How Does the CFA® Program Exam Stay Current?

This page is split into two clearly separated parts: FinQuiz Editorial Additions and the Original Guest Post (Text Unchanged). Wondering what actually changed this cycle? See our guide to CFA curriculum changes for Levels 1, 2 and 3.

Read the Original Guest Post Level I Resources FAQ
On this page FinQuiz Editorial Additions (2026 update) Recommended Level I resources Original Guest Post (Text Unchanged) FAQ

Disclosure

  • The guest author does not endorse FinQuiz products.
  • FinQuiz editorial additions are separate from the original guest post.
  • The author’s words are preserved exactly as written, with no links added into the guest text. A link to the FinQuiz curriculum-changes page that appears in the original text has been kept.

FinQuiz Editorial Additions (2026 Update)

This section is written by FinQuiz editors. The guest post below is a rare inside look: a charterholder walking through the actual Practice Analysis Survey, question by question, in the paper-exam era. What makes it worth restoring is hindsight—the “trends” he was asked to rate read today like a preview of the modern curriculum.

The machinery he describes still runs. As of 2026, CFA Institute still evolves the curriculum through practice analysis, led by the Education Advisory Committee with interviews and surveys of practitioners, regulators, university faculty, and policymakers. And look at his Q3 trend list: the line about “environment, social, and governance factors” came true—CFA Institute has since integrated ESG across the CFA Program curriculum. The survey he sat for is exactly how the exam you’ll take got its shape.

What has changed since this post was written

  • The process is continuous now: CFA Institute describes practice analysis as an ongoing effort rather than one annual questionnaire, combining practitioner surveys with interviews and expert panels. The committee structure he itemizes (“five groups”) was as of his era—the Education Advisory Committee still leads, but check cfainstitute.org for how it is organized today rather than relying on his breakdown.
  • His trend list was prophetic: ESG factors—one line in his survey—have been integrated across the curriculum, alongside data analytics, as a direct product of practice-analysis reviews.
  • The biggest response yet came in 2025: Level III added specialized pathways—Portfolio Management, Private Wealth, or Private Markets—on top of a core curriculum (65–70% of the exam). That is the practice-analysis feedback loop working at full scale.
  • Delivery changed too: the exams he knew on paper are now computer-based at Prometric test centers with multiple windows per year, and results report a scaled score against the Minimum Passing Score.
  • What this means for your prep: because readings genuinely do get added and dropped, always study the edition you registered for. Our curriculum-changes guide tracks what moved at each level this cycle.

Recommended Level I resources (FinQuiz)

Only Level I resources are promoted in the editorial areas of this page. Studying for Level II or III? Start from the CFA hub.

  • Level I Notes (Primary) — organized around the current edition’s Learning Outcome Statements, so curriculum updates show up in your materials instead of slipping past you.
  • Level I Summary — condensed multi-pass review of the current edition’s material.
  • Level I Question Bank — practice against the topics as currently weighted. An optional extra alongside the official practice included with your CFA Institute registration.
  • Level I Formula Sheet — the current edition’s formulas on one page for daily recall.
  • Level I Full Course Playlist — free video-led coverage of the Level I material.
  • Free Full-Length Mock Exam — one complete 180-question mock (two 90-question sessions) free with any account.
Practical pairing: read the curriculum-changes guide for your cycle first, then study from LOS-aligned Notes—that way the annual churn this post explains works for you, not against you.

Original Guest Post (Text Unchanged)

Disclosure: The guest author does not endorse FinQuiz products. The content below is displayed with no edits, no paraphrasing, and no reordering. No links have been added into the author’s text; a link to the FinQuiz curriculum-changes page that appears in the original text has been kept. The post dates from the paper-exam era, and the committee details it describes were as of that time—see the editorial update above for the process today.

I get questions occasionally about the CFA Program exam and how the CFA Institute updates the exam to stay relevant in the industry. The curriculum across the three exams does change regularly with the addition of new readings while others are dropped each year. Ten topic areas remain but the emphasis and material within each may change.

The Institute uses a committee of practicing CFA charter holders and staff to design the curriculum with input from other charter holders through an annual survey. The education advisory council (EAC) provides oversight and guidance to the process of development.

