PRProfessional Final Exam 3
CPA Professional Readiness, the last step before membership

Two cases in three hours, the least technical and most judgment-focused exam in the program. You cannot start this module until all twenty-four months of your practical experience are complete.

Join the mailing list →The whole program

FormatTwo cases

Length3 hours

Reference materialsHandbooks, ITA, ETA

First sittingJanuary 20, 2028

What the exam looks like

A two-hour case on professional judgment and a one-hour case on ethical decision-making. You manage the time between them, and you must pass each case to pass the exam.

Format
A 2-hour professional judgment case and a 1-hour ethics case
Length
3 hours, with your time between the cases left to you
Time pressure
No. CPA says these cases are not meant to be time pressured
Passing
You must pass each case to pass the exam
Marking
Holistic
Reference materials
Handbooks, Income Tax Act, Excise Tax Act
Publicly disclosed
No
Prerequisite
All practical experience must be complete before the module starts
Module starts
December 11, 2027
First sitting
January 20, 2028

The content and how it is weighted

CPA has not published topic weights for this exam. What it has said about the content is set out below, and it is unusually specific about what the cases are not.

WHAT CPA SAYSin place of topic weights
Topic weights
None published
Technical areas
May provide context but are not the focus
Calculations
No complex calculations; detailed analysis is provided where needed
Approach
Complex and ambiguous, with multiple acceptable approaches
Ethics case
No clear right answer

What this exam actually asks of you

What the final exam is really testing, and what has to be done before it.

Judgment, ethics and the public interest

This is still case writing, but the emphasis moves to professional judgment, ethics and the public interest, with technical analysis supporting the decision rather than driving it. An ethics case with no clear right answer is marked on how you reason, not on what you land on.

Practical experience is now a gate, not a formalityIn the current program you can sit the CFE and finish your practical experience afterwards. Here the experience sits between CPA Leadership and CPA Professional Readiness, and Readiness cannot start until it is complete. If your reporting is behind, it now delays your designation directly.
Coming 2027
GCPA resources for CPA Professional Readiness

We are building our coaching for the new program against the published blueprints, the same way we built the CFE and PEP courses. Nothing is for sale yet. Join the mailing list and we will email you once, when this one is ready to buy.

Join the mailing list →

One email per course, nothing else. The list closes once every course has launched.

Everything we have published on the new program

The program is new and CPA is still releasing detail, so this is general to the whole transition as well as to this exam.

October 6, 2026Analyzing the new CPA Professional Program exam blueprintsEvery exam in the new program: format, length, topic weights, and which ones let you use reference materials.Read the article →October 4, 2025Everything you need to know about the 2027 CPA Professional ProgramThe full breakdown: transition rules, module structure, exam formats and every key date.Read the article →August 23, 2025Deadlines and transition rules you need to knowThe five updates that matter most, and what they mean if you are mid-program.Read the article →
ON YOUTUBEWatch the walkthroughsFree, no signup. Updated as CPA Canada releases more.
▶CPA Canada 2027: Less Technical, But Harder Than You Think?▶CPA Canada 2027: New Exam Blueprints Finally Released!▶2027 CPA Professional Program: Webinar with Gevorg
See the whole channel →

Source: the CPA Professional Program Exam Guide, issued August 27, 2026. We update these pages as CPA publishes more. Back to the CPA Professional Program →