The North Carolina Notary Public examination is the written examination approved by the North Carolina Secretary of State that an applicant for an initial notary public commission must pass at the end of a mandatory course of classroom instruction of not less than six hours, and that an applicant for recommissioning must pass again. Under Chapter 10B of the North Carolina General Statutes, an applicant must answer at least eighty percent (80%) of the questions correctly in order to pass the exam. The content of the course and the examinations is notarial laws, procedures, and ethics, the commission runs five years with statewide jurisdiction, and the North Carolina State application fee is $50.
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The examinations at a glance
| Item | Verified position |
|---|---|
| Examination | North Carolina Notary Public written examination — approved by the Secretary of State; the initial examination is the notary course exam, administered at the end of the mandatory course of instruction by the certified notary instructor; the recommissioning examination is taken online on the Department of the Secretary of State’s website |
| Commission | Notary public, commissioned by the Secretary of State; a notary is a public officer of the State of North Carolina; jurisdiction in any part of the state; term of five years |
| Course | Course of classroom instruction of not less than six hours, approved by the Secretary and taught by a certified notary instructor, taken within the three months preceding application for an initial commission |
| Format — initial | Written examination approved by the Secretary, taken as the examination of the mandatory course. The official sources read for this guide do not publish a question count or a time limit for the initial course examination, and this guide prints neither |
| Format — recommissioning | Online examination on the Department’s website: 20 questions per the Secretary of State’s Notary Tutorial for reappointment, with 30 minutes to complete it under Title 18, Chapter 07 of the North Carolina Administrative Code |
| Content | Notarial laws, procedures, and ethics (G.S. 10B-8(c)). No topic weights are published |
| Passing standard | In the statute’s exact published form: an applicant must answer at least eighty percent (80%) of the questions correctly in order to pass the exam (G.S. 10B-8(a)) |
| Application fee | North Carolina State fee: $50 nonrefundable (G.S. 10B-13); an online recommissioning payment carries an additional $3 transaction fee per the Secretary of State’s published renewal steps |
| Manual | The most recent Secretary-approved manual must be purchased and kept as a reference; the current edition is the North Carolina Notary Public Manual (2026), prepared by the Department of the Secretary of State and published by the UNC School of Government — $35 |
| Exemption | A licensed member of the North Carolina State Bar is exempt from the course and the examination at initial commissioning and at recommissioning. At recommissioning only, the examination requirement also does not apply to a notary continuously commissioned since July 10, 1991, and never disciplined by the Secretary |
| Administrator | North Carolina Department of the Secretary of State, Notary Public Section. PassProfessor is independent and is not affiliated with the Department of the Secretary of State |
North Carolina does not run one notary examination; it runs a structure. The statute pairs a course with an examination at entry — the course of not less than six hours and its written examination are a single requirement with a single clock — and then imposes a second, differently delivered examination at every recommissioning: online, on the Department’s website, against the same standard and the current manual. Candidates who prepare for “the exam” as a single event misunderstand the commission they are entering. This guide treats the structure as the subject: the course and its examination first, the recommissioning examination second, and the clocks that govern both throughout.
Reading the verified facts
Every fact in the table above is stated as the state states it in its own publications, because candidates for this commission are ill-served by the approximations that circulate about it. Three reading disciplines govern this guide. First, the figures given are the state’s figures — the course length, the passing standard, the fees, and the deadlines are reproduced from Chapter 10B of the General Statutes, Title 18, Chapter 07 of the Administrative Code, and the Secretary of State’s own pages and tutorial named in this file’s INTERNAL section; where those documents do not publish a figure, this guide prints none rather than borrowing one. Second, that discipline applies with full force to the initial examination’s shape: the official sources publish no question count and no time limit for the initial course examination. Pages that state one are stating a figure the statute and the rules do not contain — and they do not agree with each other. Third, the companion PassProfessor program is in the works and unbuilt: nothing in this guide describes a question bank, a course, or an enrollment that exists today. PassProfessor preparation, when it opens, will not be the mandatory course of instruction, which only the state’s certified instructors teach.
