Fact checkQuestions and time
How many questions are on the CEH exam, and how long do you get?
The CEH exam (312-50) has 125 multiple-choice questions and a 4-hour limit, as EC-Council lists it on Oct 11, 2026. That averages a little under two minutes per question.
- Exam
- 312-50
- Checked
- Oct 11, 2026
- Source
- EC-Council certification site, Certified Ethical Hacker
The format on one card
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Exam code | 312-50 |
| Questions | 125, multiple choice |
| Time | 4 hours (240 minutes) |
| Average per question | About 1 min 55 s (240 ÷ 125) |
| Open book | No |
| Mark for review | Yes: flag questions and return before you end the exam |
| Delivery | EC-Council remote proctoring or a Pearson VUE test center |
| Passing | A cut score per exam form, 60% to 85%: how the CEH passing score works |
| Version | CEH v13, current as of Oct 11, 2026 |
A pacing plan for 240 minutes
0:00–2:00
First pass
Answer what you know on one read and flag the rest. Quick answers bank minutes for the slow ones.2:00–3:15
Flagged scenarios
Spend the banked time on the questions you flagged.3:15–3:45
Second look
Revisit flags only. Change an answer when you can name the reason.3:45–4:00
Buffer
Confirm every question has an answer before you end the exam.
How the four hours feel
The format sets the difficulty: 125 closed-book questions across nine domains, read under a clock for four hours. Somewhere past the second hour, every answer can start to look shaky. That is fatigue talking, and it tells you nothing about your score; only the transcript does. Slow down, re-read the stem, keep moving.
Point-yield decides where the hours before exam day go. EC-Council's blueprint gives Network and Perimeter Hacking 24% of the exam and Wireless 5%, so a gap in wireless costs you a fraction of what a gap in network attacks does. Sit the full four hours at least once on the timed CEH mock exam, and put it in the last two weeks of your CEH study plan.
Where the questions sit
On the day itself
Are there lab or performance-based tasks?
Not on this exam. EC-Council lists the 125 questions as multiple choice (CEH certification page, Oct 11, 2026). Hands-on work is tested in the separate, optional CEH Practical exam.
Can you go back to an earlier question?
Yes. The CEH Candidate Handbook says you can mark questions and review them before ending the exam (as of Oct 11, 2026).
Does every form follow the blueprint's split exactly?
EC-Council's blueprint v5.0 publishes the domain weights and per-module counts; it does not promise each form matches them item for item. Treat the weights as a guide to study time.