About the Arkansas Master Electrician license
Arkansas licenses electricians through the Arkansas Board of Electrical Examiners. The Master Electrician is the senior credential. It generally requires you to first hold a journeyman license, meet one of the paths in 17 CAR § 210-604, and pass the master exam that adds heavier load-calculation, design, and code-application content. A holder at this level can typically pull permits, supervise journeymen and apprentices, design installations, and serve as the qualifying individual for a licensed contracting business.
The exam is National Electrical Code (NEC) based, because Arkansas adopts the NEC as its electrical code. It is normally open book: you may bring a clean, bound copy of the adopted NEC edition. Prov bulletin ARDOL-Electrical 2023.11.10 allows highlighting, underlining in pen, and permanent tabs. Loose papers are not allowed. Plan to tab and index your code book before test day, because the exam is as much a test of how fast you can locate a section as it is of what you have memorized.
Know these scope facts cold, because the exam asks them in plain-language form: the license is held by the individual, not the company; most installations require a permit and inspection before concealment (rough-in) and again at final; you must work within the classification you hold; and performing electrical work without the required license, or beyond your scope, is a violation that can cost you the license and carry civil penalties.
How Arkansas licensing works
- Experience: documented hours in the trade (apprentice and journeyman time), with the senior license requiring journeyman time on top of the base requirement.
- Education: approved instruction hours or completion of an approved apprenticeship program count toward the journeyman experience that underlies the master credential.
- Application: submit the application, fees, and proof of experience (often signed off by a supervising/master electrician or employer) to the board before you are approved to sit.
- Exam vendor: Prov, under contract to the Arkansas Department of Labor and Licensing / Board of Electrical Examiners — not PSI. The Master Electrician exam is 60 questions in a 3-hour, open-book format based on the 2023 NEC, with a 70 percent passing score (verified against the Board's Prov candidate information bulletin). That count, clock, and cut are the ones printed in Prov bulletin ARDOL-Electrical 2023.11.10.
- Renewal: renewal and any continuing education are Board of Electrical Examiners rules. This Prov bulletin does not print a renewal date or an hour count. Do not invent either from this guide.
The bulletin read for this course on October 8, 2026, is ARDOL-Electrical 2023.11.10. It names the 2023 NEC as the only reference. Ampacities, GFCI and AFCI scope, and working-clearance distances belong to that edition. Do not bring the 2020 NEC or the 2017 NEC because an older paper used them. This bulletin does not print a 2026 switch date.
This is the opening of the full study guide. The complete guide continues into code navigation, worked calculations and solved exam questions.