The route, step by step
Step 1 — Place yourself: standard applicant, Bar member, or recommissioning notary
Three positions, scoped as the official sources scope them. (a) The standard initial applicant must take the course and pass its examination. (b) The licensed member of the North Carolina State Bar is outside G.S. 10B-8 entirely — subsection (a) states it “shall not apply to a licensed member of the North Carolina State Bar,” and the Administrative Code’s attorney rules (18 NCAC 07C .0701–.0702) work the exemption through: no course attendance, no course exam, and no instructor signature at initial appointment, and no course or exam at recommissioning — while the duty to maintain a personal copy of the most recent approved manual remains, as do the application and the fee. Note the boundary the same rules draw: the exemption does not reach the separate electronic notary course and examination (18 NCAC 07C .0704). (c) The recommissioning notary faces the examination again without the course, under Step 6 below — with one further narrow examination exception of its own, for a notary continuously commissioned since July 10, 1991, and never disciplined by the Secretary. Before anything else, check eligibility under G.S. 10B-5(b): at least 18 years of age or legally emancipated; residing or having a regular place of work or business in this state; residing legally in the United States; speaking, reading, and writing English; and holding a high school diploma or equivalent — and the denial grounds in G.S. 10B-5(d), including the 10-year bar that follows release from prison, probation, or parole for a felony or a crime involving dishonesty or moral turpitude.
Step 2 — Own the manual before the course
G.S. 10B-5(b)(7) makes the manual a qualification, not a study aid: purchase and keep as a reference the most recent manual approved by the Secretary. The current edition is the North Carolina Notary Public Manual (2026) — prepared by the Department of the Secretary of State, published by the UNC School of Government, the official replacement for the 2016 manual, $35 — and the Secretary of State’s renewal steps repeat the point for recommissioning: you must own the 2026 manual before completing your renewal application. Study from the current edition; the examination’s content is the law as it now stands, and the manual is its official statement.
Step 3 — Complete the course inside its window
Take a course of classroom instruction of not less than six hours, approved by the Secretary and taught by a certified notary instructor, within the three months preceding your application — the Department develops the training materials and certifies the instructors who teach them, and the instructor must teach to the Department’s curriculum. The identity discipline starts here: an applicant not personally known to the instructor presents satisfactory evidence of identity before the course begins, before the instructor signs the application, and on request at any other time during the course, and the name on that evidence must match the name for use on the commission. The timing rule is two-sided (18 NCAC 07C .0202): apply within three months after successfully completing the course and exam, or the initial requirements must be complied with again.
Step 4 — Sit the course examination, proctored by your instructor
The initial written examination is the examination of the course, administered at its end. The certified instructor proctors it — following the institution’s proctoring requirements or, where the institution has none, taking steps to prevent cheating — grades paper examinations, reviews the grades of examinations administered electronically on the Department’s website, and submits student exam grades to the Department within two business days. The standard is the statute’s: at least eighty percent (80%) of the questions correct. The official sources publish no question count and no time limit for this sitting, and this guide invents neither: what can be said exactly is that it is a written examination on notarial laws, procedures, and ethics, taken under proctoring, at the close of the course that taught them. Retesting is conditional in the rules (18 NCAC 07C .0305, .0903–.0904): a student who fails may retake the exam if the institution where the course was taught permits retesting — the institution determines whether an instructor may administer a retest — and any retest is taken within 30 days of the failure and reported to the Department within two business days.
Step 5 — Apply, and take the oath within 45 days
The application (G.S. 10B-6) carries the statement of personal qualifications, the instructor’s certificate or signed statement evidencing successful completion of the course — an instructor signs only after the student has successfully completed it — your notarized declaration in the form G.S. 10B-12 prescribes, and the $50 nonrefundable North Carolina State application fee. You are commissioned in your county of residence, or, if not a state resident, the county of your employment or business; an applicant residing outside North Carolina with a regular place of work or business in the state files an employer affidavit on business letterhead under the rules. On approval, the Department issues a certificate of appointment to the register of deeds; you appear before the register of deeds in the county of commissioning and take the oaths within 45 days of the certificate’s issuance date, presenting satisfactory evidence of identity or being personally known to the register. The register records the notary record, delivers the commission certificate, and notifies the Department. Two consequences frame the deadline: no commission is effective before the oath and acts performed before it are invalid (G.S. 10B-9), and an appointee who misses the window must reapply — with the Secretary able to waive the educational requirements only where reapplication comes within one year of the granting.
