The era of taking the LSAT from home is largely coming to an end. Beginning with the August 2026 administration, most law school applicants will be required to take the exam at an in-person testing center under a policy change announced by the Law School Admission Council.
The LSAT will continue to be offered in August, September, October, November, January, February, April and June, as well as the LSAT-Puerto Rico in February. Remote testing will be available only for applicants who live significant distances from a testing center and for certain test takers who qualify for medical- or disability-related accommodations.
“This move for in-person testing will improve the testing experience and help to ensure the security and integrity of the test,” said Susan Krinsky, executive vice president for operations and chief of staff at LSAC.
Expanded in-person capacity
To help make this successful for test takers, LSAC is expanding the number of test centers and testing appointments available for each test administration.
Krinsky said the goal is to have significantly more in-person test slots available for each test administration than the overall number of test takers for the corresponding month in last year’s testing cycle, so test takers can find a time slot that meets their needs.
Limited exceptions to in-person testing
Most test takers will be required to test in person at a Prometric testing center. A small number of test takers with approved medically justified accommodations that cannot be provided at a test center will be allowed to test remotely.
“We recognize that there will be a small number of test takers that live far from a test center with available capacity,” Krinsky said. “Any test taker who provides documentation that they live more than 180 miles or three hours travel time from a test center can request an exception to test remotely.”
Test takers would need to submit documentation such as a driver’s license or utility bill that would confirm the physical address of where they plan to take their test. All remote test takers will be subject to heightened security measures and real-time human proctoring.
Once registered for an LSAT administration, test takers will be able to apply for a remote testing exception and submit all their documentation through JD Services. For more information, visit LSAT Remote Testing and Distance Exceptions.
Streamlining how you schedule your test session
Krinsky said moving to in-person testing gives LSAC the opportunity to streamline the way test takers schedule their test date and time.
“Test takers will be assigned a scheduling window based on the order in which they register for each administration,” Krinsky said. “This assignment will be done on a ‘first to register, first to schedule’ basis for each LSAT administration.”
Once registered for a specific LSAT administration, test takers will be able to find their assigned scheduling window in the LSAT status tab in JD Services.
About four weeks before each test administration, test takers will receive an email reminder that scheduling will open in a few days.
“On the day scheduling opens, test takers will receive another email as well as an SMS message when their specific scheduling window opens,” Krinsky said. “The email will provide instructions on how to schedule their testing in the Prometric ProScheduler tool.”
Rescheduling will be available starting 24 hours after the scheduling window opens.
