired geometry allocation, and PAX content proportions.

How to screen a guide in 30 seconds:

• Does its blueprint include Data and Information?
• Does it remove the old physics allocation?
• Does it show 60 minutes per subject, 145 scored questions, and equal section contribution through percentile ranks?

Passing that screen proves only that the guide knows the current blueprint. It does not prove its explanations or questions are good.

Not sure which section is costing you the most? Use the score translator above with your official percent-correct values or a scored practice set. It shows both comparison groups and orders the next-question opportunities from the published tables.

What is actually on the NEX? The full 145-question blueprint

The NEX has 145 scored questions: 50 Verbal, 40 Math, and 55 Science. Science contains the most scored questions, but the composite is not a simple 145-point total. Each subject is converted to a percentile rank first, so the effect of one additional correct answer is nonlinear and depends on the subject, comparison group, and where you are on that subject's table.

That is why “one Math question is always worth more” is wrong. Around some raw scores it can move the composite more; around others it may not move the percentile rank at all.

Every content area, by the numbers

Source: NLN NEX Technical Brief, Table 2. Verified August 21, 2026.

Word Knowledge contains 25 items. Anatomy and Physiology contain 22 combined. Chemistry contains five. Those counts deserve to shape a plan—but counts alone do not tell you which area is personally weak or how difficult its items will be.

The content-outline breadth map

Item counts tell you how much of the scored form sits in each area. The NLN's content outlines also show how broadly each area is described. We hand-counted 46 named dimensions, outcomes, topics, or body systems across the manual's Verbal, Math, and Science outlines and paired those counts with the current item totals.

Castleport hand count and arithmetic from the content outlines in the NLN NEX Technical Manual. This is a breadth comparison—not item difficulty, study ROI, point value, or a hidden hour-allocation rule.

The useful conclusion is narrower than “chemistry is worthless.” Chemistry is only five scored items, so do not let it crowd out a much larger weak area. But if your Coaching Report shows chemistry as a severe weakness and you are one or two raw questions from a target, those five items can still matter.

The largest published cognitive block

The current technical brief also classifies items by cognitive dimension. Its largest named Verbal block is Word Analysis, 15 items. The manual describes this as using prefixes, suffixes, roots, and context to deduce meaning.

Castleport extraction from the current NLN NEX Technical Brief, Tables 2–4.

That makes word analysis a large, concrete area to check. It does not make “study roots first” a universal rule. Your own content breakdown should decide whether it is first, fifth, or already solid.

How logic and reasoning is reported

The NLN derives an additional Logic and Reasoning reporting dimension from items already classified in the subject blueprints:

Those 75 items are not scored twice. They count once toward the subject score and are also grouped into a second feedback dimension. In Math, the current brief splits the scored items into 25 problem-solving and 15 computation items.

The questions that do not count

Eighteen of the 163 questions shown are unscored pilot items: eight in Verbal, five in Math, and five in Science. You cannot identify them, and unanswered questions count as incorrect. Treat every item as live.

The practical lesson is not to guess which brutal passage or odd Science item is unscored. It is to answer everything and refuse to let one ugly item hijack the next five minutes.

How is the NEX scored, and why does my report show two different numbers?

Your NEX composite is the sum of your three subject percentile ranks. It is not a percent correct and it is not the number of questions you answered correctly.

The official score report describes the composite on a 0–300 scale. Under the published formula, each subject percentile rank runs from 1 to 99, so the mathematically attainable sum is 3 to 297. Castleport's tool accepts the official 0–300 label but flags targets above 297 as unattainable under that formula.

A percentile rank tells you the percentage of people in the comparison group who scored the same as you or lower. A percentile rank of 60 is a comparison result, not 60% correct.

The same test, scored twice

The NLN's worked example uses one candidate and one set of answers:

Source: NLN NEX Technical Brief, worked score-report example. Verified August 21, 2026.

Identical answers. A 41-point composite gap. The RN comparison group performed better as a group in the 2024 norm data, so the same raw performance generally receives lower RN percentile ranks.

What the national middle costs in scored questions

The NLN publishes the percent correct associated with the 50th percentile in each group:

Source: NLN NEX Technical Brief, Table 6. Question counts are Castleport arithmetic from the exact denominators.

Which column does your school read?

It varies.

• Hopkinsville Community College explicitly uses Your RN Composite Score for both its RN and PN tracks.
• Shoreline College tells applicants to use the RN Program Applicants column.
• Salem Community College publishes an RN composite rule for ADN and a total-score rule for PN.

If you read the wrong column, you can either panic over a score your school ignores or relax over one it does not accept. Ask the program in writing.