Step 6 — Recommission: the second examination, online
Apply no earlier than 10 weeks before expiration. The Secretary of State’s published renewal steps give the working order: own the 2026 manual first; sign in and complete the renewal application; pay the $50 application fee — plus a $3 transaction fee online, and by mail the payment must be received before the online exam can be taken; take and pass the online exam — in the steps’ own summary, 80% or better, 3 chances within 30 days; print and mail the notarized application; and take the oath within 45 days of the oath notification at the register of deeds in your commission county. The rules supply the sitting’s exact shape: the recommissioning exam is taken on the Department’s website (18 NCAC 07C .0602); the candidate has 30 minutes to complete it and must achieve a passing score of at least 80 percent (.0604); the Secretary of State’s Notary Tutorial walks the candidate through a test whose final question is question 20 — a 20-question examination, graded on the final page. A candidate who fails may take the exam up to two additional times within 30 days of the date it was first taken (.0605) — three chances in total, matching the Secretary’s steps. Failure to pass within that 30 days means the application is denied (.0606); the tutorial states the recovery the Department applies — attend a Notary Public course of instruction, complete a new application, and pay another nonrefundable $50 commissioning fee — and the rules independently allow taking the initial course and its exam in lieu of the recommissioning exam (.0603). A notary whose commission has expired may still apply for recommissioning within one year after expiration; an individual who lets that year pass may be commissioned only by completing all the requirements for an initial commission (.0607).
The material in full: what the course and examinations are drawn from
The statute names the content — notarial laws, procedures, and ethics — and publishes no outline and no weights. This section follows the material’s own organization: Chapter 10B, the Department’s rules, and the current manual.
Qualifications, application, and commissioning — G.S. 10B-5 to 10B-14
The commissioning code: the qualifications list and the manual duty; the county-of-commissioning rule; the denial grounds and their time bars (10 years after release for qualifying convictions; five years after completion of a disciplinary order’s conditions); the application’s five statutory contents; the personal-qualification statement with its disclosure lists — commissions and licenses held, criminal convictions, civil findings; the course-and-examination section itself; the five-year term and statewide jurisdiction; the oath mechanics at the register of deeds; recommissioning; the applicant’s declaration; the $50 fee; and the instructor-certification scheme — the instructor who taught you passed a certification course of not less than six hours, holds at least one year of active notary experience and a current commission, and renews certification every two years.
The acts and their definitions — G.S. 10B-3 and 10B-20
The definitional core the examinations reason from: acknowledgment, oath, affirmation, jurat, verification or proof, principal, subscribing witness, credible witness, personal knowledge, and satisfactory evidence — each defined as a sequence of events at a single time and place. The powers section then gives the three acts and the prohibitions that bound them: the principal or subscribing witness must be in the notary’s presence and personally known or identified through satisfactory evidence; a credible witness must be personally known to the notary; and the notary must not act where the notary is a signer, party, or beneficiary of the record, or stands to receive consideration beyond the statutory fees — with the named exceptions for trustees under deeds of trust, drafters, mailing designees, and attorneys for a party. Signature-by-mark and signature-by-designee procedures are prescribed step by step and examined as procedure.
Certificates — G.S. 10B-40 and following
What a notary certifies by making a certificate — including, whether or not the certificate states it, that the notary was lawfully commissioned, that the person whose signature was notarized did not appear incompetent, lacking in understanding, or acting involuntarily, under duress, or under undue influence — and the sufficient forms for acknowledgments, verifications by subscribing and nonsubscribing witnesses, and oaths or affirmations, each with its required elements: venue, the named principal, the appearance statement, the date, the signature and seal, and the commission expiration date.
Signature, seal, journal, and fees — G.S. 10B-31 to 10B-38
The fee schedule is exact and examinable: up to $10.00 per notarized principal signature for acknowledgments, jurats, verifications or proofs; $10.00 per person for oaths or affirmations without a signature (except an oath administered to a credible witness); actual mileage at the federal business mileage rate where agreed in writing beforehand; no fee for absentee ballot applications or certificates; and a conspicuously displayed English-language fee schedule in type no smaller than 10-point where the notary charges. The signature must be by hand in ink, affixed only after the act. The seal is the notary’s exclusive property, kept secure, never surrendered to an employer, affixed only after the act and on the same page as the certificate; its image must carry the notary’s name exactly as commissioned, the words “Notary Public,” the county of commissioning, and “North Carolina,” within the statute’s size limits — and a lost or stolen seal triggers notification to law enforcement, the register of deeds, and the Secretary within 10 days. On journals, this guide states the statute as it stands: G.S. 10B-38 provides that each notary may maintain a journal of all notarial acts in the manner required for that type of act and under the Secretary’s rules — the Department’s own program description lists recording evidence of the notarization in a journal among the notary’s primary tools, and the manual treats journal practice in full.
