FRCOphth pass rates

The FRCOphth Part 1 pass rate was 41.2% in January 2026: 77 of 187 candidates passed. Over the ten Part 1 sittings from January 2023 to January 2026 it ranged from 32.3% to 70.9%.

Pooled across every Part 1 sitting in the College's cumulative table, October has the highest pass rate: 49.8% of October entries passed (1,346 of 2,702), against 40.9% in January (560 of 1,370) and 40.9% in April or May (824 of 2,015). Overall, 44.8% passed (2,730 of 6,087). It is not true of every year: in 2023 October had the lowest pass rate of the three sittings. The report gives no reason for the difference.

The Part 1 pass mark is not fixed. For each sitting, examiners sort the questions by difficulty and importance and estimate how a minimally competent candidate would score on each group (the Ebel method). In January 2026 it came to 115 out of the 179 questions that counted.

The FRCOphth Part 2 Written pass rate was 81.0% in December 2025: 166 of 205 candidates passed. Over the six Part 2 Written sittings from June 2023 to December 2025 it ranged from 60.6% to 81.0%.

At the FRCOphth Part 2 Oral in Birmingham in April 2026, the latest UK sitting with a published report, 54.9% of candidates passed: 84 of 153. Among candidates sitting it for the first time, 60.2% passed (59 of 98).

The overseas Part 2 Oral sittings in this table had between 3 and 20 candidates each, so one or two results move the pass rate by several points. The College's cumulative table, covering sittings since September 2010 where it holds the information, records 1,790 passes from 2,630 candidate entries: 68.1%.

At the Part 2 Oral in Birmingham in April 2026, candidates in UK ophthalmic specialist training passed at 74.3% (52 of 70). Candidates not in that training, or whose status the College did not record, passed at 38.6% (32 of 83). The College's report for York in November 2025 also gives results by where candidates qualified: 73.4% of those with a UK primary medical qualification passed (58 of 79), against 43.8% of those who qualified overseas (28 of 64).

At the Refraction Certificate in Birmingham in December 2025, the latest UK sitting with a published report, 77.2% of candidates passed: 88 of 114. First-attempt candidates passed at 77.2% as well (61 of 79).

The Refraction Certificate is ten stations of 15 marks each, and its pass mark is set after the exam by the Hofstee method: 106 out of 150 in Birmingham in December 2025. The cumulative table in the Dubai report records 1,518 passes from 2,167 candidate entries: 70.1%.

The Duke Elder prize exam is not a pass-or-fail exam, so it has no pass rate. Every candidate is told their percentage score and which 10% band they ranked in. The highest scorer is offered the prize, and the top 10% receive a commendation from the President of the College.

The headline pass rate for a sitting counts everyone who sat, first attempt or later; first-attempt rates are given separately above. A low pass rate does not mean the pass mark was higher. Across the ten Part 1 sittings above, the pass mark moved between 60.7% and 65% while the pass rate moved between 32.3% and 70.9%. The written exams set the pass mark from the difficulty of the questions. The practical exams set it from examiners' judgements and the marks on the day. The Refraction Certificate uses the Hofstee method. The Oral uses the borderline-candidate method, plus one standard error of measurement in Birmingham in April 2026; for smaller cohorts, such as the overseas sittings, the College's Part 2 Oral information pack names Hofstee as the preferred method.