EA Part 1 is 100 multiple-choice questions in 3.5 hours, reported on a scale from 200 to 800 with 500 needed to pass. Roughly 85 questions are scored and about 15 are unscored experimental items the testing body is trialing for future exams. You can't tell which are which, so answer every one as if it counts. Most candidates spend 40 to 80 hours preparing for it.
Part 1 is the Individuals part of the Special Enrollment Examination (SEE), the three-part exam you pass to become an Enrolled Agent. PSI Services administers it for the IRS and took it over from Prometric in March 2026. Most people take Part 1 first, since it overlaps with the returns a lot of preparers already handle during tax season. You get a pass or fail result at the test center, and a fail comes with diagnostic feedback showing how you did in each content area.
The tax year and the testing window
The exam is written against a specific tax year, generally the prior calendar year, so the July 2026 through February 2027 window tests the earlier year's law and inflation-adjusted numbers. Standard deduction amounts, contribution limits and phase-out thresholds all move each year. Before you buy a review course or a question bank, confirm it matches the covered tax year, or you'll end up memorizing the wrong figures.
You schedule Part 1 through PSI Services after getting a Preparer Tax Identification Number. Each part is scheduled and paid for separately, and you can take the three parts in any order and on different days. The testing window historically ran from May 1 through the end of February. The 2026-27 window runs July 1, 2026 through February 28, 2027 under PSI Services, with a spring blackout while the exam is updated for the new tax year. If you don't pass, you can retake a part, subject to the retake limits within a testing window.
The six content areas
The IRS publishes the number of questions per area. The exact counts can shift a little, but the shape is stable:
| Content area | Questions (roughly) | What's in it |
|---|---|---|
| Preliminary Work and Taxpayer Data | 14 | Filing status, dependency, filing requirements, taxpayer identification |
| Income and Assets | 17 | Wages, interest, dividends, capital gains and basis, retirement income, other income types |
| Deductions and Credits | 17 | The standard deduction, itemized deductions, adjustments to income, the major individual credits |
| Taxation | 15 | Computing tax, the alternative minimum tax, other taxes on individuals |
| Advising the Individual Taxpayer | 11 | Estimated taxes, record retention, planning topics |
| Specialized Returns for Individuals | 11 | Estate and gift concepts, international items affecting individuals |
Income and Assets plus Deductions and Credits come to 34 of the 85 scored questions, about 40 percent, so if you're short on time, that's where an extra hour of study pays off most. Specialized Returns is smaller, but it's where candidates tend to feel least comfortable, because gift, estate and international items rarely come up in routine individual practice. Those 11 questions count the same as any others, so don't skip the basics there.
A 6 to 8 week plan
The 40 to 80 hour range is wide because your starting point matters. A preparer who files hundreds of 1040s a year already knows filing status, dependency and the common credits cold and can focus on the thinner areas. Someone coming from outside tax has to build the vocabulary first. Here's the plan I'd use:
- Weeks 1 to 2: Preliminary Work and Income and Assets. Do questions in small sets right after each subtopic so the reading sticks.
- Weeks 3 to 4: Deductions and Credits, then Taxation. These are computation-heavy, so work problems by hand and track which credit phase-outs and thresholds you keep missing.
- Week 5: Advising the Individual Taxpayer and Specialized Returns. Budget extra time for estate and gift if they're new to you.
- Weeks 6 to 8: full-length timed practice, then targeted review of your weakest content areas. Stop adding new material.
If you can only study on weeknights and weekends, 10 hours a week gets you to roughly 60 to 70 hours in about seven weeks, which is a reasonable target for most people.
Get into the question bank in week one, not week five. Rereading a chapter feels productive, but you learn more from missing a question and working out why. I'd practice in three stages. First, learn-mode questions right after each subtopic, with the explanations on, so you connect the concept to how it's tested. Second, mixed sets pulling from all six areas, so you get used to switching topics the way the real exam makes you. Third, at least two or three full 100-question timed runs, so 3.5 hours feels normal. That's just over two minutes a question. Flag anything that stalls you, give it a provisional answer and move on, and don't leave anything blank, since there's no penalty for guessing.
The questions come in three styles. Direct questions ask something straightforward, incomplete sentence questions ask you to finish a statement, and "all of the following except" questions ask you to find the one wrong option, which catches people who read too fast. When you review, write one sentence on why each wrong option is wrong, not just which answer was right. Capital gains, basis calculations and short versus long term holding periods show up all through Income and Assets and are worth extra repetition.
You can work the full Part 1 blueprint in FreeFellow's EA Part 1 questions: 1,247 original practice questions with step-by-step solutions and 18 written lessons, free with an account. Use them to find your weak content areas early, then go back to your source material for the topics you keep missing.