60 cards · 9 content areas · timed mock
CNA practice test: free questions with answer explanations
This free CNA practice test is a deck of 60 four-option questions written in the style of the NNAAP and Prometric written exams, and each one shows its explanation the moment you answer. Work it as a practice deck, drill one content area with the chips, or press Timed mock for a full 60-card dress rehearsal with a score sheet.
Card 1 of 60
Basic Nursing Skills
60:00
Which action BEST protects the client during a transfer from the bed to a wheelchair?
Pick an answer. The rationale flips up right here, on the back of the card.
0 right · 0 missed · 60 to go
Between shifts
How to practice with this deck
Start in practice mode with All selected, answer a card, read the explanation on the back, and move on. About 15 cards fit a 20-minute break with time left to read every explanation, so the full deck is four breaks, not a lost day off.
First pass, all areas
Go through the 60 cards in order. The deck is dealt so that any stretch of it mixes content areas in roughly the proportions of the 2024 NNAAP outline.
Send guesses to the back
Got it right but you weren't sure? Press Back of the deck. A lucky guess on the practice deck is a miss on test day.
Drill your weakest area
Tap a chip, such as Client rights or Basic nursing skills, to deal only that area. Then read the matching study-guide page before you try the chip again.
Sit the timed mock
Once the practice deck feels easy, switch to Timed mock. Do it in one sitting at the hour your real test is booked, not at 7 a.m. after a night shift.
Re-deal what you missed
The score sheet ends with Review missed cards. Run those with explanations on, wait a few days, then sit the mock again. The order is reshuffled each time.
Tip
On a keyboard, press 1–4 or A–D to answer. That's handy when you're eating with one hand on a break.
How this practice test mirrors the written exam
The deck copies the format of the written exam, not its questions: four options, one best answer, short scenarios set in a nursing home. Every vendor writes its items that way, so the habits you build here carry over to whichever test your state uses.
- Four options, one best answer. No “all of the above”, no “none of the above”, no select-all-that-apply. Two options often look right, and one of them skips a step.
- Third person, plain words. Stems talk about “the nurse aide” and “the resident” (NNAAP says “the client”). They are short, often under 30 words.
- Qualifiers carry the question. FIRST, SHOULD, BEST and MOST decide which of two good actions wins. Read the qualifier before you read the options.
- Aide-level scope only. Nothing on giving medications, sterile dressings or inserting tubes. When an option has the aide doing one of those, it's a distractor.
- No trick negatives. Real items almost never ask “which is NOT…”, so our deck has none.
- A little arithmetic. The written tests slip in intake-and-output sums. Keep 1 oz = 30 mL and 1 cup = 240 mL in your head.
| Vendor | Items | Time allowed | Match it on this deck |
|---|---|---|---|
| NNAAP, delivered by Credentia | 70 multiple-choice: 60 scored, 10 unscored pretest. Oral version: 60 multiple-choice + 10 word-recognition | 2 hours | Sit the full timed mock and give every card full effort, scored or not |
| Prometric nurse aide test | About 60 multiple-choice (some forms 50 scored + 10 pretest) | 90 minutes | The 60-card mock is close to full length; our clock is tighter than yours will be |
| Headmaster/D&S (TMU) | Varies by state, e.g. California 75, Michigan 65, Wisconsin 75 | Varies by state; California 60 minutes | Pace is the skill here: practice one card a minute on the mock |
Vendors, forms and contracts change (California moved to Headmaster/D&S in 2025). Your vendor's current candidate handbook is the final word for your test.
Note
These are original practice questions written in the style of the NNAAP and Prometric written tests. They are not questions from any real exam, and no vendor has reviewed or endorsed them.
Dress rehearsal
CNA practice exam (timed mock)
The timed mock is the full-length practice exam: press Timed mock above the deck and all 60 cards are dealt in a new order, with a 60:00 clock running in the card's corner. Explanations stay hidden until you finish, the same as the real thing, where you won't get feedback item by item.
- The deal. 60 cards weighted toward the 2024 outline, so Basic Nursing Skills and Activities of Daily Living fill more than half the mock.
- The clock. 60 minutes for 60 cards is one card a minute. That's our pacing target, not your vendor's limit. It runs tighter than the NNAAP and Prometric allowances in the table above and close to some Headmaster/D&S forms.
- Flagging. Unsure? Press Flag, come back later and the card goes to the end of the run. If time runs out, unanswered cards count as missed.
- The handoff sheet. You get a total, a bar for each content area and a button to re-deal only the cards you missed, explanations on.
Set the mock up like test day
- A table and a hard chair, not the couch. You'll sit at a desk on test day too.
- Phone on do-not-disturb and out of reach. At the test center it goes in a locker or your car.
- Use the restroom first and keep the drink to one glass. The clock doesn't pause.
- A pencil and a scrap of paper for intake-and-output sums.
- A snack you can eat quietly, eaten before you press start, not during.
- The same time of day as your booked test, so your body knows what that hour feels like.
