Current as of October 12, 2026. Dates are CPA’s and subject to change.
150 questions. Five hours. And nothing to look up.
That’s the Knowledge Assessment, the first exam anyone can sit in the new CPA Professional Program. CPA has now released the Exam Guide, issued August 27, 2026, with the blueprint for every exam. In this post we go deep on just this one: whether you need to write it, how it’s structured, what’s on it, what CPA’s sample questions show, and whether it can really replace your university courses. We walk through one question to show you what that means, and finish with what we think will be trickiest.
A video version is coming soon on our YouTube channel. For all five exams at a high level, see Analyzing the New CPA Professional Program Exam Blueprints and its video.
At a glance
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| What it is | An optional entrance exam |
| Format | 150 objective-format questions, in two timed parts |
| Time | 5 hours |
| Reference materials available during the exam | None |
| To pass | Sufficiency on financial reporting, on management decision-making, and overall |
| Disclosed? | No |
| First sitting | March 23, 2027 |
Source: Exam Guide; CPA Western School of Business schedules.
Do you need to write it?
CPA calls the Knowledge Assessment an optional entrance exam. You can enter the CPA program either by having the required prerequisites (a degree and specific accounting and business courses) or by passing the Knowledge Assessment instead. You still need a university degree to write it, but the accounting-specific courses are no longer required: a pass lets you in without them.
The easiest way to work out whether it’s for you is three questions.
Question 1: Do you already meet all the prerequisites to enter the program? That means a degree or equivalent, at least 120 credit hours of post-secondary education, a 65% average on your most recent 60 credits, and 45 credit hours of accounting and business courses. At least 21 of those hours must cover intermediate financial reporting, advanced financial reporting, management accounting, finance, assurance and taxation. Introductory courses don’t count.
- If yes, you don’t need the Knowledge Assessment. Apply for admission and go straight to Foundational Development, Module 1.
- If not, go to question 2.
Question 2: Do you meet the requirements to write the Knowledge Assessment? You need the degree, the 120 credit hours and the 65% average. What you’re missing is the accounting and business coursework.
- If yes, you can register for the Knowledge Assessment.
- If not, complete those requirements first (for example, finish your degree), then come back to question 2.
Question 3: Did you pass?
- If yes, you’ve met the accounting and business requirement, and you have five years to start Foundational Development.
- If not, you can write it again. After a third failure, you have to wait one year before the next attempt.
The eligibility rules are on CPA Western School of Business’s admission requirements page. The five-year window and the one-year wait come from the Education and Experience Policies, Western Region draft of May 2026, which may change before launch.
The logistics. It costs $1,000 plus GST and is offered three times a year (Knowledge Assessment page).
| Sitting | Date |
|---|---|
| First | March 23, 2027 |
| Then | September 16, 2027 |
| January 20, 2028 | |
| May 18, 2028 | |
| September 14, 2028 |
Source: CPA Western School of Business schedules, updated August 25, 2026.
Structure
150 objective-format questions over five hours, in two parts, each timed separately. That works out to an average of two minutes per mark.
| Part | Questions | Time |
|---|---|---|
| A | 90 | 3 hours |
| B | 60 | 2 hours |
CPA says the question types may include multiple choice, multiple select, fill in the blank and drop-down list, and that the list isn’t exhaustive.
Content
| Part | Topic | Weight |
|---|---|---|
| A | Assurance and trust | 10 to 15% |
| A | Big data and data analytics | 10 to 15% |
| A | Ethical decision-making and governance, including data governance | 10 to 15% |
| A | Finance | 10 to 15% |
| A | Non-financial reporting | 10 to 15% |
| A | Strategy, risk management and innovation | 10 to 15% |
| A | Tax | 10 to 15% |
| A | Foundational competencies | 10 to 15% |
| B | Financial reporting | 50% |
| B | Management decision-making | 50% |
Source: Exam Guide.
The foundational competencies are economics, along with quantitative methods and probability; law and legal forms of business; organizational behaviour; and sustainability. Value creation isn’t tested on its own: CPA integrates it into the other topics.
Management decision-making is CPA’s “Management Decision-Making and Information (Data) Systems/Technology”. At this level it covers preparing budgets and forecasts, determining variances, costing calculations, cost-volume-profit and break-even analysis, pricing, describing responsibility centres and incentives, and describing IT, AI and systems implementation (Module Guide).
It’s a knowledge exam. The Module Guide says the Knowledge Assessment does not assess the Decision Competencies.
Passing and reference materials
To pass, you need sufficiency on financial reporting, sufficiency on management decision-making, and sufficiency on the exam overall: each one separately. It’s a non-disclosed exam.
And there are no reference materials. No Handbook, no Income Tax Act, nothing. It’s the only exam in the program where that’s true. Keep that in mind, because it matters a lot for what comes next.
What CPA’s sample shows
CPA has published sample Knowledge Assessment questions: 31 questions, all multiple choice. CPA Western School of Business says a full sample exam will be available in early 2027 (Knowledge Assessment page). We anticipate the full sample may show the other question formats.
Does it replace the university courses?
