ICAM urgently calls for the second 2026 sitting of the bar admission exam to be convened

The Madrid Bar Association (ICAM) has called on the Ministry of Justice to urgently push forward the publication of the second call of the professional aptitude evaluation exam for the practice of law corresponding to 2026. The dean of ICAM, Eugenio Ribón, conveyed the request by letter to the Minister of the Presidency, Justice and Relations with the Cortes, Félix Bolaños, amid the uncertainty that the lack of detail is generating among future professionals.

What the bar is asking for exactly

In its communication, ICAM recalls that the first admission exam of 2026 was convened by Order PJC/298/2026 of 24 March, and demands continuity in the evaluation calendar with a second call, in line with the practice of previous years. The bar asks the Ministry of Justice, in coordination with the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, to publish the call and communicate as soon as possible the plans for its celebration.

The Madrid institution underlines a relevant technical argument: the regulations governing bar admission require calls to be published in the Official State Gazette (BOE) three months in advance of the exam date. Although the regulatory framework only provides for a minimum annual frequency, the absence of a second date leaves thousands of candidates without a planning horizon for their admission and their entry into the labour market.

Who is affected

The waiting group is large and diverse: graduates who have finished the admission master's and did not pass or could not sit the first exam, students completing their specialized training this autumn, and professionals who need bar admission to access a position or start practising on their own account. For all of them, the exam is not a formality: it is the gateway to professional practice, to legal aid duty rotas, to bar employment pools and to a large part of legal job offers.

The uncertainty over the date has immediate practical effects. Without a published call, candidates do not know whether the exam will fall in late 2026 or slip into 2027, and that doubt conditions preparation-course enrolments, training contracts and employment decisions. The exam format and the dates of the first call are detailed in our analysis of the 2026 bar admission exam.

The precedent of previous years

The Ministry's usual practice has been to hold two sittings a year, generally in spring and autumn, although the regulatory framework only guarantees a minimum annual frequency. ICAM appeals precisely to that consolidated practice: keeping two dates a year gives predictability to candidates, to the universities and legal practice schools programming their master's courses, and to the bars themselves, which plan the incorporation of new members.

What comes next

The Madrid dean's request adds institutional pressure to a demand candidates have been voicing for weeks. The next step belongs to the Ministry: if the two-sittings-a-year scheme and the three-month notice requirement are maintained, publication of the convening order should take place in the coming weeks so that the exam can be held by the first quarter of 2027 at the latest. In this section we will follow the call as soon as it is published in the BOE.

In the meantime, candidates can review the keys to choosing a master's in our guide on how to choose the bar admission master's and the underlying debate about the exam in the editorial on the admission test.

The Madrid bar's move also reflects a broader sensitivity across the profession towards the bottlenecks of access to practice. Deans of other bars and the associations of admission-master's students have insisted in recent years on the need for a stable calendar with two fixed sittings, arguing that predictability costs the Administration little and saves candidates months of professional limbo. Whether the Ministry answers with a date or with silence will be the first test of that demand this term.