Conduct and discipline
Official misconduct is a defined term — performing a prohibited act, failing to perform a mandated act, or performing an act negligently or against the public interest as the Secretary finds — and the ethics third of the statutory content runs through the whole code: confidentiality of a principal’s documents, the unauthorized-practice-of-law boundary for non-lawyer notaries, and the advertising prohibition that feeds a denial ground. Expect conduct rules tested through described situations, because that is how the definitions are written.
The sittings themselves: format, scoring, and what follows
The two sittings share a standard and differ in everything else. The course examination is a proctored written examination taken where and when the course ends — the candidate’s preparation for it is the course itself, compressed into a single instructional event, which is why this guide’s plan front-loads the manual before the course begins. The recommissioning examination is an individual online sitting: 20 questions, 30 minutes, graded at submission, with the 30-day, three-chance window as its recovery structure. Both are scored against the same published line — at least eighty percent (80%) of the questions correct — and in neither case does a published topic weighting exist to steer by: the statute’s three content words, laws, procedures, and ethics, are the whole blueprint the state issues.
Answer every question. No scoring position in the sources read rewards a blank, and on a 20-question recommissioning paper each question carries five percent of the whole — two wrong answers are the entire margin between 100 and 80. Pace the online sitting at its arithmetic: ninety seconds a question, with no time to reconstruct a rule from first principles; the rules that decide it — fees, deadlines, seal elements, disqualifications — must be recall, not reasoning.
What this examination is for
The catalog’s notary coverage is organized state by state, because notary law is state law — there is no national notary examination. North Carolina’s gate is among the family’s most complete: a mandatory course, a proctored course examination, a five-year commission that re-examines its holder online at every renewal, and a single official manual the law requires every notary to own. This guide and its companion cover the North Carolina Notary Public commission itself — its course, its two examinations, and its register of deeds route — and nothing borrowed from another state’s scheme. The separate electronic notary registration, with its own course and its own examination, is a distinct credential stacked on this commission and is not covered here beyond that boundary.
Preparation errors this guide is written to prevent
The recurring errors are specific to this structure. Candidates prepare for one examination and meet two — studying the course exam and forgetting the recommissioning sitting that returns in five years against a manual that will have changed. Candidates borrow the initial examination’s supposed shape from third-party pages — a question count, a time limit, an online delivery — that the statute and rules do not publish for it, while the figures that are published (20 questions, 30 minutes, three chances in 30 days) belong to the recommissioning exam and are missed. Candidates treat the six-hour course as the preparation rather than the event preparation must precede, arriving without having read the manual the law already required them to buy. Candidates let the clocks run: applying more than three months after the course, missing the 45-day oath, or opening recommissioning after the one-year post-expiration limit has closed it. And candidates repeat stale law — the 2016 manual’s regime — against a 2026 manual the Secretary’s renewal steps require them to own.
After the examinations
Hold both results in the file where they belong. The instructor-submitted course grade, the application and its fee receipt, the certificate of appointment, and the commission certificate the register of deeds delivers after your oath together evidence the commission; at recommissioning, the graded online result and the oath notification do the same work. Note the dates the record turns on — commissioning, expiration, the 10-week recommissioning opening, and the one-year post-expiration limit — because the commission’s own calendar, not memory, governs the next sitting.
