Every commercial bar course is built around the same skeleton — 8 to 12 weeks, 400 to 500 hours — and that skeleton predates the NextGen exam. Port it over unchanged and you inherit its oldest bias: a calendar that's mostly lectures and MCQs, on an exam where written and skills-based work carries about half the score. A NextGen schedule isn't the old schedule with new labels; the proportions have to move.
Below: the three standard runways, week by week, with the written formats scheduled like they count — because they do. (And if you'd rather not adapt a template by hand, the free study plan tool generates a personalized week-by-week plan from your exam date and weekly hours — it's also in the form at the bottom of this page. No account needed.)
First, the math that picks your runway
The 400–500 hour consensus divides simply:
| Runway | Hours/week | Who it fits |
|---|---|---|
| 8 weeks | 50–60 | Full-time studiers, no job, high urgency — the classic post-graduation sprint |
| 10 weeks | 40–50 | Full-time with margin — the most forgiving standard runway |
| 12 weeks | 33–40 | Studying alongside part-time work, or anyone who wants slack for bad weeks |
| 16+ weeks | 20–25 | Full-time workers and February takers starting early — the long flat runway |
Pick by honest weekly capacity, not by ambition. A 10-week plan executed at 45 hours beats an 8-week plan abandoned in week five.
The daily shape (every runway)
The unit that repeats is the day, and a NextGen day has three blocks:
- Read/review (2–3 hrs): one subject's chapter-level material, scope-mapped — starred topics at depth, unstarred at recognition.
- MCQs (1.5–2 hrs): 25–40 questions — today's subject plus a mixed set from everything already covered, at the real 1.8-minute pace, select-two formats included.
- Written work or cards (1–2 hrs): the block legacy schedules leave out. Alternate days: integrated question sets / flashcards on the starred topics. Performance tasks get a fixed weekly slot instead (below).
The 10-week plan, week by week
The most popular runway, in full. (For 8 weeks, compress phase one; for 12, stretch it — the back four weeks stay the same shape.)
| Week | Focus | Written-format quota |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Torts + Civ Pro; diagnostic first to find real weaknesses | 1 question set + first performance task, untimed |
| 2 | Contracts + Evidence | 2 question sets, 1 PT |
| 3 | Con Law + Property | 2 question sets, 1 PT (timed from here) |
| 4 | Crim + Business Associations — the added subject most old materials skip | 2 question sets, 1 PT |
| 5 | Provided-resource subjects: Family Law + T&E Practice — practice using supplied law, don't memorize it | 3 question sets, 1 PT |
| 6 | First full pass done → weakest two subjects again, by the analytics | 2 sets, 1 PT, all timed |
| 7 | Mixed-subject MCQ blocks; starred-topic card consolidation begins | 3 sets, 1 PT |
| 8 | Weak-subject rotation #2; every session now in exam proportions | 3 sets, 2 PTs |
| 9 | Full simulated sessions — 40 MCQs + 2 sets + 1 PT, clocked | 2 full sessions |
| 10 | Taper: half volume, review-only errors, exam-day logistics locked by mid-week | 1 full session, early in the week |
Three rules keep the plan honest:
- The written quota is load-bearing. Skipping question sets to do "just a few more MCQs" is the single most common NextGen scheduling error — it feels productive and rehearses the wrong half of the exam.
- Analytics beat vibes. Week 6 and 8 rotations should come from your miss data, not from which subject feels scariest. (Feared and weak are usually different subjects.)
- Never sacrifice the taper. Cutting week 10 to cram week 9's gaps trades a known score-booster (rest + error review) for a known score-killer (fatigue).
Adapting it without a course
Everything above assumes materials, not lectures — which is exactly the self-study question. The reading layer is ten study guides at $9.99 each; the practice layer — every MCQ format, all 30 question sets, all 15 performance tasks with model answers, plus the analytics the rotations depend on — is the $99 platform; the calibration layer is NCBE's free materials throughout. Total cost of the full self-study stack: about $150, against $1,699–$4,199 for the same calendar with lectures attached.
Or skip the template entirely: put your exam date and honest weekly hours into the study plan generator and get this schedule personalized to your runway, subject by subject, emailed as a plan you can actually follow. It's free, and it's the same scope math this article runs on.