About Our Practice Tests

Our practice simulations of the NOCE and CLRE competency exams are set up in order to provide you a balanced range of questions in regards to both content and difficulty, so that in taking our practice tests you can better prepare yourself for your National Boards.

The questions are drawn, in a stratified random sample, from an over 5,000 question reservoir that encompasses every type of optical knowledge that might conceivably be on your Boards. We also update our site periodically, adding new questions and more detail to our explanations to make this site even better for you.

The National Boards, themselves, change with every testing period. Most of us in the industry believe there are a series of tests that are rotated every so many testing periods, but we can’t be certain what the rotation is. (After all, once you pass you don’t have to do it again!) Of the people we have interviewed who have taken the tests multiple times, they all have reported never getting the same test twice, and they all felt that was a disadvantage. One never knows what exactly to study. One exam might be heavy on calculations, another on practical experience. It all depends, it seems, on sheer, dumb luck.

What our aim is with these practice tests is to give you a broad range of questions as possible of varying difficulty. All the questions are grouped according to the difficulty levels of 1 to 5, with only 10% drawn from the most easy or most difficult levels, 20% drawn from levels 2 and 4, and the bulk of 40% drawn from the middle level 3.

Test Content

The content is broken up into five major categories. For The simulated NOCE exam: Anatomy and Physiology; Sight and Vision; Lenses; Frames; Tools and Regulations. For the simulated CLRE exam the categories are: Anatomy, Vision, and Optics; Diagnostics and Pathology; Lens Design, Lens Fitting; Practice, Procedures, and Legalities. From these five major groupings, the questions are evenly taken so that out of a hundred question test, twenty questions will be drawn from each major category.

Within these major groupings, the questions are divided even more so that the twenty you receive from any major grouping will be varied. While you may get a similar question to one you had before, you are unlikely to get the exact same question twice.

For this reason, we encourage you to take our practice exams more than once. There are hundreds of subcategories and thousands of questions. Even if you do fairly well once, the next simulated exam could very well be substantially different. This way, you can cover all the bases before taking the true National Boards. And if all goes well, you’ll pass them the first time!

Our simulated exams also provide you with the answers to the questions that you miss. That is what we think is the most valuable feature of these tests. When you take the actual ABO and NCLE Boards, and fail them, you never know what you did wrong. But if you get an answer wrong here, we will tell you, and in most cases explain why the answer was wrong, and, if any mathematics was involved, show you the calculations to help you understand the problem better. Each question you miss is an opportunity to learn!

So, when taking our tests, if you don’t know an answer, don’t guess. Leave it blank. At the end of the exam, the un-answered questions will be shown to you with the correct answers, and in most cases, an explanation. This way you learn.

Take these tests without notes, and without an open book. You are trying to experience that the real Optical Boards will be like.

Savings Package Bundle

Since we recommend that you take more than one practice exam we have added a savings package bundle. When you get to the test page you will have the opportunity to purchase 10 test codes for a discounted price!