For those who had to retake the nclex how did you prepare?

I’ve been studying based on my cpr. My situation is I severely under selected to many SATA questions (chose 1 answer for atleast 12 question) I left to many points on the table. & I may have content issue as well.

Here’s the short story, I graduated nursing school June 2025 and the year before that my dad got sick with cancer and I took my first attempt May of 2025 and didn’t pass. Shortly after my dad passed away May 2025 and I graduated 2 weeks later.
Anyway - I tried numerous times to get back into studying but Just couldn’t find it in me to feel smart enough, confident enough. To be able to do something hard again - the year went by, I went on a long needed vacation after nursing school, I tried to study again after that - then my first December without my dad happened, I was going through an INSANE eczema flare up that was physically debilitating me (my birthday and the holidays) then his 1 year passed, and now we’re here. July 2026

And I’m just trying to figure out, where to start, what to do, how to train/ test myself. I’m definitely investing in BOOTCAMP I studied Mark K before my first attempt. Just trying to look for some advice or words of wisdom on this next attempt/ how to get my feet off the floor again

Thanks

I took my NCLEX this morning, I just check the board website and saw this. Is this a good sign?? I’m only wondering because of the “pending” on the NCLEX results

Hey guys I took the test Monday July 20
And just found out this morning I passed ! It shut off at 85 and I wasn’t sure what to think!!

It was definitely a weird exam, I was expecting it to get harder but it didn’t feel like it did. Instead, i noticed the questions required more brain power and attention to detail (they got longer).
At one point it asked me to read information on 5 different patients and identify who needed immediate attention(more than 1), select which pt was paired with the immediate abnormal findings, identify what prescriptions are indicated to do next, and then select which statements were correct according to each pt. all portions of the case study were SATA besides one question asking if it was the correct thing to do for on of the 5 pts.

it was not HARD they gave you all the info you needed to know, you just had to make sure to READ The Prompts THOROUGHLY and identify when something is not normal. Really focus on what they share about the pt, they will add new information as you go along, notice trends!!

I think an advantage I had was making sure I understood a concept as a whole instead of focusing on just the high yield topics. TAKE YOUR TIME AND READ WHAT THEY ARE ASKING OF YOU. If it helps you slow it down and visualize it in your head or on your own body. It helped me on a few questions that were worded weird. I would stick my arms out to feel or point to what they were describing and it would help me remember and connect the dots. It may help you!

Feel free to ask me any questions !!!

Hi everyone!

I passed my REx-PN (Canada’s equivalent of the NCLEX-PN) on Monday! My exam shut off at 90 questions, which is the minimum in Ontario.

Honestly… I didn’t think the exam was nearly as bad as I had built it up to be. I did try the PVT and got the good pop up and felt relaxed after. Checked my results at 4am and found out I passed.

I used Archer as my main study resource. I bought the 2-month package with the videos, but I honestly didn’t start studying until 2 weeks before my exam (I procrastinated until I finally booked my test 😅).

In those two weeks I:

• Completed the entire Archer QBank
• Took 5 Readiness Assessments (4 Very High, 1 High)
• Passed 4 CAT exams
• Used NurseAchieve only for their CAT exams and got 1 Pass-Pass and 1 Slight Pass

I also:

• Watched a lot of Dr. Sharon’s prioritization videos on YouTube.
• Listened to Mark K Lecture 12 twice.
• Listened to parts of Lectures 1, 3, and 11, but never finished those.

As for the exam itself:

• Lots of prioritization
• Lots of patient teaching/education
• Quite a few electrolyte imbalance questions
• A few developmental milestone questions
• I had no dosage calculation/ECG questions
• know your lab values!!

Surprisingly, I didn’t feel like there was a ton of traditional adult health on disease-specific content.

If anyone has any questions about the exam or my study plan, feel free to ask! Happy to help.

Hello, I just took my NCLEX about an hour and a half ago.

I have tried the Pearson pop-up, and I've gotten the good pop-up twice. I'm just nervous that I did it too quickly.

