1.1 The Six Divisions: Items, Durations, Sections & Objectives

The Architect Registration Examination (ARE) 5.0 is the professional licensure examination developed by the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB) and accepted by all 55 U.S. licensing jurisdictions — the 50 states, the District of Columbia, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Its single legal purpose is to protect the public's health, safety, and welfare (HSW) by confirming that a candidate can practice architecture independently at entry level.

ARE 5.0 is not one exam. It is six separately scheduled, separately scored divisions, each with its own item count, clock, fee, and cut score. You may take them in any order, and each division you pass stands on its own.

The Six Divisions at a Glance

Every division is built the same way — a block of standalone items followed by case studies — and varies only in the number of questions (NCARB calls them items) and the time you get.

Source: NCARB, ARE 5.0 Guidelines (June 2026 edition). Total appointment time includes 10 minutes of introductory and exit screens plus the allowed break time.

Three numbers are worth memorizing because they anchor almost every logistics question you will be asked about the exam: 490 total items, 19 hours 50 minutes of testing, and six divisions.

Pretest items are unscored questions NCARB embeds to gather statistics for future forms. They look identical to scored items, they are not flagged, and they are excluded from your score. Between 6 and 9 of them appear in every division, so treat every question as if it counts — because you cannot tell which ones do.

Sections and Objectives: The Real Blueprint

Each division's content is broken into 4 or 5 topic-based sections, and each section is divided into objectives. The objective is the unit NCARB actually writes items against, and it is the unit you should study against.

Each objective is tagged with a cognitive level that tells you how it will be tested:

• Understand/Apply (U/A): recall a rule and apply it to a described situation — for example, interpreting an AIA A201 clause or classifying an occupancy.
• Analyze/Evaluate (A/E): weigh competing information and make a judgment — for example, choosing among three structural systems given a program, budget, and site.

A/E objectives dominate the technical divisions. That is why memorizing tables alone does not pass PPD or PDD.

What Each Division Tests

• Practice Management (PcM — 65 items): running the firm. Business structures, ethics and the NCARB Rules of Conduct, employment and work-environment regulation, firm financial health (utilization rate, overhead rate, break-even rate, net multiplier), professional liability and risk, contract types, and project delivery methods.
• Project Management (PjM — 75 items): running one commission. Team assembly, resource allocation, work plans, schedules and the critical path, budget monitoring, scope creep, the AIA B101 / A201 / C401 agreement family, regulatory approvals, and quality management.
• Programming & Analysis (PA — 75 items): pre-design. Climate and solar geometry, site constraints, environmental site assessments and soils, zoning and land-use controls, code classification, existing-building evaluation, program development, and the feasibility of the owner's budget and schedule.
• Project Planning & Design (PPD — 100 items): schematic synthesis. IBC Chapter 5 height and area, Chapter 10 means of egress, accessibility, structural and MEP system selection, special systems, envelope physics and passive strategies, materials, and schematic cost.
• Project Development & Documentation (PDD — 100 items): technical resolution. Roofing and waterproofing, wall assemblies and vapor control, connections and movement joints, MEP coordination and shaft design, partitions and acoustics, doors and fire-rated glazing, drawing standards, the project manual, specifications, and cost estimates.
• Construction & Evaluation (CE — 75 items): the construction phase. Bidding and procurement, bonds, preconstruction, bid evaluation and award, site observation, submittals, RFIs and change instruments, payment certification, substantial and final completion, and post-occupancy evaluation.

Exam Tip: PPD and PDD together are 200 of the 490 items — 41% of the entire exam. Candidates who schedule them last, after months away from technical content, consistently report the hardest recovery. Plan your order so the two 4-hour technical divisions land while your code and systems knowledge is warm.