The UKMLA Applied Knowledge Test is new, and that creates a problem for anyone searching for its pass rate: the clean national figure many candidates expect does not yet exist in public. What we do have is the structure of the exam, the way the standard is set, and useful proxies from PLAB 1 and UK finals. This guide separates what is known from what is not, and explains what it means for your preparation. This is a fast-moving area — confirm current details with the GMC and the Medical Schools Council.
Is there a published UKMLA AKT pass rate?
Not in the way there is for older exams. The AKT became a requirement for UK graduates from 2025 and, for international graduates, the PLAB 1 route has been aligned to the MLA content map since August 2024. Comprehensive, official MLA pass-rate data is not yet publicly available, and the GMC has signalled that the UKMLA may show lower pass rates initially, reflecting its higher standards. So rather than a single headline number, the honest answer is a set of reference points. That uncertainty is itself worth understanding: anyone quoting you a precise UKMLA AKT pass rate is almost certainly extrapolating from PLAB or finals data rather than citing a published national figure, so treat confident percentages with caution.
The proxies that do exist
Two are informative. For UK medical students, the AKT is, in effect, written finals: pass rates for UK finals have historically been high — commonly cited around 80 to 90% or more — reflecting five years of curriculum built towards this standard, with most students passing on their first attempt. International graduates sit the same standard by a different route, so the two proxies bracket the likely picture: comfortably high for well-prepared UK finalists, more variable for the IMG cohort during the transition to the new format. For international graduates, the PLAB 1 route is the closest guide: historically in the region of 55 to 75% depending on the sitting, with post-alignment sittings reported at the lower end during the transition before stabilising as candidates and resources adapted. The takeaway is that the AKT is demanding but not designed to fail most people; preparation quality is the main variable.
How the standard is set
The UKMLA is pass/fail and is not used for national ranking. The AKT is delivered as two papers of 100 single-best-answer questions, each with a two-hour limit, drawn from the GMC's MLA content map. The pass mark is criterion-referenced — set against a defined standard using methods such as Angoff rather than a fixed percentage — so it reflects what a safe new doctor should know rather than a quota of passes. Scores are provided, but they do not feed Foundation Programme ranking, and you must pass both the AKT and the practical CPSA to complete the UKMLA.
Why the AKT is challenging
The difficulty is less about obscurity and more about breadth and reasoning. The content map is detailed and wide, covering conditions and presentations across every major specialty plus ethics, professionalism and clinical sciences, with a substantial primary-care weighting. The questions favour applying knowledge to a clinical scenario over recalling facts, and the ethics and professionalism strand is a common blind spot for candidates who focus only on clinical medicine. For international graduates, the added challenge is UK-specific practice: management that follows NICE and CKS rather than the sequences taught elsewhere. The breadth is the real test: because the content map is deliberately comprehensive, the candidates who come unstuck are usually those with a few neglected areas rather than those who are weak across the board, which is why finding and fixing specific gaps matters more than general revision.
How to give yourself the best chance
The candidates who pass comfortably share a pattern: they work from the MLA content map rather than a generic finals syllabus, they practise clinical reasoning rather than memorising, and they verify management against current UK guidance. They also do not delay out of pass-rate anxiety — because the standard is criterion-referenced, sitting when genuinely prepared matters more than waiting for a supposedly easier diet.
A bank mapped to the content map, that adapts to your weak areas and explains the reasoning behind each answer, fits this well. iatroX offers blueprint-mapped questions, an adaptive engine that targets your weakest topics, a Socratic tutor that rebuilds the logic of each answer, and explanations grounded in NICE and CKS — useful for both UK students and international graduates building UK-specific knowledge. The UKMLA bank sits on one subscription at £29 a month or £99 a year, with free sample questions to try first; the same subscription also covers PLAB, the MSRA and more. For UK students that means one tool that continues from finals into specialty recruitment; for international graduates it means the AKT preparation and the later MSRA sit on the same platform, rather than starting again with each exam.
A few common questions
What is the UKMLA AKT pass rate? No comprehensive official figure is published yet; UK finals proxies sit around 80 to 90% or more, and the aligned PLAB 1 route has historically been roughly 55 to 75% depending on the sitting.
Is the UKMLA harder than PLAB or finals? It is different rather than dramatically harder — broader content and more clinical reasoning — but the underlying standard remains at the level of a doctor entering Foundation Year 2.
What score do I need? There is no fixed percentage; the pass mark is set against a defined standard, and the exam is pass/fail with no ranking.
Do I have to pass both parts? Yes — the AKT and the practical CPSA are separate components with independently set pass marks, and both are needed. Many candidates pass the AKT first and prepare for the CPSA separately, since the two test very different skills.