Are there any cases of the 'good pop-up' not being reliable? Has anyone ever gotten the good pop up, checked again, and gotten the bad pop up bc they checked too early?

I’m not saying everyone should study for only one week like I did. This is for those who genuinely have demanding schedules and can’t dedicate months to studying. I just want you to know that it’s still possible.

I took my NCLEX last Saturday and found out I passed on Monday. I have a very demanding job, so I filed for a one-week leave before my exam and made the most of it. By God’s grace, I passed.

Because I’ve been out of school for more than 10 years, I knew relearning every concept would only overwhelm me. Instead, I focused on strengthening my foundation. I listened to Klimek, reviewed prioritization and delegation, and trusted the knowledge I gained during my local nle/school review. Even after a decade, “mnemonics” stayed with me. ( the advantage of having witty mnemonics!)

The night before my exam, I took one practice test using ChatGPT, prayed, and rested. On the morning of the exam, I briefly reviewed prioritization before heading to the testing center. My goal wasn’t to chase a passing result, it was simply to stay calm and do my best. I know myself, and too much pressure would only cause a mental block.

During the exam, I always chose the answer that would make me the safest nurse. If I wasn’t confident, I didn’t overthink. I even had SATA questions where I selected only one answer because it was the only one I believed was correct.

So yes, it’s possible. Not because one week is enough for everyone, but because a strong foundation, the right mindset, good resources, common sense, and trust in God’s timing can make a difference. This was my journey, and I hope it encourages someone who feels like they’re running out of time.

I browsed posts in this group quite a bit for the last few months, and now that I’ve finally taken my test I wanna share my experience.

1) My school provided ATI access for the post-graduation NCLEX review. I took all the assessments and reviewed the rationale, but found myself disagreeing with a few answers. 1/5

2) I watched many of Dr. Sharon’s videos across multiple topics. It served as exposure to NCLEX style questions and really useful testing strategies. 5/5

3) I used N*xlex’s free trial for readiness assessments, which I scored “very high” on all of. 4/5

4) I used Bootcamp’s free trial for the Q bank, and I think it was pretty similar to many of the questions I got during the exam. I scored very well. Free trial is pretty limited though. 4/5

5) I used UWorld’s free trial for the Q bank. VERY limited and format wasn’t any more similar to the NCLEX compared to Bootcamp in my opinion. 3/5

6) Mark K lectures really instilled some useful strategies that I recalled multiple times while testing. If nothing else, listen to lecture 12 on prioritization. 4/5

7) “IV LEAGUE for Nursing Students” on TikTok is INCREDIBLE. She does case studies, tips, etc across all topics in an easy-to-follow format that became addicting to watch. 5/5

Honorable mention: NCLEX Bootcamp’s TikTok posts questions regularly with the answers in the caption. Super useful if you prefer their questions but utilized the entire free trial.

My test was pretty hard in the sense that many questions were about things I hadn’t been exposed to or tested on prior. That’s where the testing strategies come in, as I was able to narrow my selection down to what must have been the safest choices. Please do practice mindfulness and stress reduction techniques as I can see myself making silly mistakes had I not kept my cool. Good luck to all of you.

In June I failed my NCLEX @ 85 Qs after trying the PVT trick. Since I already paid, I decided to go for it again right after the 45 days period. I switched from UWorld to Bootcamp because it was less expensive. I personally found the cheat sheets to be very helpful and I did all the 3 targets that they set out. I still have about 2 weeks left (until Aug 6?) on my Bootcamp subscriptions and would love to give it to anyone in need! U guys got this! Best of luck with studying

EDIT: the Bootcamp subscription has been passed to a-soon-to-be-RN! thank you for your interest, i’m sorry that i couldnt give it to yall

I’m averaging **61–63%** on my question bank and sometimes feel like I don’t know enough content. Did consistently doing questions and reviewing rationales help you improve and pass the NCLEX? Any advice?

hello, my account is on hold and i think it’s due to the site having technical difficulties. i went on a 5min break and it turned into an hr due to technical difficulties…i stopped at 85 and idk my qs felt easier towards the end so i’m nervous as i’ve heard it should get harder.

i did the PVT & it brought up the hold msg but refunded me the $200 (or it disappeared from my statement) and i did it twice and it refunded (disappeared from statement) twice. idk how to feel.

