The LMSW Exam (ASWB Masters)

No exam is called the LMSW exam. LMSW is a license, granted by a state board under that state's own title and rules. The exam belongs to ASWB, which calls it the Masters exam.

The title changes from state to state. New York and Texas grant the LMSW and require the ASWB Masters exam for it; Texas adds its own jurisprudence exam. Minnesota's equivalent is the LGSW and Pennsylvania's is the LSW, both on the Masters exam. In Ohio the LSW is open to bachelor's graduates, who take the Bachelors exam, so the same letters can mean a different exam.

Not every state uses the exam at this level. Illinois has required no exam for its LSW since January 1, 2022. Minnesota has a second route to the LGSW through a provisional license and supervised practice in place of the exam. California has no Masters-exam step: graduates register as associate clinical social workers and later take a state law and ethics exam and the ASWB Clinical exam. Timing differs too. Texas lets students take the Masters exam in their last semester, and New York approves no one before the degree is awarded. These were the boards' published rules in October 2026; rules change.

So the board is where you confirm that the Masters exam is the one your license needs, and ASWB is where the exam's format, fee and scoring come from.

The exam comes near the end of a fixed order of events.

Three content areas of nearly equal weight: Values and Ethics 35%, Assessment and Planning 33%, Intervention and Practice 32%. On 110 scored questions that is about 39, 36 and 35.

The lists behind those weights are not equal. Values and Ethics has 27 knowledge statements, Assessment and Planning 39 and Intervention and Practice 43, so the shortest list carries the most weight. Ethics on this outline is concrete: informed consent, the limits of confidentiality, mandatory reporting and duty to warn, boundaries, records, billing, technology, and ending services.

Assessment and Planning runs from what to recognize (trauma, abuse and neglect, substance use, indicators of mental illness, development across the lifespan) through how to assess it (interviewing, risk of harm, the mental status examination) to planning services. Intervention and Practice covers casework methods, group and family work, community organizing and social planning, evaluation and research design, and supervision.

ASWB publishes weights for the three areas only, and it does not number its knowledge statements. The statement numbers in the outline on this page are ours.

The two exams are the same length and are taken the same way. They differ in who may take them, in fee and in content.

Eligibility is the clearest difference. The Clinical category requires two years of experience in clinical settings on top of the degree, or what the jurisdiction treats as equivalent; the Masters category requires the degree alone.

Question style is not a published difference. ASWB's guidebook groups the Masters exam with the Clinical exam as using more application and reasoning questions, and fewer recall questions, than the Bachelors exam. A Masters candidate may therefore be answering 'what should the social worker do first' from coursework and field placement, without years of practice to draw on, which is a reason to practice that question type deliberately.

The content overlaps heavily, and most knowledge statements appear in both outlines. The Masters outline alone lists community organizing and development, methods of social change and social planning, and policies for a safe, inclusive and healthy workplace. The Clinical outline alone lists using the DSM in assessment, treatment approaches for couples, role play and assertiveness training, research ethics, and organizational and fiscal management. The Masters outline still expects you to recognize indicators of mental illness and to know the mental status examination and common medications.

Study material written for the Clinical exam will therefore over-prepare you in places and leave gaps in others.

Two sections of 61 questions, each with 2 hours on its own clock, and an optional break of up to 10 minutes between them. Submitting the first section closes it for good, so finish reviewing it before you move on. 12 of the 122 questions are unidentified pretest questions that do not count, and ASWB's guidebook says questions may have three options or four.

The result is pass or fail against a fixed standard. The number of correct answers that standard requires varies with the exam form, and ASWB says it generally ranges from 66 to 78 of the 110 scored questions. A practice percentage is useful for finding weak areas; it is not a prediction.

If you do not pass, the wait is 90 days, and ASWB will consider a waiver if you were within 10 correct answers of passing and your jurisdiction allows waivers. Each attempt costs the full $230 fee. Your board may have to approve you again, and some boards limit the number of attempts.

Until August 3, 2026 the Masters exam was 170 questions on an earlier content outline. The current outline is based on ASWB's 2024 Analysis of the Practice of Social Work. Older books and question sets follow the earlier outline, and their full-length practice tests are the wrong length.