Texas offers two exams for selling life insurance. Recruiters tend to send new agents to whichever one their shop uses, without saying why. Here is what each covers, what each license lets you sell, and the pass-rate data that most people get backwards.
| Life Agent | General Lines · Life, Accident & Health | |
|---|---|---|
| Pearson VUE exam code | InsTX-Life01 (English), Life21 (Spanish) | InsTX-LAH05 (English), LAH25 (Spanish) |
| Questions | 90 (80 scored + 10 pretest) | 145 (130 scored + 15 pretest) |
| General part | 50 scored | 100 scored |
| Texas law part | 30 scored | 30 scored |
| Time | 120 minutes | 150 minutes |
| Exam fee | $39 | $49 |
| Passing | Scaled score of 70 on either exam | |
| First-time pass rate, 2025 | 47% (20,769 first-time sittings) | 57% (26,267 first-time sittings) |
| Retake pass rate, 2025 | 33% | 40% |
| Pre-licensing course required | No, for either | |
Exam structure, time and fees: Pearson VUE publications 124400 and 124401 (outline effective September 1, 2026). Pass rates: Pearson VUE's monthly Texas reports, summed for 2025. All the pass-rate data ›
The names say most of it. The Life Agent license is the narrower one: life insurance and annuity contracts. The General Lines Life, Accident and Health license covers those plus accident and health insurance, which is where disability, hospital, Medicare supplement and most group work lives. If the agency that recruited you sells term life and annuities only (many do), the Life Agent license is all they need from you. If you expect to touch health products within a year, the broader license saves you a second exam. License scope is set by the Texas Insurance Code and can change; confirm it on the Texas Department of Insurance license types page before you book.
Both exams draw from the same published outline. The Life Agent exam uses the four life sections of the general part and two of the four Texas-law sections. The combined exam adds five health sections and the health and HMO law sections.
| Section | Life Agent | Life, Accident & Health |
|---|---|---|
| G-I Types of policies (life) | 15 | 15 |
| G-II Policy riders, provisions, options, and exclusions | 15 | 15 |
| G-III Completing the application, underwriting, and delivering the policy | 12 | 12 |
| G-IV Retirement and other insurance concepts | 8 | 8 |
| G-V Types of policies (health) | — | 16 |
| G-VI Policy provisions, clauses, and riders (health) | — | 15 |
| G-VII Social insurance | — | 6 |
| G-VIII Other insurance concepts (health) | — | 5 |
| G-IX Field underwriting procedures | — | 8 |
| TX-I Texas statutes and rules common to life and health | 20 | 14 |
| TX-II Texas statutes and rules pertinent to life only | 10 | 6 |
| TX-III Texas statutes and rules pertinent to accident and health only | — | 7 |
| TX-IV Texas statutes and rules pertinent to HMOs | — | 3 |
| Scored questions | 80 | 130 |
Notice the Texas-law share: 30 of 80 on the life-only exam is 37.5% of your score, against 23% on the combined exam. A thin grasp of Texas statutes hurts a Life Agent candidate much more.
Pearson VUE does not explain the gap, and neither can we with certainty. Three things are visible in the structure and the data:
Section TX-I appears on every Texas life exam. This is the style.
Under the Texas Insurance Code, a rule adopted by the commissioner of insurance must
TIC Sec. 36.001 gives the commissioner general rulemaking authority to adopt any rule necessary and appropriate to implement the powers and duties of the department, and subsection (b) requires that those rules have general and uniform application.
Not by the numbers. In 2025, 47% of first-time takers passed the Life Agent exam and 57% passed the General Lines Life, Accident & Health exam, according to Pearson VUE's monthly reports. The life-only exam has fewer questions (80 scored instead of 130), so each mistake costs more.
90 questions in 120 minutes: 50 scored general questions plus 5 pretest, and 30 scored Texas-law questions plus 5 pretest. The exam fee is $39. Source: Pearson VUE candidate handbook 124400 and content outline 124401.
No. The Life Agent license is the narrower one: life insurance and annuities. Accident and health products need the General Lines Life, Accident and Health license (or a separate accident and health license). Confirm the current scope on the Texas Department of Insurance license types page before you choose.
Yes, by passing the General Lines Life, Accident & Health exam and applying for that license. You would be taking the full 145-question exam, not a top-up, so if you expect to sell health products within a year it is usually better to take the broader exam once.
Practising for the Life, Accident & Health exam? Start with a 15-question check-up: a projected score on the 130 scale, your three weakest topics, and a plan to your date. Free, no sign-in. Life Agent candidates: the life and Texas-law topics are the same questions; a life-only mode is on the way.
Start the check-up free