If you tested before November 1, 2025

Earlier reports used one 2022 comparison group, so the RN and LPN/VN columns were identical. The current technical brief says schools should re-norm pre-November 1, 2025 results by pulling the current report from the NLN assessment dashboard.

Do not predict the direction of the change from program type alone. Ask your admissions office to retrieve the current report and use the column its current policy names.

How big are the comparison groups?

Sources: NLN NEX Technical Brief and NEX Technical Manual. The manual's 10-candidate discrepancy is preserved rather than silently “fixed.”

The current split gives a more relevant program-type comparison but uses smaller groups than the legacy combined norm. Both facts matter.

One more report you may not have seen

The NLN's Coaching Report shows percent correct by content area and cognitive dimension. If your school has not sent it, ask for it. It is the most useful official document for deciding what to study next because it shows where you lost points—not only the composite total.

Have your subject results? Enter them in the translator above. It reconstructs both score columns from the current tables and shows the shortest table-based path to the composite you entered.

What is a good score on the NLN NEX?

There is no good score on its own. The NLN sets no passing score. A composite of 145 is the current national median for RN applicants; 143 is the median for LPN/VN applicants. In the current school register below, direct composite minimums run from 88 to 160.

So “what is a good NEX score?” has one decision-useful answer: the score your program requires, in the column it actually reads, for the application cycle you are entering.

The national scale, for context

Source: NLN NEX Technical Brief, Table 1. The NLN says this relationship table is not a recommended standard or decision threshold.

What 12 institutions currently publish

We opened each linked official page on August 21, 2026. A blank means the program did not publish that detail on the page we verified—not that no rule exists.

What that register proves

Among the 11 rows with a direct numeric composite minimum, the scores are:

88, 124, 140, 143, 145, 145, 145, 148, 149, 150, 160.

The median is 145. The range is 72 composite points. Converted on the current RN table, those endpoints sit at the 26th and 57th percentiles, a 31-percentile-point spread.

That is an original decision dataset, not a national benchmark. It shows why a generic internet answer such as “140 is exceptional” can be dangerous: on the current RN table, 140 is the 47th percentile, below the national middle.

Is the NEX a gate or a ranking factor?

This changes whether chasing a higher score earns anything.

At Shoreline, it is a gate. The school says a higher score does not improve your chances once you meet both the 145 composite and 50th-percentile requirements.

At UACCM, it is a gate and a ranking input. A 140 composite is required, and the selection process assigns points based on NEX score, education, and GPA before ranking applicants.

At Santa Monica, it is a gate. The current page requires 160 and says a candidate who remains below 160 on the second session is ineligible. The current page does not publish the old four-tier NEX points ladder, so that ladder is not reproduced here.

Ask one question before you build a study calendar: Once I meet the minimum, can a higher NEX score improve my admission ranking?

The California 160 finding—and what it does not prove

Santa Monica's current page attributes its 160 minimum to the California Community College Chancellor's Office Approved Score. Separately, Appendix D of the NLN technical manual maps a historical PAX 114 to NEX 160 at percentile rank 57.

That is a clean concordance match. It supports the logic of the conversion. It does not, by itself, prove that every California community college currently applies 160, and we did not find a current statewide Chancellor's Office page that independently establishes a universal implementation rule. Use your own program's current page.

Score context without internet adjectives

Castleport lookup from the complete current Appendix A RN composite table.

A number becomes “good” only when it clears the rule that governs your application. The table above gives context, not permission to ignore your program.

How much does the NLN NEX cost, and how do I register?

The current NLN price sheet lists $59 for the on-campus institutional route and $80 for a virtual Proctor360 sitting. The $59 row appears under school-paid exams for administration on campus. That is not a universal promise that every candidate personally pays exactly $59: a school may pass the charge through, cover it with a voucher, or add a local proctor fee.

Official NEX prep materials are $38 per subject for 90-day access or $89 for the Math, Science, and Verbal bundle. The NLN says practice exams are untimed, remain available for 90 days, and may be taken repeatedly during that access period.

The current fee map

Source: NLN Assessment Services Pricing Sheet, effective March 1, 2026; NLN prep and practice page; and Hopkinsville's current NEX page.

How registration actually works

Follow your nursing program's instructions first. The current NLN workflow uses the student assessment account, linked from the NLN testing site. For a virtual purchase, the official instructions say to:

1. Sign in to the student account.
2. Select the correct virtual exam in the store.
3. Pay by credit card or enter a school-provided voucher code.
4. Register for proctoring through Proctor360 from the purchased exam.
5. Run the system check before test day.

