Washington’s New 610 NextGen UBE Cut Score and the Retroactive 260 Legacy UBE Pass

Every once in a while, a bar-exam order drops that makes me stop mid-scroll, blink twice, and say, “Wait! They did what?”

That just happened in Washington.

Washington will be one of the first jurisdictions to administer the NextGen UBE starting in July 2026, and on December 8 the Washington Supreme Court issued a short, two-page order that quietly made three big moves at once.

In its new order, the Washington Supreme Court did three key things:

1️⃣ Set the NextGen UBE passing score at 610.

Beginning with the July 2026 administration, Washington will require a 610 on the new 500 to 750 NextGen scale to pass.

2️⃣ Lowered the Legacy UBE passing score to 260 for its final administration.

For the February 2026 bar exam (Washington’s last Legacy UBE), the minimum passing score will be 260, not 266.

3️⃣ Made the 260 cut score retroactive all the way back to July 2020.

Anyone who took the Washington UBE from July 2020 through July 2025 and scored between 260 and 265 is now potentially eligible for admission if they apply within one year of the order (i.e., by December 8, 2026).

The Court directed the Washington State Bar Association to publish details on how to apply, but the core message is clear: If you sat for the Washington UBE anytime from July 2020 to July 2025 and landed in the 260-to-265 range, your score may now be passing in Washington.

That is an enormous deal for a small but very real group of examinees.

Quick Refresher: How 260 Became 610

If you read my earlier post, "On the NextGen UBE, 620 is the new 270," you’ve already read how the new NextGen UBE scale lines up with the current UBE scale.

In short, the Legacy UBE uses a 200-to-400 score scale, with most jurisdictions setting cut scores between 260 and 270.

The NextGen UBE will report its score on a 500-to-750 scale, and the National Conference of Bar Examiners has recommended a passing-score range of 610 to 620 on that new scale.

So when Washington chose 610 as its NextGen passing score, it effectively chose the NextGen twin of a 260 on the old UBE scale.

That’s where things get interesting.

Before the Court weighed in, different stakeholders in Washington had different ideas about where to set the bar (literally).

According to the recent order, the WSBA Board of Governors recommended 616 on the NextGen scale because the NCBE’s mapping shows 616 equated 266 on the old scale. That would have kept Washington’s existing 266 standard in place, just on the new ruler for the new exam.

The Washington law school deans urged the Court to adopt 610, equivalent to a 260, partly because early NextGen UBE takers won’t have the same depth and history of prep materials that Legacy UBE takers had.

The Court ultimately sided with the Washington law school deans and the low end of NCBE’s recommended 610-to-620 range, and then made the logical follow-through move:

If 610 on NextGen is equivalent to 260 on the UBE, then the UBE cut score in Washington should also be 260.

That’s how we ended up with:

✅ NextGen passing score in Washington: 610 (starting July 2026), and

✅ Legacy UBE passing score in Washington: 260 (for February 2026 and retroactively back to July 2020).