NextGen UBE Constructed Response Guide

Yesterday, the National Conference of Bar Examiners released a new document: "NextGen UBE Constructed Response Guide." It's touted as the "NCBE’s Official Resource for Understanding and Responding to the Written Components of the NextGen Uniform Bar Examination.” The document is attached for your reference.

If you're taking the NextGen UBE in July 2026, I highly recommend that you review this new document and the previously released resources found at the end of the document.

Source: https://www.ncbex.org/news-resources

This new document focuses on the constructed-response portions of the Next UBE: the Integrated Question Sets and the Performance Tasks (and not the standalone multiple-choice questions).

Here are some key takeaways and highlights from the new document:

1. Prepare for a fully online exam

You’ll take the exam through the NCBE’s secure digital platform using your own laptop, so your test-day performance requires navigating online documents, using on-screen tools, and typing clean, organized answers under time pressure. Because everything is delivered inside the software, you should train like it’s a fully digital experience. In other words, there are no hard copies of the test questions.

2. Review the instructions for the IQS and Performance Tasks

The "NextGen UBE Constructed Response Guide" includes separate, specific expectations for the IQS and for each type of Performance Task. Make sure you are familiar with each set of instructions ahead of time so you’re to wasting time on the actual exam.

3. Plan for rubric-based score rather than relative grading

The NextGen UBE’s grading approach is a shift away from the relative grading method (i.e., putting responses in one of six “buckets”) used for the MEE and MPT portions of the UBE. Instead, your written responses are scored against a specific rubric.

4. Practice to the exam’s weights and timing

Although the "NextGen UBE Constructed Response Guide” focuses on the constructed-response questions, the NextGen UBE is built around three components:

Standalone multiple-choice (MC): 120 questions total (expected time: ~1.8 minutes per question), worth 49% of the exam score.

• Integrated Question Sets (IQS): 6 sets total (expected time: ~24 minutes per set), worth 21% of the exam score.

• Performance Tasks (PT/LRPT): 3 tasks total (expected time: ~60 minutes per task), worth 30% of the exam score.

One more thing: the NextGen UBE includes unscored pretest items (for example, 20 of the 120 standalone MC questions and 1 of the 6 IQS sets). You won’t know which ones they are, so treat every question like it counts. All three of the Performance Tasks are scored.

5. Practice the skill each question is testing

The NextGen UBE isn’t “mini-essays all day.” Performance Tasks assess traditional legal analysis, while Integrated Question Sets assess other practice skills like counseling and drafting. So your prep shouldn’t be “study a topic, then write a long answer.” It should be “practice the skill this prompt is targeting.”

6. Distinguish counseling IQS from drafting IQS

The "NextGen UBE Constructed Response Guide" reminds examinees there are two types of IQS: counseling sets and drafting sets.

• Counseling sets include multiple-choice plus short answers and are aimed at counseling/advising, negotiation, and dispute-resolution skills.

• Drafting sets focus on drafting/editing and are built around a single medium-length drafting question (and they do not include multiple-choice or short-answer questions).

7. Distinguish Standard PT from Legal Research PT

The "NextGen UBE Constructed Response Guide" also reminds examinees that there are two types of Performance Tasks (the successors to the current Multistate Performance Test). The key difference is structure:

A Standard Performance Task is one longer writing assignment.

A Legal Research Performance Task combines multiple-choice and short-answer questions plus a medium-length writing assignment (smaller in scale than a standard PT).

8. Avoid excessive copying and pasting

Since the test questions are online, you can copy and paste from the test materials. But the guide warns that an answer with excessive copying and pasting will not receive credit, even if the pasted material is technically correct. As the NCBE warns, excessive copying and pasting doesn’t show that you understand what matters and why.

9. Treat key words and phrases as instructions

The "NextGen UBE Constructed Response Guide” provides a defined list of “Key Words and Phrases” (like argument, legal argument, dispositive fact, factor, implication, and support) so you know exactly what a prompt is asking you to produce. If you ignore the definitions, you risk answering the question incorrectly.

10. Respect the recommended lengths

Short-answer questions include a recommended answer length (e.g., “about 1 to 2 sentences”). You generally won’t be penalized just for writing more, but the NCBE warns that sticking close to the recommended length helps ensure you answered the specific question asked (and helps you manage time).

11. Understand the grading

The grading process is designed to be standardized and consistent across graders. Every constructed-response answer is double graded (two independent graders), and if the scores don’t fall within an acceptable range, it goes to reconciliation for additional review.

12. Always include rules and application (separately)

For the Performance Task questions, the guide recommends using a traditional legal writing paradigm like IRAC/CREAC/CRAC. And the scoring rubric is explicit: You earn points based on the quality of your rules and your application, and a “0” includes situations where “no rules exist.”

13. Review the NCBE’s additional resources

At the end of the "NextGen UBE Constructed Response Guide,” the NCBE provides links to previously released Additional Resources (including documents like the Blueprint, Content Scope, the Official Examinees’ Guide, and sample scoring materials). Don’t skip those. They provide the bigger-picture context for how NextGen is structured and what the graders are looking for across question types.