Don't read the score as a pass prediction
Each state sets its own cut score and reports the written test as pass or fail, so no number on our sheet maps to your result. Use the bars instead: one short bar shows you which area to drill before your next mock.
Two full mocks, a few days apart, beat five in one weekend. The second sitting tells you whether the drilling worked; the fifth mostly tells you that you're tired.
Practice by content area
Use the chips above the deck to practice one content area at a time. The 2024 NNAAP outline splits the 60 scored items like this, and the deck tracks it almost card for card. The one stretch is Spiritual & Cultural Needs: it gets 3 cards instead of about 1, so its chip has something to drill, and Basic Nursing Skills gives up 2 to make room:
| Content area | Weight | ≈ Items of 60 | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Physical Care Skills · 64% | |||
| Activities of Daily Living | 22% | 13 | |
| Basic Nursing Skills | 35% | 21 | |
| Self Care / Independence | 7% | 4 | |
| Psychosocial Care Skills · 10% | |||
| Emotional and Mental Health Needs | 8% | 5 | |
| Spiritual and Cultural Needs | 2% | 1 | |
| Role of the Nurse Aide · 26% | |||
| Communication | 7% | 4 | |
| Client Rights | 8% | 5 | |
| Legal and Ethical Behavior | 5% | 3 | |
| Member of the Health Care Team | 6% | 4 | |
NNAAP written content outline, effective April 2024 (60 scored items). Prometric and Headmaster/D&S outlines are similar, not identical.
| Chip | What the cards cover | Go deeper |
|---|---|---|
| Basic nursing skills | Infection control and gloves, falls and transfers, fire and weather emergencies, vital signs in context, what to report | Basic nursing skills guide, 12 more questions |
| Daily living (ADL) | Bathing, oral and denture care, dressing, feeding and swallowing problems, elimination, positioning and comfort | Activities of daily living guide, 12 more questions |
| Self-care & independence | Letting the resident do what they can, preventing footdrop and contractures, normal aging vs a change to report | Study guide |
| Emotional & mental health | Dementia, sundowning, aggression, depression, adjusting to a new home | Study guide |
| Spiritual & cultural | Religious items and diets, grief that looks different from family to family | Study guide |
| Communication | Hearing loss, language barriers, objective charting, things a resident tells you “in confidence” | Study guide |
| Client rights | Dignity, privacy with visitors, consent before care, refusing a meal | Study guide |
| Legal & ethical | Gifts and boundaries, complaints without fear of punishment | Study guide |
| Health care team | Scope of practice, saying no to an untrained task, who to check first after report | Study guide |
High-yield
Basic Nursing Skills and Activities of Daily Living together are 57% of the scored items. If you only have two evenings, spend them on those two chips.
Five worked CNA practice questions
Most keyed answers follow one order of priorities: resident safety first, then rights and dignity, then staying in your scope (get the nurse), then infection control, then comfort and independence. Each example below sits on one rung of that order. The explanation under the options is the one you'll see in the deck; the lines after it take apart each wrong answer.
Rung 1 · safety
A resident becomes weak and starts to fall while walking with the nurse aide. The nurse aide SHOULD:
- catch the resident under both arms
- let go and call for help at once
- try to hold the resident up at all costs
- ease the resident gently to the floor (best answer)
When a resident starts to fall, the nurse aide keeps a wide stance, holds the gait belt, and eases the resident down to the floor while protecting the head. Fighting the fall or catching under the arms can injure both people, and letting go allows a hard fall. The aide then calls for the nurse.
Why the others lose
- Grabbing under the arms pulls the resident's weight through the shoulders. The gait belt at the waist is the handle you use.
- Letting go turns a slow, guided slide into a hard fall. You call for help once the resident is down safely.
- “At all costs” is the absolute wording that marks a distractor. You won't win against gravity, and you'd both end up on the floor.
Rung 2 · rights
A resident asks the nurse aide to place a small statue of a saint on her bedside table. The nurse aide SHOULD:
- ask the nurse whether religious items are allowed
- put it in the drawer so it will not get broken
- place the statue where the resident can see it (best answer)
- place it on the windowsill away from the care area
Residents have the right to keep personal possessions, including religious items, and a simple request like this can be honoured directly. Asking the nurse is not needed and delays the resident's choice. Moving the statue to a drawer or windowsill puts the aide's convenience ahead of where the resident wants it.
Why the others lose
- Keeping personal possessions is a resident right, so there's nothing to ask permission for. This is the “tell the nurse” reflex the test likes to punish.
- Protecting the statue from breaking is your worry, not hers. A drawer hides exactly what she asked to see.
- Clearing the care area is staff convenience. She asked for the bedside table, and that's where it goes.
Rung 3 · scope
During an emergency, the nurse asks the nurse aide to suction a resident's airway. The aide has not been trained to do this. The nurse aide SHOULD:
- leave the room to find a coworker
- say so and offer to do another task (best answer)
- watch the nurse do it and then copy
- try it because it is an emergency
Even in an emergency, the aide does only tasks she is trained to do. She tells the nurse right away and offers help she can safely give, such as bringing equipment or calling for help. Attempting an untrained skill risks harm, leaving abandons the team, and copying without training is unsafe.
