This workflow is for RACGP registrars who have plenty of commercial questions but have not squeezed the signal out of the college's own material. It applies to all three components — AKT, KFP and CCE — because the official material is where the real standard is set. The principal limitation is that this material is finite and precious: there is not much of it, and its value collapses if you burn it as ordinary practice. The skill is to read it for calibration signals, not to consume it for volume.
Most candidates use the official sample questions once, note their score, and move on. That wastes the most informative resource they have.
What the official RACGP material actually is, and how to treat it
The following describes the official material and how to handle it; it is not a commercial product with a price or a question count.
| Item | What it is | How to treat it |
|---|---|---|
| Examination guides / candidate guides | The college's description of format, rules and expectations | Read first; it defines the standard |
| Sample AKT and KFP questions | A small set of items written to the real standard | Sit unseen, timed, once — calibration gold |
| Curriculum and contextual units | The definitive scope of what is examinable | Use as your coverage checklist |
| Examiner / examination reports | Post-exam feedback on where candidates failed | Mine for recurring weaknesses to pre-empt |
| CCE guidance and score-band descriptors | How the clinical exam is judged (now F4–P4 bands) | Read to understand what "competent" looks like |
There is no AI, no adaptivity and no large bank here — that is not what official material is for. Its purpose is to be the most accurate available picture of the real exam, and its scarcity is exactly why it must be rationed. Confirm the current list and access arrangements on racgp.org.au, as the college updates guides and samples between years.
The exam you are calibrating against
The AKT is 150 single-best-answer questions; the KFP is 70 individual multiple-selection questions, each case standing alone. Both are delivered on paper with computer-readable answer sheets. The RACGP sets the time allowed per paper — published durations have varied, so confirm the current timing on racgp.org.au rather than trusting a third-party number. The KFP's multiple-selection format rewards precise selection and can penalise scattergun over-selection, so check the current marking rules — how many answers you may give per case, and how over-selection is treated — in the official guide, because that rule shapes how you should practise. The CCE is the clinical/consultation component, reported in score bands. The official material is the authority on all of this; anything a commercial provider says is a claim to be checked against it.
Extract the signals, not just the answers
When you sit an official sample item, the answer is the least interesting thing about it. Read it for its construction signals, and write them down:
- Stem length and structure — how much clinical detail is given, and how much is noise to be filtered.
- Option construction — how close the distractors are to the key; whether they are plausible near-misses or obvious throwaways.
- Cognitive level — is it recall, application or judgement? AKT and KFP items lean heavily on applied reasoning in a primary-care context.
- Image and data use — whether, and how, images, results and trends appear.
- Timing implied — how long a well-prepared candidate would reasonably take per item.
- Domain emphasis — which curriculum areas the samples keep returning to.
These signals are the blueprint made concrete. They tell you not just what is examined but how it is examined — the texture a raw curriculum list cannot convey.
Build a side-by-side matrix
Now compare, without copying any item text, the official sample against your main commercial RACGP bank on each signal. A simple matrix does the work:
| Signal | Official sample | Your commercial bank | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stem length | Moderate, some redundant detail | Often shorter, cleaner | Bank is easier to parse |
| Distractor closeness | Close near-misses | Mixed; some obvious | Bank slightly easier |
| Cognitive level | Applied judgement | More factual recall | Bank under-trains judgement |
| Australian primary-care framing | Strong | Variable | Check jurisdiction fit |
| Image/data use | Occasional | Rare | Gap to fill separately |
The verdict column is the payoff. It tells you exactly how your commercial practice diverges from the real standard, which is far more actionable than a percentage.
Use the discrepancies diagnostically
Read the pattern of divergence and act on it. If your bank is easier to parse and more factual than the official samples, you are under-training applied judgement and should deliberately slow down and reason on harder items. If your bank is harder or more esoteric, you may be over-preparing for trivia and under-preparing for common presentations. If the jurisdiction framing differs, you have a localisation gap to close against Australian guidance. Each discrepancy converts into a concrete adjustment; none of them is visible from a score alone.
Preserve the calibration value
This is the rule most candidates break: sit official material unseen, timed and once. The moment you re-do a sample item you remember, you are testing recognition, not reasoning, and its calibration value is gone. So do not "warm up" on the samples, do not review them repeatedly, and do not let them leak into your everyday practice. Ring-fence them, sit them under exam conditions at the two or three points where you most need an honest read on the real standard, and otherwise leave them sealed.
Translate the findings into quotas and conditions
Finally, convert everything into instructions for your remaining weeks — question quotas and practice conditions, not vague intentions. If the matrix showed under-trained judgement, set a quota of harder applied items and a rule to write your reasoning before revealing the answer. If it showed a localisation gap, set a fixed number of Australian-guideline review sessions. If timing was tight on the samples, set a per-item pace and rehearse it. The official material's job is to point; your quotas are how you follow the pointer.