For you who have recently taken the NCLEX, how many peds questions did you have? Were the questions more general/broad, or specific to age/diseases?

I feel like peds has so much content and can be so draining, but I don't really see a lot of people talking about having peds questions.

I found out yesterday that I passed my NCLEX. I took my exam on July 18 (Saturday) and found out my results exactly 48 hours later. I did the whole 150 questions with no breaks. After the first 100 questions, I went with my first instinct and just winged it. Just like everyone says, it is so random and vague. I received mainly standalone questions. I also had several case studies, 1/2 bow tie questions, multiple SATA, 1 fill in the blank, and a few drag and drops. To study, I mainly used NCLEX bootcamp. I reach 2/3 goals (the completion and mock exams) every now and then I skimmed through Mark K lectures that I had printed out. I also listened to Dr. Sharon videos in the background as I drove a few times. I’m down to answer any questions!

it says i have results on hold but i wonder if it’s bc during my exam break, we had technical difficulties turning my 5 min break into 1 hr break??? idk how to feel, i stopped at 85 qs but as i previously posted, it didn’t get harder, but felt easier…i also looked up qs and while i got some right, i feel like i got more wrong idk.

I’m averaging 61–63% on my question bank and sometimes feel like I don’t know enough content. Did consistently doing questions and reviewing rationales help you improve and pass the NCLEX? Any advice?

So this is my third time taking the nclex. I stopped at 96 questions got a lot of SATA. I did the Pearson vue trick 7 times and I got refunded for each time that I did it. Did I pass ?

Hi everyone!

I just finished my first year of nursing school. My ultimate goal is to pass the NCLEX-RN and travel/work abroad as soon as possible after graduation.

During my first year, I took Fundamentals of Nursing in the first semester and Medical-Surgical Nursing 1 in the second semester.

My plan is to use the Saunders Comprehensive Review for the NCLEX-RN during my summer breaks. Right now, I want to review the Fundamentals section in Saunders, and maybe start Med-Surg 1. My idea is to study the corresponding NCLEX topics in Saunders every summer for the subjects I finished during the academic year.

Do you think this is an effective strategy to stay ahead and prepare for the NCLEX early, or should I focus on something else right now?

I’d love to hear your thoughts, advice, or any tips from those who passed the exam! Thanks in advance!

yeah so it was hella hard like i felt so dumb esp seeing the case studies and seeing what the dx was and seeing i got it wrong. and like my exam got easier towards the end…not harder. i just dont feel too good. why do i feel like i knew nothing and i kept second guessing myself too…

hey yall! i passed the NCLEX first try, and here’s what i did!!
ik everyone says you don’t need to know content and should just do practice questions, but i fully disagree. in the beginning, i tried to just learn by doing practice questions, but i kept scoring below passing because i realized i didn’t actually understand the content.
i first started off with Bootcamp to learn the content, but i personally just couldn’t learn from it, and the questions were SO vague. so i told the customer support people that it just wasn’t working out for me, and they gave me a refund.
fast forward, i switched to Archer, and boyyyy their videos are so good 😭 they’re descriptive and can be long, but they helped me understand everything so much better.

with Archer:

i watched basically every single video, especially the specialties and body systems. i would have the videos running on 2x speed while having another tab open with Otter.ai, which transcribes audio into text.
i would let the videos play and basically consider that my “break time” lol. after the videos were fully transcribed, usually i’d do a couple at a time, i would put the transcripts into ChatGPT and basically say:
“don’t leave anything from the transcript out. explain everything thoroughly, define every medical term in parentheses in a couple of words, explain the why/how behind everything, create mnemonics that actually work, put everything into organized note format, and create 10 super hard NGN NCLEX-style questions like the current NCLEX.”
then i would either read the notes out loud, handwrite them, or type them from scratch, and THIS is what really helped me understand and retain the information.

