The lifestyle medicine board exam: format, eligibility and how to prepare
The American Board of Lifestyle Medicine (ABLM) certifies physicians and health professionals in lifestyle medicine once a year. Here is what the exam looks like and a practical way to prepare in the weeks before it.
Exam format
- Physicians: 150 multiple-choice questions.
- Health professionals: 120 multiple-choice questions.
- Time: up to four hours, proctored at a Prometric testing center.
- When: once a year. The 2026 window is the last week of November and first week of December.
That is about 1.6 minutes per question for physicians and 2 minutes for health professionals. Most questions are short clinical or counseling vignettes with one best answer, so pacing matters less than recognizing what the question is really testing.
Who can sit the exam
Physicians must be primary board certified for at least two years by an ABMS or AOA board in the US, or hold physician licensure in Canada. Health professionals need a master's or doctoral degree in a health or allied health discipline.
Both pathways require 50 hours of approved education: 30 hours from an approved course, such as ACLM's Foundations of Lifestyle Medicine, and 20 hours from approved events.
Fees
For physicians, a $299 non-refundable registration plus a $1,349 certification fee for ACLM members or $1,499 for non-members ($1,648–$1,798 in total). Health professionals pay $199 plus $1,169 or $1,299. Fees, deadlines and the exam window change, so check ABLM's current requirements before you plan around them.
What the exam covers
The exam follows the lifestyle medicine core competencies, weighted across ten domains. Nutrition alone is about a quarter of the exam.
- Nutrition Science, Assessment and Prescription26%
- Physical Activity Science and Prescription14%
- Fundamentals of Health Behavior Change10%
- Emotional and Mental Well-Being10%
- Key Clinical Processes in Lifestyle Medicine8%
- Sleep Health Science and Interventions8%
- Tobacco Cessation and Other Toxic Exposures8%
- Connectedness and Positive Psychology8%
- Introduction to Lifestyle Medicine4%
- Practitioner's Personal Health and Community Advocacy4%
Weights from ABLM's published competency weighting.
A six-week study plan
- Week 1: find your gaps. Take a short mixed set of questions cold. Note which domains you miss, not just your score.
- Weeks 2–3: nutrition and activity. Together they are 40% of the exam. Know the landmark trials (PREDIMED, DPP, DiRECT, Lyon Diet Heart), the current dietary and physical activity guidelines, and how to write an exercise prescription with FITT.
- Week 4: behavior change, emotional well-being and sleep. Motivational interviewing, stages of change, SMART goals, CBT-I, and screening tools such as PHQ-9 and GAD-7.
- Week 5: substances, connectedness and the smaller domains. Tobacco treatment (including pharmacotherapy), alcohol guidance, loneliness and positive psychology, clinical processes and the practitioner's own health.
- Week 6: timed practice. Sit a full-length timed mock, review every miss and every lucky guess, then drill the weakest two domains.
Read every rationale, including on questions you got right. The exam rewards knowing why the second-best answer is wrong.
Exam week
Stop adding new material two or three days out. Skim your notes on missed questions, confirm your Prometric appointment and ID requirements, and sleep. Sleep is on the exam for a reason.
Practice the way the exam tests you
Lifestyle Medicine QBank has 150 board-style questions weighted to the ABLM blueprint, timed physician and health professional mock exams, and a rationale for every answer. One-time $149 USD.
Exam facts checked against ablm.org on October 2, 2026. Lifestyle Medicine QBank is independent and not affiliated with ABLM, ACLM or IBLM.