Which Exam Is Required After MBBS Abroad? FMGE vs USMLE

Which exam is required after MBBS abroad comes down to one factor: the country where you earned your degree. Graduates of EU universities — including all nine countries futureMBBS partners in — must clear India's FMGE screening test to practise at home, while only degrees from five exempt countries (USA, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) skip FMGE and follow that country's own licensing route instead. This guide is a decision-first overview: it tells you exactly which exam applies to your situation and links out to a full explainer for whichever path is yours, based on the current list published in NMC's rules and regulations.

Key Takeaways

• Only five countries are exempt from India's FMGE requirement: the USA, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Every other country's medical degree, including all nine EU countries covered in this guide, requires FMGE.

• If your MBBS is from an EU country, FMGE is your answer — a twice-yearly screening test run by NBEMS, with 2026 pass rates of 25.40% (January) and 12.77% (June).

• If your MBBS is from an exempt country, you don't sit FMGE at all — you instead follow that country's own licensing exam (USMLE for the USA, PLAB for the UK, MCCQE for Canada, and so on) if you plan to practise there.

• The National Exit Test (NExT), which will eventually replace FMGE for everyone, remains deferred to February 2028 under NMC's own CBME schedule — plan around FMGE, not NExT, for now.

• Exam choice only decides your licensing route; it's a separate question from postgraduate specialisation, which is covered in our broader guide on career paths after MBBS.

• Knowing which exam is required after MBBS abroad up front saves months of misdirected preparation — check your degree's country against the exempt list before you plan your return.

Which exam is required after MBBS abroad?

The single decision point behind which exam is required after MBBS abroad is your degree's country of origin. If you completed MBBS in any EU nation, at a university outside the five FMGE-exempt countries, then FMGE is the exam you need to register with the NMC or a State Medical Council and practise in India. If your degree is instead from the USA, UK, Canada, Australia, or New Zealand, you're exempt from FMGE and instead sit that country's own licensing exam only if you intend to practise there — not to practise in India, where an exempt-country degree is directly recognised without FMGE.

Is my country exempt from FMGE?

No EU country is on India's exempt list — this includes every one of the nine EU countries most Indian students choose for MBBS abroad: Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Croatia, Latvia, Lithuania, Cyprus, and Romania. The exemption applies only to five countries under current NMC rules.

For the full breakdown of FMGE's format, eligibility, and pass rates, read our complete FMGE exam guide — this article focuses only on the decision of which exam applies to you.

What if I want to practise abroad instead of India?

Which exam is required after MBBS abroad changes completely once your goal shifts from practising in India to practising in the country where you studied, or in a third country — the FMGE-vs-exempt decision above no longer applies, and you instead need that destination country's own licensing exam. A few of the most common ones:

1. USMLE (United States Medical Licensing Examination) for practising in the USA, run in three steps by the NBME.

2. PLAB (Professional and Linguistic Assessments Board) for the UK, run by the GMC in two parts.

3. MCCQE (Medical Council of Canada Qualifying Examination) for Canada, in two parts.

4. AMC (Australian Medical Council) exam for Australia.

5. NZREX (New Zealand Registration Examination) for New Zealand.

None of these substitute for FMGE if your actual goal is practising in India with an EU-earned degree — FMGE remains the only route home for that.

Does the National Exit Test change which exam I need?

Not yet. The National Exit Test (NExT) is designed to eventually replace FMGE as the single licensing exam for every MBBS graduate, but as of mid-2026 it remains deferred, with NMC's CBME schedule setting NExT Step 1 for February 2028. Until that actually happens, the FMGE-versus-exempt-country decision above is what governs your path. See our full National Exit Test status update for the complete timeline.