state eligibility guide
Illinois CPA exam requirements
Illinois requires bachelor's degree or higher and 120 semester hours, including 24 accounting hours for CPA exam eligibility. Illinois Board of Examiners makes the final eligibility decision.
Published by Kesler CPA Review, a commercial CPA exam preparation company. This page is educational, not legal advice. The Board or application authority makes the final eligibility decision.
- Minimum education to sit
- 120 semester hours
- Degree rule
- bachelor's degree or higher required to sit
- Passed-section credit window
- 30-month passed-section credit window
Education requirements to sit
- Degree: bachelor's degree or higher required to sit
- Minimum education to sit: 120 semester hours
- Accounting coursework: 24 semester hours
- Business coursework: 12 semester hours
- Accreditation: The degree and coursework must satisfy Illinois Board of Examiners accreditation rules. Graduate accounting or business programs with recognized accreditation can qualify under separate curriculum options.
Required accounting subjects
- Auditing
- Taxation
Required business subjects
- Two semester hours of business communication
- Three semester hours of business ethics
The standard bachelor's route requires 24 accounting hours and 12 non-accounting business hours. Internship or life-experience credit is limited to three hours in accounting and three in business, with up to six additional hours usable as general credit. Duplicate course credit counts once.
Personal eligibility rules
- Citizenship: U.S. citizenship is not listed as an absolute requirement; review any lawful-presence rule
- U.S. residency: No U.S. residency requirement is listed
- Jurisdiction residency: No jurisdiction-residency requirement is listed
- Social Security number: An SSN is not required to apply
- Character review before sitting: No pre-exam character requirement is listed
How to apply
Apply through Illinois Board of Examiners online through the Illinois Board of Examiners.
Documents commonly required for this application
- Illinois credentials-evaluation application
- Official transcripts sent directly by each institution
- Exam request after education approval
- NASBA foreign evaluation when applicable
Exam requests carry a 3% credit-card recovery fee. Illinois Board of Examiners controls eligibility; IDFPR controls licensure.
Published exam fees
- Domestic credentials evaluation: $200.00 Charged once for a first-time candidate.
- Exam request: $40.00 for 1 section Choose the tier matching the number of exam sections selected.
- Exam request: $76.00 for 2 sections Choose the tier matching the number of exam sections selected.
- Exam request: $108.00 for 3 sections Choose the tier matching the number of exam sections selected.
- Exam request: $120.00 for 4 sections Choose the tier matching the number of exam sections selected.
- CPA exam section fee: $268.59 per section Charged for each exam section selected.
- Credit-card recovery fee: 3% of the applicable payment Applies to the Illinois exam-request transaction when paid by credit card.
Before you pay: These figures were verified on 2026-08-09, but fee schedules can change. Confirm the current official fee schedule.
Can you apply or sit before graduation?
- Apply before the degree is awarded: Yes, subject to the conditions below
- Sit before the degree is awarded: Yes, subject to the conditions below
- Final transcript deadline: Within 150 days after the first exam section taken provisionally, or by the term deadline if no section is taken.
Provisional status is available in the final term when remaining courses or the degree are expected by the Board's term deadline.
Foreign education
- Foreign education accepted: Yes, with the jurisdiction's conditions
- Credential evaluation: A credential evaluation is required
- NIES: NASBA International Evaluation Services is required
- Certified translation: A certified translation is required when applicable
Published evaluation services
- NASBA International Evaluation Services (NIES)
The Illinois Board relies solely on NASBA for the foreign-education report. The Board's foreign credentials application has no separate fee, but NIES charges its evaluation fee.
NTS and passed-section credit
- NTS issuer: NASBA
- NTS validity: 6 months
- Passed-section credit: 30-month passed-section credit window
- Continuous testing: Available subject to current AICPA scheduling windows
- The 30-month period begins on the score-release date for the first passed section.
- Discipline sections follow AICPA testing windows.
Select only the sections you can take before the six-month NTS expires.
Sitting for the exam is not the same as licensure
These examination rules answer whether you can apply and sit. A CPA license can require additional education, experience, ethics, and administrative steps.
- Education for licensure: 150 semester hours under the current pathway
- Experience: 1 year required under the current pathway
- Ethics exam: Required
- Alternative pathway: enacted not yet effective
Current licensure requires one year of experience after certification. The new degree-and-experience routes begin January 1, 2027.
Special rules and recent changes
- alternative pathway: New bachelor's-and-two-year-experience and advanced-education-and-one-year-experience licensure routes begin in 2027. Effective date: 2027-01-01. Read the official change source.
Official sources used
- Education Requirements — Illinois Board of Examiners (accessed 2026-08-07)
- Illinois Administrative Code Section 1400.90 — Illinois General Assembly (accessed 2026-08-07)
- Provisional Status — Illinois Board of Examiners (accessed 2026-08-07)
- Exam Application — Illinois Board of Examiners (accessed 2026-08-09)
- Credentials Evaluation Application — Illinois Board of Examiners (accessed 2026-08-09)
- Illinois Administrative Code Section 1400.140 — Illinois General Assembly (accessed 2026-08-07)
- Public Act 104-0228 — Illinois General Assembly (accessed 2026-08-07)
- Illinois Administrative Code, section 1400.60 — Illinois General Assembly (accessed 2026-08-08)
- Open an account FAQ — Illinois Board of Examiners (accessed 2026-08-09)
- Implementing Candidate Fee Changes — National Association of State Boards of Accountancy (accessed 2026-08-09)
Before you apply: Confirm the current application, fees, NTS terms, and testing availability with the Board. This guide only includes details we could verify from published sources, and the licensing section is a starting point—not a complete licensing checklist.
Your application plan
Turn this page into a checklist
Check off each research step as you complete it. This is a planning aid; finishing the checklist does not mean the Board has approved your eligibility.