Here’s the question a lot of candidates will be asking: if I pass the Knowledge Assessment, do I skip the accounting courses altogether?
Technically, yes. Passing it meets the accounting and business knowledge requirement, in place of the 45 credit hours of courses. For students who can self-study well, saving the time and money of a full accounting program is a big deal. What you need to think through, though, is how you’ll learn and absorb this material without a course. That isn’t to talk you out of the Knowledge Assessment, but to help you make an informed choice.
To picture what you’d need to know, here’s one financial reporting question, worked step by step. It’s our illustration, not a CPA sample question.
A company signs a five-year lease for equipment. It pays $20,000 at the end of each year. The interest rate implicit in the lease is 6%. The company reports under IFRS.
Select the carrying amount of the lease liability at the end of year 1.
A. $69,302
B. $84,247
C. $80,000
D. $64,247
Step 1: Recognize what’s being tested. It’s a lessee under IFRS, so this is IFRS 16. The lessee puts the lease on the balance sheet as a right-of-use asset and a lease liability, and the liability is measured at the present value of the lease payments, not their total.
Step 2: Measure the liability on day one. Five payments of $20,000 in arrears at 6%. The five-year annuity factor at 6% is 4.2124, so the liability is $20,000 × 4.2124 = $84,247.
Step 3: Record the lease, then roll the liability through year 1.
| When | Account | Debit | Credit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Day one | Right-of-use asset | $84,247 | |
| Day one | Lease liability | $84,247 | |
| End of year 1 | Interest expense ($84,247 × 6%) | $5,055 | |
| End of year 1 | Lease liability | $5,055 | |
| End of year 1 | Lease liability | $20,000 | |
| End of year 1 | Cash | $20,000 | |
| End of year 1 | Depreciation expense ($84,247 ÷ 5) | $16,849 | |
| End of year 1 | Accumulated depreciation, right-of-use asset | $16,849 |
The interest uses the effective interest method: the opening liability times the rate. So the liability goes $84,247, plus $5,055 of interest, less the $20,000 payment, which is $69,302. Depreciation doesn’t change the liability, but it’s part of the same year-one picture.
Step 4: Choose, and know why the others are wrong.
| Option | What it is |
|---|---|
| A. $69,302 | Correct: day-one liability plus interest, less the payment |
| B. $84,247 | The day-one liability: forgets the interest and the payment |
| C. $80,000 | $100,000 of payments less one: never discounts |
| D. $64,247 | Takes off the payment but forgets the interest |
Each wrong answer is a specific mistake. If you only half know the method, there’s an answer waiting for you.
What you’d normally learn this from. Present value and annuity factors, from finance. The effective interest method, from intermediate financial accounting. IFRS 16 itself, and how ASPE differs: under ASPE, the lease is first classified as capital or operating, and an operating lease stays off the balance sheet. And this is one topic. Financial reporting on this exam also covers revenue, inventory, property, plant and equipment, deferred tax, business combinations, investments and more, under both IFRS and ASPE (Module Guide).
So, can it replace the courses? On paper, yes. In practice, you still have to learn everything those courses teach, well enough to apply it without notes, across every topic area. For disciplined self-studiers, or anyone taking online courses to prepare, it can be a faster and cheaper route. For everyone else, think carefully about how you’ll actually learn the material before choosing it.
What we think will be trickiest
Our read of the blueprint, not CPA’s. It’s here to give you a feel for the exam, not to tell you how to study.
The breadth. This is the biggest challenge. Seven topic areas plus the foundational competencies in Part A, at 10 to 15% each, and two full subjects in Part B. There’s no topic you can leave out. You need the depth of that lease question across seven topic areas, which is why many students take two years to work through this material.
Nothing to look up. Every other exam gives you the Handbooks and both tax acts. Here, everything has to be in your head. In our opinion, this matters less than it sounds for prepared students: if you don’t know how to approach a lease calculation, having IFRS 16 open in the exam is unlikely to help you fast enough. We don’t think the closed-book format will be the deal breaker.
Formats you haven’t seen. The sample is all multiple choice, but the real exam may include multiple select or fill in the blank, where you can’t eliminate options or guess your way to a one-in-four chance.
One open question: the Exam Guide’s content table for the Knowledge Assessment lists the foundational competencies but not the sub-foundational ones (equity, diversity and inclusion; Indigenous views; emerging technologies). Whether those are examinable here isn’t settled yet.
The bottom line
The Knowledge Assessment is optional, 150 questions, five hours, and nothing to look up. If you’re not sure whether you need it, start with question 1 and check your courses against the 45-credit-hour requirement.
Be the first to know about our Knowledge Assessment course
We’re building a study course for the Knowledge Assessment. Visit our CPA Professional Program page for more detail on the new program, and to be the first to hear when the course launches.
Next in this series: Foundational Development, the first exam most candidates will write.
CPA resources
- CPA Professional Program Exam Guide, issued August 27, 2026
- CPA Professional Program Module Guide, issued August 25, 2026
- Sample Knowledge Assessment questions
- Knowledge Assessment, CPA Western School of Business
- Admission requirements, CPA Western School of Business
- Exam schedules, CPA Western School of Business
Links as at October 12, 2026.