The EAC is comprised of five groups: the executive advisory board that oversees the council, a working body of volunteers to assist the board, working groups formed for specific tasks, and curriculum consultants that are contacted to actually develop new readings.

The EAC selects the body of knowledge sections to be reviewed each year and sets priorities for the topic areas. It also makes recommendations for development of the process and balances the topic areas according to task force reports.

CFA curriculum consultants review the readings for relevancy, write practice problems and author CFA curriculum material in their area of expertise. A lot of the initial input into CFA curriculum changes and development comes from the CFA charter holders themselves with the Practice Analysis Survey, conducted each year. The survey provides continuous feedback from industry practitioners to the CFA Institute on curriculum relevance.

I took the survey from CFA Institute last week, by email and lasting about 25 minutes. Questions did not get into a lot of detail but focused on the importance of higher-level topic areas to the skills needed by new charter holders in the industry.

The focus is on new CFA charter holders and preparing them for a changing industry. (questions below may not be worded exactly as they appear in the survey).

Q1, What % of content should be devoted to each topic across all three exams

Q2, In which of the topics do you spend the majority of your time

Q3, Rate the degree to which each trend will impact the practice of investment professionals over the next five years

Development of new financial products

Importance of market liquidity

Improved measures of counter-party and settlement risk

Demise of Modern Portfolio Theory and efficient frontier portfolio optimization

Impact of asset price bubbles on market equilibrium

Impact of behavioral finance

Rise in pension funding shortfalls

Role of environment, social, and governance factors on investment decisions

Importance of understanding financial history

Q4-Q13, Rate each knowledge area related to each topic area planning by importance and to what extent must a new CFA charterholder have mastered the area? (followed by a separate page for each topic area on which you are expected to rate the importance of topic area sections and what level of mastery must be achieved (none, recall, application, synthesis).

Q14, Additional comments From what I have seen, the curriculum does a good job of staying relevant to actual practice in the industry. Of course, there are details within each topic area that are not covered in the curriculum.

You wouldn’t expect to become a bond guru like Bill Gross just by passing the CFA Program exams.

The body of knowledge gives you a general understanding across the topic areas from which you can use to guide decision making in your specific field.

‘til next time,

happy studyin’

Written by Joseph Hogue, CFA

Related Blog Posts

FAQ (Global candidates)

Does CFA Institute still run the Practice Analysis Survey?

Yes. The process the author describes from the inside—called practice analysis—still drives the curriculum, and the Education Advisory Committee still leads it. Today it combines interviews and surveys of institutional and private-wealth practitioners, regulators, university faculty, and policymakers, and CFA Institute describes it as continuous rather than a single annual questionnaire. The committee structures he details have evolved since his era, but the core idea is intact: topics enter the program because practitioners say they matter.

Did the trends in his survey actually make it into the curriculum?

Remarkably, yes. The clearest case is the survey line about environmental, social, and governance factors: CFA Institute has since integrated ESG across the CFA Program curriculum (alongside data analytics) as a result of its practice-analysis reviews. And the same responsiveness produced the biggest structural change in the program’s history—the 2025 introduction of specialized Level III pathways in Portfolio Management, Private Wealth, and Private Markets. The survey he sat for is exactly how the exam you’ll take got its shape.

How much does the curriculum change each year?

It varies by cycle—some years bring modest reading updates, others restructure whole levels, and topic weights can shift. That’s why you should always study from the edition you registered for rather than hand-me-down materials. For a plain-English rundown of what changed at each level this cycle, see our guide to CFA curriculum changes for Levels 1, 2 and 3, and confirm details in your CFA Institute registration materials.

Do curriculum updates make prep materials go stale?

Only if the materials don’t follow the edition. Each FinQuiz product is prepared for a specific exam edition and organized around its Learning Outcome Statements, so an updated LOS shows up in the materials rather than slipping past you. The safest habit: check what changed for your cycle, then work from current-edition, LOS-aligned resources—and benchmark with a free full-length FinQuiz mock exam, available with any account, to confirm nothing in the new edition caught you off guard.