- Why There Is No Single ERIS Pass Rate
- How ERIS Assessment Actually Works
- The Only Hard Numbers You Can Rely On
- Why a Pass-Rate Statistic Would Mislead You Anyway
- Where Candidates Struggle, Course by Course
- The Real Failure Point: The Terminology Gap
- Completion Risk: Windows, Access Periods and Renewal
- Sequencing the Courses to Protect Your Results
- Frequently Asked Questions
- ERIS has no single exam, so no single published pass rate exists; each core course ends with its own final.
- Default course finals are 50 multiple-choice questions drawn from a bank, with 70% correct required to pass.
- Finals are open book, unproctored, and allow unlimited retakes under certification-only credit.
- Finish any five of six core courses within five years of buying the first one.
Why There Is No Single ERIS Pass Rate
Candidates searching for an "ERIS pass rate" usually expect a tidy percentage: a share of test-takers who pass a standardized exam on a given date. For the Energy Risk and Insurance Specialist (ERIS) designation from the International Risk Management Institute (IRMI), that number does not exist in the public record, and the reason is structural rather than evasive.
ERIS is not earned by sitting one sealed examination. It is earned by completing five of six available core courses, each with its own separate final assessment. Those finals are not combined into an aggregate score, and the retrieved public materials do not report cohort-level outcomes for them. Any site that quotes you a precise percentage for "the ERIS exam" is either borrowing a figure from a different credential that shares the acronym or inventing one. Neither helps you.
This article takes a different approach: it shows you what the data does support, explains why a headline pass rate would be the wrong number to chase, and focuses on the factors that actually determine whether you finish the designation. If you want the difficulty question answered directly, our companion piece on how hard the ERIS exam is covers the topic from the candidate's side.
How ERIS Assessment Actually Works
To interpret any pass-rate discussion, you first need to understand what is being passed. The ERIS structure is modular, and each module is assessed on its own terms.
The five-of-six structure
IRMI's catalog presents six core courses. To earn the designation you complete any five of them, along with each course's separate final assessment, within five years of purchasing the first core course. You choose which course to skip. That flexibility matters: a claims professional may drop one topic, while an underwriter may drop another.
The final-assessment format
For certification-only credit, each course final contains 50 multiple-choice questions selected from a question bank. You need 70% correct, which works out to 35 of 50, to pass. The default conditions are:
- Open book: you may consult course materials during the final.
- No proctor or monitor: there is no remote-surveillance requirement.
- Unlimited retakes: a failed attempt does not lock you out.
One caveat: adding insurance continuing-education or CPA CPE credit can change assessment requirements. The defaults above apply to certification-only credit, so confirm the conditions for your chosen credit type before you begin. For a deeper treatment of the cut score itself, see our guide to the ERIS passing score.
| Feature | ERIS Course Final (Certification-Only) |
|---|---|
| Question count | 50 multiple-choice questions from a bank |
| Passing threshold | 70% correct |
| Book policy | Open book |
| Proctoring | None required |
| Retakes | Unlimited |
| Courses required | Any five of six |
| Completion window | Five years from first core course purchase |
The Only Hard Numbers You Can Rely On
When you strip away speculation, the verifiable ERIS figures are procedural, and they are more useful than a pass rate would be.
- 70%: the score required on each course final.
- 50: the number of multiple-choice questions per final.
- 5 of 6: the number of core courses required.
- 5 years: the window from first core-course purchase.
- 12 months: the typical access period for an individual online course.
- USD 169: current catalog price per course, or USD 845 for five selected courses.
- 6 hours: the continuing education needed in each 12-month period to keep the designation valid.
Notice what is absent: no cohort pass percentage, no average score, no first-attempt success figure. Treat any such number you encounter with skepticism unless it cites IRMI directly. Our ERIS certification cost breakdown unpacks the pricing math, including the optional insurance CE add-on of USD 19 per course.
Why a Pass-Rate Statistic Would Mislead You Anyway
Even if IRMI published a percentage tomorrow, it would tell you less than you might hope. Three features of the ERIS design make a conventional pass rate a poor predictor of your outcome.
Unlimited retakes dilute the meaning of "pass"
With unlimited retakes and an open-book format, the relevant question stops being "will I pass?" and becomes "how many attempts, and how much time, will it take?" A pass rate that counted only first attempts would punish candidates who simply used the first try to learn the question style. A pass rate that counted eventual passes would approach completion rates and say little about difficulty.
Question banks change the experience
Because each final draws 50 questions from a larger bank, two candidates taking the same course final see different question sets. Your result reflects your command of the whole course, not memorization of a fixed paper.
Self-selection is strong
People who enroll in an energy-insurance designation are typically already working in or adjacent to the sector, such as brokers, underwriters, claims handlers, risk managers and loss-control specialists. A population that self-selects this way would be expected to perform differently from a general audience, which makes cross-credential comparisons meaningless. Our ERIS study guide explains how to approach preparation given that profile.
Where Candidates Struggle, Course by Course
Since outcomes are determined course by course, the useful exercise is identifying where each of the six core titles asks the most of you. The six titles below are the exact available course names and are best read as preparation topics rather than weighted exam domains. For a fuller walkthrough, see the ERIS exam domains guide.
Commercial Liability Insurance for the Energy Industry
This course assumes you already know basic commercial-liability concepts. The final will test whether you can apply them to energy exposures rather than define them.
- How standard liability structures behave when applied to energy operations
- Where energy-specific forms and endorsements depart from conventional wording
- Coverage triggers, exclusions and limits as they interact in layered programs
Contractual Risk Transfer in Energy
Energy projects run on contracts, so this topic rewards careful reading of indemnity and insurance clauses.