Select the institution your program tells you to select. Hopkinsville, Queensborough, and Minnesota West all warn candidates to use the correct institution so the right exam option, dates, or score routing appear.

The most expensive sentence on the price sheet

The NLN publishes a no-refund policy. Once a purchase is made, it is final. The current sheet also tells students to confirm their school's retake policy before buying another attempt.

That is the exam owner telling you to check the rule before the checkout screen. A second attempt your program will not accept is still a completed, nonrefundable purchase.

Can I use a calculator?

Yes, but follow the rule for your delivery route. The technical manual says calculator access is built into the testing platform. The NLN's current virtual-testing materials also explicitly allow a basic four-function calculator, dry-erase whiteboard, dry-erase marker, and eraser. It prohibits scientific calculators, paper, pens, pencils, phones, smart watches, books, headphones, food, and drink during virtual testing.

Onsite programs can provide or specify materials. Hopkinsville provides a basic calculator and scratch surface onsite; Santa Monica provides a basic or pop-up calculator. Do not turn up with a scientific calculator because a general webpage said “calculator allowed.”

Test-day mechanics

• All three subject tests are completed in one sitting, and all three must be completed for a score report.
• Each subject has its own 60-minute clock.
• Every item is multiple choice with four options.
• There is no guessing penalty; unanswered items count as incorrect.
• Live proctoring is used onsite or through Proctor360.
• Score reports should be available in the assessment dashboard after completion; a school may still have its own internal processing timeline.

Accommodations

The NLN says accommodation requests must come through the institution. Start with your school's disability-services office before purchasing or scheduling. Shoreline tells candidates to allow at least five business days for NLN processing and not to begin a virtual exam until the accommodation is confirmed.

York College currently publishes a different “ACC version” instruction. Because that conflicts with the current NLN Student Resources direction, this page does not treat York's wording as a universal NLN process. Your institution and the NLN control the request.

Can I retake the NLN NEX, and is a retake worth it?

Usually, but the rule that matters is your program's. The March 2026 price sheet says the NLN requires 30 days between testing on the same exam unless a school has communicated a different frequency. The Student Resources FAQ separately says the NLN does not have an assessment retake policy, does not limit attempts, and directs candidates to their institution.

The clean reconciliation is:

• Purchase/testing interval: plan on 30 days unless your school has arranged something different.
• Attempt cap, accepted attempt, and admission consequence: your nursing program controls these.

That is how current programs can publish six weeks, three months, six months, one attempt per application period, or two attempts per cycle.

Published retake rules that can change your decision

What the standard error of measurement can—and cannot—tell you

The NLN technical manual publishes reliability and standard error of measurement from 71 NEX sittings administered November 27–December 5, 2023:

Source: NLN NEX Technical Manual, Table 11.

This is score-precision context, not a hard retake threshold. It does not mean “a retake must gain four questions to count.” Two administrations each have measurement error, preparation can change ability, and the percentile conversion is nonlinear. The useful decision is simpler:

• A tiny score change should not be over-interpreted as proof of a major ability change.
• A near miss can justify a retake when the program permits it and you have a concrete study gap to address.
• The Coaching Report is better evidence for a retake plan than the composite alone.

The score translator shows a one-SEM context band but labels it as uncertainty, never as a required gain or outcome prediction.

Before you rebook, ask these four questions

Get the answers in writing.

1. Which column do you read—RN or LPN/VN?
2. Is the rule a composite, a percentile, per-subject percentages, or a combination?
3. How many attempts, how long between them, and which attempt counts?
4. How long is the score accepted, and do you accept remote or outside-site results?

Trying to decide whether another sitting has a real purpose? Put your current subject results and the program minimum into the translator. It will show the exact shortest table path, then you can compare that path with your time, Coaching Report, fee, and school rule.

How long are NLN NEX scores valid?

Two clocks exist, and the shorter one controls your application. The NLN keeps scores on file for three years. A nursing program can accept them for a shorter period or impose a test-date, venue, or application-cycle restriction.

Current windows we verified

Sending scores to a school

Your institution selection and score-routing instructions matter. If you are applying to a new school after testing, use the NLN's current duplicate-score-report process and confirm that the receiving program accepts outside scores. Shoreline explicitly accepts qualifying outside NEX reports; Southwest and Salem publish venue restrictions that can make an otherwise current score unusable.

What about an old PAX score?

The technical manual includes a PAX-to-NEX concordance table built from 2022 data. That gives schools a formal conversion reference, but it does not force a program to accept a PAX result. The current NEX report uses 2024 program-specific norm groups, so a historical conversion is not a substitute for a current program decision.

