The NExT Exam: Notified, and Still Not Scheduled

What the NExT exam is, and why it still has no date

NExT is meant to do four jobs at once

Under Section 15 of the National Medical Commission Act 2019, the National Exit Test is the common final year MBBS examination, the licence to practise and enter the State or National Register, the basis for admission to broad speciality postgraduate courses, and the screening test every foreign medical graduate must clear.

The regulations are law, the exam is not running

The NMC National Exit Test Regulations 2023 were notified on 27 June 2023 and gazetted on 28 June 2023, coming into force at once. On 13 July 2023 NMC issued a public notice deferring the examination on the Ministry’s advice of 11 July 2023, till further directions.

Nothing has been published on NExT since February 2024

NMC reopened the 2023 regulations for stakeholder feedback in January 2024 and extended the deadline to 17 February 2024. No outcome has been published, and NMC has issued no NExT communication in the 31 months since.

Only the Central Government can switch it on

Section 15(3) of the National Medical Commission Act 2019 provides that NExT becomes operational on a date appointed by the Central Government by notification. NMC writes the regulations, but the start date is not NMC’s to set, and no such notification has been issued.

What the two steps would look like

NExT Step 1 is a computer based multiple choice test across six papers: Medicine and allied, Surgery and allied, Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Paediatrics, Otorhinolaryngology and Ophthalmology, with a pass mark of 50% in each paper. Step 2 is a practical and clinical examination in seven subjects, graded pass or fail, held after internship.

FMGE is going the other way

NBEMS decided on 28 August 2026 to hold the Foreign Medical Graduate Examination three times a year instead of twice, added a session on 31 October 2026, and rescheduled the January 2027 session into January or February 2027. The June 2026 session passed 4,635 of the 36,300 candidates who appeared.

Want to know more about FMGE and licensing in India?

Who has to sit it, what it asks, and how the registration route works.