As a concrete illustration, suppose your matrix returned three verdicts: your bank under-trains applied judgement, your KFP selection is loose, and your images are under-practised. Translated into the next fortnight, that becomes three measurable quotas — forty harder applied AKT-style items a week with reasoning written before the answer is revealed; two KFP sets a week sat under a strict selection cap to drill precision; and one image-heavy set every three days. None of these is "do more questions" in the abstract. Each is a bounded instruction tied to a specific signal the official material exposed, and each can be ticked off or missed at the end of the week — which is exactly what makes it useful, and what a raw percentage could never give you.
A seven-day pattern for Australian GP registrars
This gives the official material one job — calibration — and iatroX a different job: supplying the unseen AKT-style volume the finite official set cannot. iatroX covers RACGP AKT-style single-best-answer knowledge and is not a CCE consultation simulator; treat any adaptive sequencing as vendor-described and judge it only by your unseen scores.
- Day 1: Read the examination guide and examiner report; list the recurring failure themes to pre-empt.
- Day 2: Sit one official AKT sample unseen and timed; extract the construction signals; do not review it again.
- Day 3: Build the side-by-side matrix against your commercial bank; write the verdicts.
- Day 4: Act on the top discrepancy with a targeted iatroX AKT-style block of unseen items.
- Day 5: Sit one official KFP sample unseen and timed; check the current selection/marking rules; note the reasoning demands.
- Day 6: A mixed unseen block in iatroX under time to rehearse the pace the samples implied.
- Day 7: Review the week; set next week's question quotas and practice conditions from the matrix verdicts, and re-seal the official material.
Decision checklist: continue, supplement, switch or stop
- Continue using the official material as your calibration reference throughout — it never stops being the standard.
- Supplement with a commercial bank and with iatroX for the unseen volume the small official set cannot provide.
- Switch toward full timed mocks and, for the CCE, supervised consultation practice as the exam nears.
- Stop re-doing official samples the moment you start recognising them; past that point they measure memory, not readiness.
Frequently asked questions
Is RACGP Official Resources enough for RACGP Fellowship on its own? No, and it is not meant to be — the official material is a calibration reference, not a volume resource. There are too few sample items to build breadth or stamina, so on its own it cannot prepare you; its role is to tell you what the real standard looks like so you can steer your commercial practice toward it. Use it to calibrate, and a bank to build.
Which RACGP Fellowship component does RACGP Official Resources not reproduce well? It cannot give you practice volume in any component, and for the CCE in particular it offers guidance and score-band descriptors rather than a way to rehearse an actual consultation. You will understand from the official material what competent consulting looks like, but understanding is not the same as repeated, observed practice, so the CCE still needs supervised role-play that the written guidance cannot substitute for.
How many RACGP Official Resources questions should I complete per day for RACGP Fellowship? This is the wrong frame: official material is not a daily quota to grind but a scarce calibration asset to ration. Rather than doing a number per day, sit each official sample once, unseen and timed, at the two or three points in your preparation where you most need an honest read on the standard. If you find yourself doing official items daily, you are burning their calibration value and should switch to a commercial bank for volume.
When should I stop using RACGP Official Resources and move to mixed mocks? You never fully stop referring to the guides, curriculum and examiner reports, but you should stop sitting the sample items as soon as you begin to recognise them, because at that point they no longer measure reasoning. Move to full mixed mocks for stamina and pacing once your commercial practice is calibrated to the official signals — typically the final few weeks — while keeping the official guidance open as your reference for what "good" looks like.
How should I combine RACGP Official Resources with iatroX without duplicating practice? Let the official material set the standard and let iatroX supply the unseen volume that meets it. There is no duplication risk, because the official set is small and used once for calibration while iatroX provides fresh AKT-style items for breadth and retention; the official material tells you what to practise, and iatroX is where you practise it. The two-Q-bank rule keeps the arrangement clean.
Editorial notes and references
Written by Dr Kolawole Tytler, NHS GP and founder of iatroX. Last checked 19 July 2026; the RACGP updates its guides, sample questions and marking rules between years, and published exam durations have varied — confirm the current material, timing and KFP selection rules on racgp.org.au rather than relying on any third-party figure. Disclosure: iatroX operates a competing RACGP question bank; its role here is confined to supplying the unseen AKT-style volume the finite official material cannot, and it is a knowledge and measurement layer, not a CCE consultation simulator. Corrections are welcome via the feedback route on iatrox.com.
References: RACGP examination guides, curriculum, sample questions and examination reports (racgp.org.au); iatroX internal references — Your Q-Bank Percentage Is Not Your Exam Score, question-bank completion is not coverage and the RACGP Fellowship bank landing page.