A preparation plan that respects the structure
Sequence the plan around the course, because the structure does. First, read the current North Carolina Notary Public Manual (2026) before the course begins — the course is not less than six hours, and it cannot carry both first exposure and examination readiness on its own; arrive able to follow the instructor’s statutory references rather than meet them for the first time. Second, work Chapter 10B’s operative figures until they are recall: 80 percent; six hours; three months; 45 days; 10 weeks; 10 days; $50; $10.00. Third, convert the definitions into worked situations — presence, identification, disqualification, certificate elements — because the acts are defined as event sequences and are examined that way. Fourth, close the initial plan inside the course’s own shape: timed practice taken without assistance, under proctored conditions like the sitting’s, aimed at the whole of laws, procedures, and ethics, since no published weighting exists to narrow it. Keep a separate, short recommissioning drill for the five-year sitting — 20 questions in 30 minutes against the then-current manual. The companion North Carolina Notary Public Exam Preparation page describes the preparation program itself, which is in the works; this guide stands on its own as the route and structure reference.
Frequently asked questions
Why does North Carolina pair a course with its examination instead of offering a standalone test?
Because the statute builds them as one requirement: G.S. 10B-8(a) places the course of classroom instruction of not less than six hours and the written examination in a single subsection, inside a single three-month window before application, taught and proctored by instructors the Department certifies. The examination certifies the course’s material; there is no route to sit it independently of the course for an initial commission.
Is the initial examination taken online?
The online sitting candidates read about is the recommissioning examination, which the rules place on the Department’s website. The initial examination is the written examination of the mandatory course, administered at the course’s end under the certified instructor’s proctoring — although instructors review grades for course examinations administered electronically on the Department’s website as well as grading paper ones. Third-party pages that describe the initial exam as a standalone online test are describing the renewal sitting.
What score passes the recommissioning examination?
The same standard, in the rules’ form: a passing score of at least 80 percent (18 NCAC 07C .0604), with 30 minutes to complete the examination. The Secretary of State’s renewal steps summarize it as “80% or better, 3 chances within 30 days.”
How many chances do I get at the recommissioning examination, and what if I use them all?
Three in total: the first taking plus up to two additional attempts within 30 days of the date the exam was first taken. Failing to pass within those 30 days means the application is denied; the Department’s stated recovery is to attend a Notary Public course of instruction, complete a new application, and pay another nonrefundable $50 commissioning fee — and the rules also allow the course route, taking the initial course and its examination, in lieu of the recommissioning exam at any point.
Does an attorney notary ever have to take a North Carolina notary examination?
Not for the base commission: the Bar exemption covers the initial course and exam and the recommissioning exam. It does not cover the separate electronic notary registration — an attorney applying to be registered as an electronic notary must successfully complete the electronic notary course and exam under the rules.
What identification must I show for the course?
If you are not personally known to the certified instructor, satisfactory evidence of identity — under the statutory definition, at least one current government-issued document bearing your photograph and either your signature or a physical description, or the oath of a credible witness who personally knows you — presented before the course begins, before the instructor signs your application, and on the instructor’s request at any other time during the course. The name on it must match your commission name.
How much may a North Carolina notary charge?
Up to the statutory maximums in G.S. 10B-31: $10.00 per notarized principal signature for acknowledgments, jurats, verifications or proofs, and $10.00 per person for oaths or affirmations without a signature — plus, for travel, actual mileage at the federal business mileage rate only where the principal agreed in writing beforehand. Electronic and remote acts carry their own maximums under the separate electronic notary regime.
What must my seal show?
Your name exactly as commissioned, the words “Notary Public,” the county of commissioning (with the word “County” or “Co.”), and the words “North Carolina” or “N.C.” or “NC” — circular seals between 1½ and 2 inches in diameter, rectangular seals not over 1 inch high and 2½ inches long, with a visible border. Order a seal only against your commission: a vendor must not provide one unless the purchaser presents a notary commission issued by the Secretary.
I was commissioned before the current manual. Which manual governs my recommissioning?
The current one. The qualification is to purchase and keep the most recent manual approved by the Secretary, the 2026 edition is the official replacement for the 2016 manual, and the Secretary of State’s renewal steps state the operational rule plainly: you must own the 2026 North Carolina Notary Public Manual before completing your renewal application.
Where do this guide’s facts come from?
From the state’s own publications — Chapter 10B of the General Statutes, Title 18, Chapter 07 of the Administrative Code, the Secretary of State’s Notary Public Section pages, renewal steps, and Notary Tutorial, and the UNC School of Government’s page for the current manual — recorded in this file’s INTERNAL section. Facts that could not be verified from those sources were omitted.