CNA Exam Passing Score: Why Your State Sets the Number

The federal rule: your state sets the CNA passing standard

The federal rule for nurse aide competency evaluations is short on numbers. It says "The State must establish a standard for satisfactory completion of the competency evaluation," and that to pass, "an individual must pass both the written or oral examination and the skills demonstration" (42 CFR 483.154(e)(1)). It sets no percentage.

Three more federal points shape what passing means:

• Both parts stand alone. A strong written score cannot make up for a failed skills evaluation, or the other way around.
• You are told where you fell short. If you do not pass, you must be advised of the areas you did not pass and that you have at least three opportunities to take the evaluation (483.154(f)(1)).
• Passing puts you on the registry. The state must record a successful evaluation in its nurse aide registry within 30 days of the date you are found competent (483.154(e)(2)).

So a "CNA passing score" is always a state's number, or a vendor's number for that state. Texas's rule shows the pattern: a trainee must achieve "a score HHSC designates as a passing score" on the skills demonstration and on the written or oral exam (26 TAC 556.6(i)), without printing the score.

What Tennessee and Pennsylvania publish

These are dated examples, as checked on October 18, 2026, and not a national rule. Tennessee's knowledge exam also has a different question count from the standard NNAAP written exam, which the written exam format guide explains.

If your state's handbook does not print a passing percentage, do not fill the gap with a number from a forum or another state. Prepare to answer comfortably more than you need, area by area, and let the score report tell you the outcome.

Why the CNA skills evaluation is scored skill by skill

The written exam is one score. The NNAAP skills evaluation is five separate pass-or-fail decisions, and you need all five. Credentia's handbooks describe two ways to fail a skill:

1. Missing a Critical Element Step. The bolded steps on each skill's checklist are Critical Element Steps. "If you leave out a Critical Element Step or do not perform a Critical Element Step properly, you will not pass the skill."
2. Falling below the skill's cut score. Getting the critical step right is not enough on its own. You must also "correctly demonstrate enough steps to meet the passing standard (or cut score) for each skill."

That is why the skills evaluation feels different from the written exam. One forgotten step can fail a skill, and one failed skill fails the evaluation, even if the other four went well. You can correct a mistake within the skill you are doing, with two exceptions that the skills evaluation guide explains.

Reading a failing CNA skills report: a worked example

Credentia's Pennsylvania and Tennessee pages say a failing skills report lists your five skills, marks each Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory, and prints the numbers of any missed or incorrect steps under an Unsatisfactory skill. Here is a fictional report for a candidate named Tasha. The step numbers are made up for this example and do not point to real checklist text.

Read it line by line:

• One Unsatisfactory is enough to fail. Tasha did four skills well, but she has not passed the skills evaluation. Her written result is separate and unaffected.
• The failed skill is a measurement. On the NNAAP, one of the four random skills always includes a measurement. A wrong count, or a number recorded inaccurately, can sink a skill that otherwise went smoothly.
• The numbers send her back to the checklist. Tasha should open her state's current handbook, find the radial pulse skill, and study steps 3 and 7 together with the steps around them, then rehearse the whole skill with her instructor rather than drilling two steps in isolation.
• The other four still need practice. The handbook pages checked do not say which skills a retake will include, so Tasha keeps every skill her state tests in her rehearsal routine.

Pennsylvania's and Tennessee's pages say the score report explains how to retake either or both parts. Limits on attempts and time windows vary by state, as the CNA retake guide shows.

Why a Passy practice percentage is not a pass prediction

Passy's CNA questions are original. They are not drawn from the secure question pool that federal rules require states to protect (42 CFR 483.154(b)(1)), and no practice round can match your state's form, length or passing standard. A percentage on practice questions therefore does not predict whether you will pass, and Passy does not convert it into one.

What a practice round can do is point you somewhere. After a few rounds, see which CNA content areas your misses come from and give the area with the most of them your next study session.