AP US Government Score Calculator

The two halves of the exam count equally: 55 multiple-choice questions and 17 free-response points are each scaled to 60 composite points. A perfect multiple-choice section with nothing on the essays still only reaches a 2.

This page turns two raw numbers — how many of the 55 multiple-choice questions were answered correctly, and the points earned on the four free-response questions — into the 1-to-5 score the exam reports. The figure worth looking at is the composite behind it, because that is where the weighting becomes visible. Each half of the exam is scaled to 60 points, so both count the same even though one is marked out of 55 and the other out of 17. On the values the page starts with, 40 correct answers scale to 43.64 and 12 free-response points scale to 42.35, giving a composite of 85.99. That total is rounded to a whole number before anything else happens, and only then looked up: 86 falls in the 84-to-100 band, so the predicted score is a 4. The thresholds are just as blunt above it — the 5 starts at 101, so a composite of 100 is still a 4. Two things the number leaves out. It counts correct answers only, so a blank question and a wrong one cost exactly the same; nothing is deducted for guessing. And it uses one fixed set of thresholds. The weighting between the sections does not move, but the cut-offs shift a little from year to year, which is why a result sitting near a boundary should be read as uncertain in either direction.