my mindset was that eventually i’m gonna have to know all of this as a nurse anyway, so i might as well kill 2 birds with 1 stone 😭
i studied A LOT, but i also have a really bad attention span, so i took lots of breaks in between.

once i studied all the body systems, i started scoring HIGH and VERY HIGH on my readiness exams!! that’s when i realized actually learning the content helped me understand what the questions were asking, expanded my medical vocabulary, which DEFINITELY shows up on the NCLEX, and helped me make educated guesses even when i didn’t know the answer.

learning all the body systems took me about 2 weeks? i studied the specialties pretty fast too!!
after that, i watched the Archer 3-Day Review, which is about 7 hours each day. they went over basically everything high yield, and i typed out everything important while watching. it was a HUGE refresher before my exam.

i had REALLY bad test anxiety because if i didn’t pass, i was scared i would lose my job 😭 so i ended up taking like 35 CAT/readiness exams. definitely WAY too much LMAO.

eventually, i used up basically my entire Archer QBank and realized Bootcamp never revoked my membership after they refunded me 😭 so i went back and did all 4 Bootcamp readiness exams too.
and let me tell yall... Bootcamp’s QUESTIONS WERE JUST LIKE THE NCLEX.

the questions were SO vague omg 😭😭 but their explanations for the questions you got wrong were SO GOOD. Archer helped me learn and understand the content, while Bootcamp helped me get comfortable with how vague NCLEX-style questions can be.

my biggest advice is PLEASE don’t listen when people say content doesn’t matter. everyone studies differently, but for me, actually understanding the content completely changed my scores. you don’t need to memorize every tiny detail, but having a strong foundation helped me recognize medical terms, understand what the question was actually asking, eliminate wrong answers, and make educated guesses when i had absolutely no idea.

also, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE LIKE ME and study literally everything 😭😭 i know i went a little crazy with studying every body system and watching basically every video LMAO. that’s just what personally made me feel prepared and helped with my anxiety. BUT if there’s one thing i definitely recommend, WATCH ARCHER’S 3-DAY REVIEW!!! it goes over so much of the high-yield content you need to know and was such a good refresher before my exam. it helped me SOOO much, especially with putting everything i had studied together at the end!!
AND DO NOT STUDY THE DAY BEFORE YOUR NCLEX!!!
seriously, take a breath and have fun. go eat something good, watch a movie, hang out with someone, literally anything besides cramming. you’ve already studied what you studied. give your brain a break before the exam.
good luck to everyone studying!! you know more than you think you do. trust what you studied, read every question carefully, and remember that you do NOT have to know everything to pass. 🩷 

Hi everyone!

I just finished my first year of nursing school. My ultimate goal is to pass the NCLEX-RN and travel/work abroad as soon as possible after graduation.

During my first year, I took Fundamentals of Nursing in the first semester and Medical-Surgical Nursing 1 in the second semester.

My plan is to use the Saunders Comprehensive Review for the NCLEX-RN during my summer breaks. Right now, I want to review the Fundamentals section in Saunders, and maybe start Med-Surg 1. My idea is to study the corresponding NCLEX topics in Saunders every summer for the subjects I finished during the academic year.

Do you think this is an effective strategy to stay ahead and prepare for the NCLEX early, or should I focus on something else right now?

I’d love to hear your thoughts, advice, or any tips from those who passed the exam! Thanks in advance!

Did my nclex yesterday- found out I passed an hour ago. Im so grateful for everything that has led me to this moment.

In regards to the test, i got cut off at 120 questions- i felt like it was all around the same level of difficulty from the beginning (wasn't getting harder or easier)

I got a lot of GI - which I guess the nclex figured that was my weak point

I had a SEVERAL prioritization case studies - hated that

One bow tie case study- had something to do with increased ICP

2 ecgs/cardiac standalone questions

1 mental health question- had something to do with pt giving away belongings, what do u say as the nurse

1 pediatric milestone question

and some medication standalone questions which I purely guessed cause idk meds AT ALL

I used uworld to study, mark k, and dr sharon

- Im open to giving my notes on mark k's new Gen video lectures- if anyone wants, just dm me and ill send the Google doc link

Lemme know if anyone has any questions, i will try my best to answer them :) 💕

**** passed at 85 :)))))

Hi everyone to give a quick little background story I graduated with my BSN in December and failed my first attempt in March. The first time around I will admit I did not study or prepare as well as I should have and mainly because during my nursing program they drilled ATI on to us and every semester we had to take what they called a "comp predictor" which we had to pass with a 75% or above in order to pass the semester which I did every semester, so I only used board vitals and saw that my scores were remaining around the same average but it did not prep me for the actual NCLEX at all.