Ask the school whether it accepts the PAX, whether it converts it, and which application cycles that policy covers.

How should I study for the NLN NEX?

Start with the rule, then use your own breakdown. The blueprint tells you what can appear. Your program tells you the target. Your Coaching Report or scored practice tells you where you are losing questions.

1. Get the target before the study plan

Find out the minimum, the comparison column, whether per-subject percentages also apply, whether the exam is a gate or ranking factor, and the deadline. Then translate the rule into a raw-question path. A study plan without that destination is just a list of topics.

2. Do not turn the NLN's p = 0.63 design target into a candidate benchmark

The technical manual gives p = 0.63 as the target average difficulty used in item and form assembly, with an acceptable item-difficulty range of 0.20 to 0.89. It does not say a typical candidate should score 63%, that 63% is nationally average, or that 63% clears your school.

Use the current percentile tables—not that item-design parameter—to interpret performance.

3. Use the Coaching Report before a universal “high-yield” list

Word Analysis is a large 15-item block, and learning prefixes, suffixes, roots, and context strategies can be useful. But it should lead your plan only when your own results show it deserves to. The same rule applies to chemistry: five items is a small share, but a severe weakness can still be the shortest path to one needed question.

4. Practise conversions and problem solving, not only arithmetic

Measurement is the largest Math content area at 14 of 40 items. The current brief classifies 25 Math items as problem solving and 15 as computation. Practise unit conversions, proportional relationships, formulas, tables, graphs, and word-problem setup—not only calculation drills.

5. Read dense informational passages on a clock

The verbal blueprint uses informational passages and tests comprehension, application, and inference. Practise reading material you did not choose, identifying details and main ideas, and defending an inference from the passage rather than from outside knowledge.

6. Rehearse the actual section rules

Three subject clocks. Sixty minutes each. One sitting. Four options per item. No guessing penalty. Blanks count as wrong. Practise finishing each subject within its own hour rather than using one three-hour pool.

How to judge a NEX study guide

The minimum version screen is straightforward:

• It includes Data and Information.
• It excludes the retired physics allocation.
• It uses the current 145-scored / 163-shown structure.
• It uses 60 minutes per subject.
• It does not apply the PAX 1.5× Math weighting.
• It distinguishes percent correct, subject percentile rank, and composite.

Passing that screen does not prove quality. It proves the publisher did not miss the governing blueprint.

The NLN's current official prep prices are $38 per subject and $89 for the bundle. The NLN says the associated practice exams are untimed, available for 90 days, and repeatable during access. Castleport is stating that as a verified option, not recommending it or earning from it.

You now have the blueprint, both score columns, and 14 current program-rule rows. Run the free translator, get your admissions answers in writing, and build the next week around the weakest area that can actually move the rule your program uses.

What we verified for this page

We think you should be able to audit us.

Official sources read directly on August 21, 2026:

• NLN NEX Technical Brief, last updated January 26, 2026: current structure, content counts, cognitive dimensions, 2024 norm groups, two-column report, worked example, Coaching Report, Table 6, and Appendix A.
• NLN NEX Technical Manual, March 2024: PAX-to-NEX change map, design rationale, initial-item-bank history, p = 0.63 specification, calculator statement, reliability, standard error, retake discussion, score retention, accommodations, and PAX/NEX concordance.
• NLN Assessment Services Pricing Sheet, effective March 1, 2026: current exam and prep prices, reschedule/on-demand fees, no-refund wording, and 30-day same-exam interval.
• NLN Student Resources, virtual-exam instructions, allowed materials, and prep/practice instructions.
• The 12 linked institution pages in the school register.
• The live Castleport home page: no paid NEX product, diagnostic, question bank, access term, price, guarantee, Version Match assurance, or Material Update assurance is currently offered for this exam.

Original verification and calculations:

• All 449 current percentile conversion rows were compared against the NLN appendix: 301 composite, 51 Verbal, 41 Math, and 56 Science rows. No mismatches remained in the production data file.
• The 46-target content-outline breadth table is a Castleport hand count from the manual's named outlines.
• The 12-institution / 14-program register was normalized into one comparison structure. The direct composite sample has 11 values, a median of 145, and a range of 88–160.
• The score tool searches all reachable raw-score combinations to find the fewest additional scored questions that meet the entered composite. It does not divide a composite gap evenly or pretend each question has a fixed value.

