About the Texas ACR Contractor Exam

About the Texas ACR Contractor Exam

Quick Answer: There is no single "Texas HVAC contractor exam." The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation (TDLR) offers four contractor endorsement exams — Environmental Air Class A and Class B, Commercial Refrigeration Class A and Class B — plus a separate Certified Technician exam. PSI delivers all of them, all are open book, and all require 70% to pass. The class and endorsement you claim on your $115 TDLR application decide which exam PSI opens for you; you do not choose at the test center.

The Class and Endorsement You Apply For Is the Exam You Sit

Texas licenses air conditioning and refrigeration (ACR) contractors along two independent axes.

Class sets your capacity ceiling:

• Class A — unlimited. Any size cooling or heating equipment.
• Class B — restricted to cooling systems of 25 tons or less and heating systems of 1.5 million Btu per hour or less.

Endorsement sets your scope of work, and it is the last field of your license number, which reads TACL / A / 000000 / C:

• E — Environmental Air Conditioning. Conditioning air for human comfort: temperature, humidity, ventilation, air movement, indoor air quality.
• R — Commercial Refrigeration and Process Cooling or Heating. Systems that hold a product or a process at a set temperature or humidity.
• C — Combined. Both of the above.

Two classes × two endorsement exams = the four contractor examinations. A candidate who wants the combined C endorsement does not sit a special "combined" test; they sit both endorsement exams at their class level. That is why this guide teaches both blueprints.

The Certified Technician exam is a different credential — not a contractor license, but the TDLR technician certification that, once held for 12 months, unlocks the shorter experience route described below.

Exam Format at a Glance

Every figure below comes from the PSI/TDLR Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Candidate Information Bulletin. Non-scored pilot items are added on top of the scored count and carry their own extra minutes, so more questions appear on your screen than actually count.

Seventy percent of 120 is 84 correct on either Class A exam; on a Class B exam it is 70 correct out of 100. Non-scored items are indistinguishable from scored ones, so treat all 125 as live. A computer tutorial of up to 15 minutes runs before the clock starts and does not consume exam time.

From $115 Application to PSI Eligibility

TDLR, not PSI, controls the gate. The sequence is fixed:

1. File the contractor license application and pay the $115 fee. You must be at least 18 years old.
2. Prove experience. Two routes, and you need only one:
   • 48 months of practical ACR work in the past 72 months under the supervision of a licensed ACR contractor; or
   • 36 months of practical ACR work in the past 48 months, plus a TDLR technician certification held for the preceding 12 months.
3. TDLR approves eligibility, and PSI sends scheduling instructions by email (or by postcard if you gave no email address).
4. Schedule with PSI online or by phone, paying the exam fee separately.
5. Pass, then file your certificate of insurance, then TDLR issues the license.

Two deadlines bracket the process. You must complete every part of the application process, including passing the exam, within one year of the date the application is filed — miss it and you begin again with a new $115. The license itself is then valid for 1 year from the date of issue, so renewal comes around quickly.

Inside your eligibility period you may test an unlimited number of times. The bulletin imposes no mandatory waiting period between attempts; the real limits are the $74 or $60 you pay for each sitting and the one-year clock. Reschedules and cancellations are free only if PSI receives notice 2 days before the scheduled date — for a Monday appointment, the previous Saturday. Voicemail and email are not acceptable forms of cancellation.

All ACR examinations are offered in English and Spanish at no additional cost; you select your language when you schedule. A bound word-to-word translation dictionary is permitted, but it may contain no pictures or definitions and may not be marked before or during the exam.

ID and Security Rules That Cost Candidates Their Fee

Arrive 30 minutes early. Arriving after the start time means you are not admitted and you forfeit the fee — the same outcome as not showing up at all.

Bring one valid government-issued photo ID (driver's license, state ID, or passport) bearing your printed name, photograph, signature or fingerprint, date of birth, and expiration date. The name must match what TDLR sent PSI, which is why the PSI account you create must use your name exactly as it appears on that ID. An expired Texas driver's license is accepted only when accompanied by a valid DPS temporary permit. If you cannot meet the ID requirement, call PSI at least 3 weeks ahead; showing up without acceptable identification is scored as a missed appointment and the fee is gone.

In the room:

• Calculators must be non-programmable, silent, battery-operated, without paper-tape printing, and without an alphabetic keyboard.
• Electronic notepads are provided. You bring no scratch paper, and no additional paper of any kind is allowed.
• Phones, smart watches, tablets, cameras, and recording devices go into secure storage; hats, coats and bulky clothing come off, and proctors may ask you to empty pockets and roll up sleeves.
• Possession of a prohibited item inside the examination room invalidates your results on the spot.

Scoring, the Diagnostic Report, and Retakes

Your score appears on screen immediately when you finish or when time expires, and an official paper score report is printed at the test center before you leave.

• Pass: a successful notification appears on screen.
• Fail: you receive a diagnostic report showing your strengths and weaknesses by subject area, and its subject areas map one-to-one onto the content outline table below. A report flagging Piping and Controls tells you precisely which two tabs in your reference books you were too slow to find.

While testing you may leave a comment on any question through the Comments link on the function bar. PSI reviews substantive comments and, if a discrepancy is confirmed, results may be re-evaluated. That comment mechanism is the only review of the written examination available to candidates — there is no appeal, no hand-score request, and no item-by-item challenge afterward.

Insurance Is Filed After You Pass — Not Before

The minimums appear in 16 Texas Administrative Code §75.40:

Read that third row carefully. Third-party study material frequently mislabels it "property damage." The rule calls it the products and completed operations aggregate — coverage for harm arising out of work you have already finished and equipment you have already sold — and it simply happens to equal the per-occurrence figure for each class.

Same 14 Subject Areas, Very Different Weights

Both endorsement outlines list the identical 14 subject areas. Only the item counts move. Here are the two Class A exams side by side:

Which Questions Will I Actually See?

Group the rows and the two exams stop looking alike:

• Environmental Air Class A is an air-side exam. Air Distribution, Testing, Ventilation, Venting and Combustion Air together are 47 of 120 items — 39% of the exam. Duct sizing, static pressure, grilles, filtration, airflow measurement, combustion testing and vent assemblies decide whether you pass.
• Commercial Refrigeration Class A is a refrigerant-side exam. Basic Refrigeration Components, Refrigeration Principles, HVAC(R) Systems and Design, Piping and Controls together are 65 of 120 items — 54% of the exam. Compressors, metering devices, pressure–temperature relationships, line sizing, and pressure and safety controls decide it.
• Neither exam lets you skip anything. Air Distribution still carries 6 items on the refrigeration exam, and Basic Refrigeration Components still carries 6 on the environmental air exam. Six items is 5% — wider than the margin most failing candidates miss by.
• Texas Laws and Rules is exactly 6 items on both Class A exams. These are the cheapest points on the test, because they come from two documents you are allowed to carry into the room: Texas Occupations Code Chapter 1302 and 16 TAC Chapter 75.
• The three largest swings are Air Distribution (12 items), HVAC(R) Systems and Design (9) and Controls (8). If you are taking both exams for the combined C endorsement, those three areas are where the second exam will feel like a genuinely different test.

The Class B outlines keep the same shape, scaled to 100 items: Environmental Air B runs Air Distribution 15 / Testing 10 / Service 10, while Commercial Refrigeration B runs HVAC(R) Systems and Design 17 / Controls 11 / Piping 9.