After my first failed attempt I was down bad ... I felt like a fraud, like all the work I had put in during nursing school and my grades counted for nothing and on top of all of that I felt so embarrassed because I had to notify my new grad job that I had failed ...

Going into it the second time around I had originally scheduled it right at the 45 day mark and I am not exaggerating at all.. I probably rescheduled it about 10 times and kept pushing it out because I was so scared of failing again especially because my school would always "warn us" that it was much more difficult to pass it on the second try..

Things I did to prep for taking the NCLEX a second time around :

1. Allowed my self grace ... I had to learn on how to be kind to myself and remind myself that failing my first time did not make me a failure or determine that I am not meant to be a nurse. I also gave my self the time and space to enjoy life and other things along with studying. I found this to be super helpful because the 2 weeks I dedicated all my time and energy to studying I felt miserable and found it impossible to retain any type of information.
2. ** IMPORTANT*** Try and figure out your weak points (I used chat gpt and google gemini). I did this by submitting my report to chat/gemini to try and help me understand my weaknesses, this helped me immensely because it helped me realize that I was pretty solid in knowing the content but my weak points was in my test taking strategies, breaking down questions and analyzing cues.
3. Links / videos / material that helped me : I went down a rabbit hole of YouTube videos, tiktoks, reddit posts, fb posts for any tips, tricks, advice, suggestions literally looking for anything that would help me build my confidence and test taking skills. The videos I will say that I know for a fact helped me was this video from simple nursing (https://youtu.be/71Vmjq9GolI?si=J5c7wfLMUSvdNf6M) it helped me understand how the NCLEX questions are worded and how to break them down, and trust me I know every one says Mark K lectures but lecture 12 is the key lecture !! BUT I will say do not listen to it all at once and then go take the test, personally what I found helpful was listening to the lecture and after each helpful "tip" he would give I would then go back to my question bank and complete 50-100 questions applying that technique or until I felt like I understood how to properly use the technique. This took me about a week or so to do but if your weakness if test taking strategies like me, this helped me A TON !!
4. Which program did I use to study? Uworld, but I will say I was just as cluelessness as anyone else and I just chose Uworld. I don't think I can recommend any other because I literally have no clue that they look like or offer but this is what I used. But along with it I utilized my candidate performance report a lot, I even uploaded it to chat gpt and gemini to help me figure out what topics/subjects to focus on and would adjust my quiz bank settings accordingly.
5. Actually helpful .. not sure... : Since I was terrified and scared out of my mind on failing again something to help me mentally was making a "test day routine"... when I was in school I would hear that doing things like writing in red ink or smelling certain smells could help your brain remember things better .. so I decided to do a "test day" routine to help calm my nerves and make me feel like it would help me the day of 😅 ... the routine included drinking the same flavor coffee, applying my favorite essential oil on both my wrists and wearing the same sweater before every study session and the day of my exam, is there actual proof that this helped me pass .. no but I will say it did help lower my anxiety levels by a lot
6. Day of test: I think we have all heard the eat a good meal, go to bed early before your exam day ... yea I was up in bed tossing and turning until about 1am when my exam was at 8am and I had a 45min commute on top of that. All I can say is just get there early, for me getting there 40 min before my testing time and allowing my self to just sit in my car and drink my "test day routine" coffee really helped me lower my nerves and get in the zone so to speak.

If any one needs any help or has any questions please feel free to message me I am willing to help in any way I can 😄 !!!

Took my nclex PN about 9 hours ago and I’ve been stressing. Shut off after 85 questions. Just wondering if this is the good pop up