Why the others lose
- Walking out takes a pair of hands away when the nurse needs them most.
- Watching once is not training. Copying a skill you were never taught carries the same risk as trying it cold, just a minute later.
- An emergency doesn't stretch your scope. An untrained aide suctioning an airway can hurt the resident.
Rung 4 · infection control
While giving care, the nurse aide should change gloves:
- after every two or three residents
- only if the gloves become visibly torn
- when moving from a dirty area to a clean one (best answer)
- only once all of the resident's care is finished
Gloves are changed, with hand hygiene, when moving from a contaminated body area to a clean one, such as after perineal care, and between every resident. Waiting until all care is finished or until the gloves tear carries germs to clean areas, and gloves are never worn from one resident to another.
Why the others lose
- Gloves never go from one resident to the next, not even once.
- Germs ride on gloves that look fine. A tear is one reason to change; it's not the only one.
- Finishing peri-care and then touching the face with the same gloves carries germs from a dirty area to a clean one.
Rung 5 · comfort and independence
When feeding a resident who cannot feed herself but can make choices, the nurse aide SHOULD:
- ask which food she wants to eat next (best answer)
- feed one food until it is all gone
- choose the order that seems healthiest
- mix all the foods together to save time
Letting the resident choose the order of her food keeps her in control of her meal and respects her preferences, even though she needs to be fed. Mixing foods together makes the meal unappetizing and hides the taste of each item. Finishing one food at a time or deciding the order for her takes the choice away without any safety reason.
Why the others lose
- One food until it's gone is a staff routine, not her meal.
- “Seems healthiest” is your judgment. The diet order sets what's on the tray; the order she eats it in is her call.
- Mixing everything saves you a minute and costs her the taste and look of the meal. “To save time” in an option is a tell.
“Report to the nurse” is not a free pass
It's the right move for a change in condition, pain or anything outside your scope. It's the wrong move for a normal finding (record it), a simple request you can grant (the statue), a refusal (respect it) or a tip (politely refuse it). If you pick it by reflex, the statue question is the one that catches you.
Does this work for my state's exam?
Yes, for the written half. Every state runs a nurse aide competency evaluation under the same federal rules, and the content is the same entry-level, long-term-care practice everywhere. What changes from state to state is the vendor, the length, the cut score and whether an oral version is offered.
- NNAAP, delivered by Credentia (formerly Pearson VUE), is used in about 25 states.
- Prometric runs the nurse aide test in states such as New York, Connecticut and Florida.
- Headmaster/D&S (TMU) runs it in states such as California (since 2025), Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin.
That's the picture as of Oct 2026. Contracts move, so check your state's current vendor on the CNA test page, which has the vendor table, and in your training program's paperwork. Some states also use their own name for the same credential:
- STNA
- State Tested Nurse Aide, the Ohio name
- LNA
- Licensed Nursing Assistant in New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine
- NAC
- Nursing Assistant Certified, the Washington name
- Nurse Aide I
- North Carolina's registry title
- GNA
- Maryland's geriatric nursing assistant credential, an add-on on top of the nurse aide certificate
The deck covers the written half only
The other half is a hands-on skills test: you perform a few randomly drawn skills in front of an evaluator. Practice questions can't rehearse that. The CNA skills test page covers how it runs and the steps graders check in every skill.
CNA practice test questions people ask
What questions are on the CNA test?
Short multiple-choice scenarios set in long-term care, each with four options and one best answer. They cover physical care (bathing, feeding, infection control, safety, vital signs), emotional and mental health, and your role on the team: residents' rights, communication, legal limits and scope. The content-area table above shows how the 2024 NNAAP outline weights them.
Is it hard to pass the CNA exam?
The content is entry-level, but the written test is built around tempting wrong answers: the kind option that skips a safety step, or “report to the nurse” when you should simply record or respect a choice. Each state sets its own cut score and reports pass or fail, so there's no single number to aim for. A steady score across all nine areas on the timed mock is a better sign than one high total.
How many questions are on the CNA test?
It depends on your state's vendor. As of Oct 2026, the NNAAP written test has 70 multiple-choice items (60 scored, 10 unscored) in 2 hours; Prometric's has about 60 in 90 minutes; Headmaster/D&S varies by state (California 75 items in 60 minutes). Your vendor's candidate handbook has the version you'll sit.
How do I practice for the CNA exam?
Work through the 60-card deck in short sessions and send every guess to the back. Drill your weakest content area with the chips, then sit the timed mock in one sitting and re-deal the cards you missed. The skills half needs hands-on rehearsal; see the skills test page.
Is there a free CNA practice test with 180 questions and answers?
Not on this site. It has 60 questions with explained answers here and 12 more on each of the two study-guide topic pages: basic nursing skills and activities of daily living. There's no printable PDF. The explanations live on the cards, and the app carries a larger bank if you run out.