- Indemnity allocation between operators, contractors and subcontractors
- Additional-insured status and how it is conferred and limited
- Whether insurance requirements in a contract actually line up with available coverage
Control of Well/Operators Extra Expense Risks and Insurance
This is the most specialized of the six and the one least likely to be familiar to a generalist.
- What control-of-well events are and what costs they generate
- How operators extra expense coverage responds and what drives its scope
- The vocabulary of drilling operations as it appears in policy language
Renewable Energy: Unlocking Opportunity
Reviewed in October 2025, this course is explicitly approved for Core and assumes basic P&C insurance and energy-industry terminology.
- How renewable generation changes the risk profile compared with hydrocarbon operations
- Where traditional energy insurance language does and does not carry over
Understanding the Oil and Gas Industry and Its Risks
This topic is the natural on-ramp for candidates from outside the energy sector and establishes the operational context the others rely on.
- The stages of the oil and gas value chain and where exposures arise
- How operational realities translate into insurable risk
Workers Comp and Maritime Liability for the Energy Industry
Offshore and marine work pulls candidates into liability regimes that differ from ordinary onshore workers' compensation.
- How workers' compensation interacts with maritime liability regimes
- Why the injured worker's status and work location change the applicable framework
The Real Failure Point: The Terminology Gap
IRMI states that it assumes basic insurance terminology and fundamentals, and that other degrees or designations do not waive the selected core courses. That assumption is the most important and least discussed variable in ERIS outcomes.
The commercial liability course, for example, expects basic commercial-liability knowledge. The renewable energy course assumes basic P&C insurance and energy-industry terminology. A candidate who lacks that baseline will find the open-book format less helpful than expected, because an open book rewards people who know what to look up and how to read what they find. If you cannot parse the question, no amount of access to the text rescues you.
Key Takeaway
Audit your baseline before you buy. If terms like additional insured, occurrence versus claims-made, or retention feel shaky, close that gap first. Open-book access does not substitute for fluency. Our ERIS requirements guide covers eligibility and prerequisites in detail.
Completion Risk: Windows, Access Periods and Renewal
For many candidates, the realistic threat to earning ERIS is not failing a final. It is running out of time or letting a window lapse. Three separate clocks are running, and they are easy to confuse.
- The five-year program window: starts when you purchase your first core course. All five completed courses and their finals must fall inside it.
- The 12-month course access period: individual online courses generally provide 12 months of access from purchase. This is separate from the five-year window and separate from any exam timing.
- The annual renewal cycle: once certified, you renew on your certification anniversary by earning six approved continuing-education hours in each 12-month period.
Renewal credit cannot be carried into a future year, so earning extra hours in one year does not reduce next year's requirement. Approved routes include an online renewal course, eligible IRMI conference sessions, or an approved educational event. If you are planning your calendar, our ERIS exam dates guide explains why scheduling here works differently from a fixed testing-window credential.
| Clock | Length | What It Governs |
|---|---|---|
| Program window | 5 years | Completing five courses and finals from first purchase |
| Course access | Generally 12 months | Time to use each individual online course |
| Renewal cycle | 12 months, recurring | Six CE hours to keep validity current |
Sequencing the Courses to Protect Your Results
Because there is no single exam date, the most valuable planning decision is the order in which you tackle the courses. Sequencing is the one place generic planning meets ERIS specifics, so here is a defensible approach tied to the actual course content.
Build the operating context
- Start with Understanding the Oil and Gas Industry and Its Risks so later coverage discussions have operational grounding.
- Keep a running glossary of drilling and production terms as you go.
Layer the liability framework
- Take Commercial Liability Insurance for the Energy Industry next, while the operating vocabulary is fresh.
- Follow with Contractual Risk Transfer in Energy, which builds directly on liability concepts.
Add the specialized exposures
- Pick your fifth course from Control of Well/Operators Extra Expense, Renewable Energy, or Workers Comp and Maritime Liability, based on your daily work.
- Choose the one most likely to benefit your actual book of business or client base.
Because you can skip one of the six, consider which topic is furthest from your career and drop that one. For many commercial lines professionals, the control-of-well course is the steepest climb, while a marine specialist may find the renewable energy course the least relevant. Weigh the trade-off against your goals; our analysis of whether ERIS is worth it and the ERIS salary guide can help frame that decision.
To check your readiness before attempting a final, work through timed question sets on the practice test site. Familiarity with multiple-choice phrasing reduces the number of retakes you need, even though retakes are unlimited. When you want a quick-reference refresher the night before a final, the ERIS cheat sheet condenses the must-know facts.
Frequently Asked Questions
No official aggregate pass rate is published for the Energy Risk and Insurance Specialist designation. Each of the core courses has its own separate final assessment, and those results are not combined into a single exam statistic. Be cautious of any percentage presented without a citation to IRMI.
For certification-only credit, each final has 50 multiple-choice questions drawn from a question bank, and you need 70% correct to pass. Adding insurance CE or CPA CPE credit can change assessment requirements, so confirm the conditions for your credit type.
Yes. Under the default certification-only conditions, retakes are unlimited, the finals are open book, and no proctor or monitor is required. Remember that your course access is generally 12 months, so retakes should happen within that period.
You must complete any five of the six core courses and their separate final assessments within five years of purchasing the first core course. Current catalog pricing is USD 169 per course, or USD 845 for five selected courses.
Validity is renewed annually on your certification anniversary through six approved continuing-education hours in each 12-month period. Eligible routes include an online renewal course, eligible IRMI conference sessions or an approved educational event, and credit cannot be carried into a future year.
The most useful way to think about ERIS outcomes is not as a pass rate but as a completion plan: confirm your baseline insurance fluency, sequence your five courses sensibly, and manage the program window, course access and renewal clocks. For a broader introduction to the credential itself, start with our explainer on what ERIS certification is.