What the sources do not support:

• A national NEX pass rate. The NLN does not set pass/fail.
• A universal “good score.” Programs set different rules.
• A hard retake-gain threshold from the standard error of measurement.
• A claim that current live NEX items are the same PAX questions.
• A claim that every California community college currently uses 160. Santa Monica attributes its rule to the Chancellor's Office; we did not locate a current statewide owner page establishing universal use.
• The old Santa Monica four-tier NEX points ladder as a current rule. It was omitted because the current page does not publish it.
• Current direct verification for Trident Technical College, Doña Ana Community College, or Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical School. Their draft rows were removed rather than carried forward on secondary or stale evidence.

Source conflicts preserved instead of hidden:

• The 2024 technical manual prints the legacy norm count as 10,877 in one section and 10,887 in another.
• The manual and January 2026 brief differ on some cognitive-dimension splits. The production page uses the newer brief for current dimension counts while noting that the content-area totals match.
• York's accommodation wording conflicts with current NLN Student Resources. The page directs candidates to the institution and NLN rather than promoting York's process as universal.

State licensing and code-edition review: not applicable to this page. The NEX is an admissions assessment, not a state nursing license or certification exam. Licensure eligibility and the later NCLEX decision belong to the relevant nursing regulatory body.

No fabricated authority: there is no named reviewer, testimonial, pass-rate claim, or student outcome claim on this page. The byline is the Castleport Test Prep Editorial Team.

Maintained by the Castleport Test Prep Editorial Team. Last verified: August 21, 2026.

NLN NEX exam prep: frequently asked questions

Is the NLN NEX the same as the NLN PAX?

No. The NEX replaced the PAX. The NEX launched February 11, 2024; the historical NLN price sheet kept the PAX available only through May 31, 2024.

What is a good score on the NLN NEX?

There is no national passing or “good” score. The current national median composite is 145 for RN applicants and 143 for LPN/VN applicants. Your program sets the rule that matters.

How many questions are on the NLN NEX?

You see 163 questions. Of those, 145 are scored and 18 are unscored: 8 in Verbal, 5 in Math, and 5 in Science.

How long is the NLN NEX?

Three hours of testing: 60 minutes each for Verbal, Math, and Science. Each subject has its own clock.

What is the NEX composite score?

It is the sum of your three subject percentile ranks. The official report describes a 0–300 scale; because each rank runs from 1 to 99, the attainable sum under the published formula is 3–297.

Why does my report show two composite scores?

Since November 1, 2025, the NLN has reported results against separate RN and LPN/VN comparison groups. The same percent-correct results can produce different percentile ranks and composites in the two columns.

Is there physics on the current NEX?

No. The NLN removed the old physics allocation when it replaced the PAX.

How long do I have to wait to retake the NEX?

The March 2026 price sheet says 30 days between testing on the same exam unless a school has communicated a different frequency. Your program controls attempt caps and acceptance rules, and current schools publish waits up to six months.

How much does the NLN NEX cost?

The current sheet lists $59 for the school-paid on-campus route and $80 for virtual Proctor360 administration. Candidate billing and local proctor fees vary by institution. Virtual late booking or rescheduling can add $30.

Can I use a calculator on the NEX?

The testing platform has calculator access, and the NLN's current virtual rules allow a basic four-function calculator. Scientific calculators are prohibited. Follow your delivery route and school's instructions.

How long are NEX scores valid?

The NLN keeps scores for three years. A nursing program can use a shorter window or add venue and test-date restrictions; the verified school windows on this page run from one to three years.

Does Castleport sell an NLN NEX study guide or diagnostic?

No. Castleport has no paid NEX product, question bank, course, diagnostic, access term, price, pass guarantee, Version Match assurance, or Material Update assurance. The score translator on this page is free.

Your next move

You're applying to nursing school. The NEX is one number in a file that may also hold your GPA, prerequisites, and application—and it is one of the pieces you can still change before the deadline.

Do these three things in this order:

1. Run the free score translator and turn your program's rule into a current two-column result and raw-question path.
2. Send the four admissions questions from the retake section and get the answers in writing.
3. Use the Coaching Report or a scored practice set to put your next week into the weak area that can move the accepted score—not the chapter a generic plan tells everyone to study first.

And when you're in, the exam waiting at the other end of the program works nothing like this one.

See how the NCLEX-RN is actually scored →

Not the exam you're taking? Check the live Castleport exam registry →

Castleport Test Prep is an independent publisher and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or approved by the National League for Nursing or any nursing program named on this page. Exam and program names are used descriptively. Castleport claims no ownership in those names or marks.

This page is study and admissions-process guidance, not an admission decision or licensing determination. Your nursing program controls its minimums, accepted score column, attempt rules, venue rules, and validity window. Castleport does not use recalled, leaked, or live exam questions and does not offer a pass guarantee.

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