Best Free SQE1 Resources and Question Banks in 2026: Practice Questions, Flashcards, Notes, and Study Tools

Why Free SQE1 Resources Matter More Than Ever

The SQE1 is a 360-question multiple-choice examination split across two sittings of 180 questions each. It tests 14 functioning legal knowledge (FLK) areas across two papers, and the pass mark — while not publicly fixed — has historically hovered around 57–60%.

Candidates pay SRA registration fees (currently £1,558 for both SQE1 sittings), and most also invest in some form of prep course. As we covered in our SQE cost breakdown for 2026, the total cost of qualifying via the SQE route can easily reach £5,000–£15,000 when you factor in courses, assessments, and living costs. Every saving matters.

The good news is that the SQE1 format — standardised multiple-choice questions — is well-suited to self-study using free materials, more so than traditional bar exams or the old LPC. The question type is predictable. The syllabus is published. And a growing community of SQE candidates has been sharing resources openly since the assessments launched in 2021.

1. The SRA's Official Free Sample Questions: Your Essential Starting Point

The single most important free SQE1 resource is the SRA's own published sample questions. The SRA has released 170 free practice questions across both FLK papers, available directly on their website.

These are genuine examples of the style, difficulty, and wording of real SQE1 questions. Nothing else replicates the official question format as accurately, because these are written by the same body that sets the actual exam.

What the SRA provides:

• 45 FLK1 sample questions (covering Business Law, Dispute Resolution, Contract, Tort, Legal System)
• 45 FLK2 sample questions (covering Property, Wills and Probate, Solicitors Accounts, Land Law, Legal System)
• A small number of additional pilot and specimen questions published over multiple cycles
• Model answers with detailed explanations

How to use them: Do not treat these as a mock exam on day one. Save the SRA sample questions until you are around 60–70% through your revision. Use them as a calibration tool — they will tell you whether your understanding of question style is accurate before the real sitting.

One limitation: 170 questions is not enough to build exam readiness on its own. The SQE1 requires you to answer 360 questions under time pressure, and you need exposure to thousands of practice questions to build genuine fluency. The SRA samples are essential, but they are a starting point, not a complete preparation resource.

2. Free SQE1 Question Banks and Mock Exams from Prep Providers

Several preparation providers offer a limited number of free SQE1 practice questions as a lead-in to their paid products. Used together, these free offerings can give you a reasonable volume of practice material at no cost.

BPP University Law School

BPP offers a small bank of free SQE1 practice questions on their website, along with free webinars and introductory sessions. The free question samples are limited in number but are written to a high standard and are useful for calibration.

QLTS School Free Resources

QLTS School provides a free mock exam as part of their sign-up process. This gives you access to a timed, simulated exam environment, which is genuinely useful even if the question volume is limited.

AllAboutLaw Free Mock

AllAboutLaw offers a free SQE1 mock exam on their platform. The question quality varies, but the volume is reasonable for a free offering, and they cover most of the FLK subject areas.

Kaplan Free Samples

Kaplan publishes a selection of free SQE1 practice questions alongside their course materials. These are available without purchase and worth collecting.

The honest total from all these free sources combined: you can probably access 400–600 free SQE1 practice questions from reputable providers without spending anything. That sounds significant, but to put it in context — serious candidates typically complete 1,500–3,000+ practice questions before their sitting.

If you want to go deeper on practice questions without the free resource gaps, our SQE1 practice question bank provides structured, exam-standard questions with full answer explanations and subject-by-subject performance tracking.

3. Free SQE1 Flashcard Resources

Flashcards are among the most effective study tools for the SQE1 because so much of the exam tests recall of specific rules, thresholds, time limits, and principles — exactly the kind of content that flashcard repetition reinforces.

Anki Decks Shared by the SQE Community

Anki is a free spaced-repetition flashcard app, and the SQE community has produced a reasonable number of shared decks available via AnkiWeb. Search for "SQE1," "SQE FLK1," or specific subject areas like "SQE land law" or "SQE wills."

Quality varies considerably. The best community-made Anki decks are genuinely excellent and are updated regularly by candidates who have recently sat the exam. The worst are riddled with errors, outdated rules, or missing cards. Check the deck's review date and any community feedback before relying on it heavily.

Best practice: Download multiple community Anki decks for the same subject, cross-reference them, and build your own merged deck from the best cards of each. This active process of evaluating and consolidating also reinforces learning.

Quizlet Sets for SQE1

Quizlet has a substantial library of SQE1 sets created by law students and candidates. Again, quality varies, but you can find well-constructed sets for most of the 14 FLK subject areas. Quizlet's free tier includes basic flashcard study and matching games.

Search specifically for: "SQE1 business law," "SQE contract law," "SQE1 torts," "SQE property law," "SQE wills probate," and so on by subject.

Building Your Own Flashcard System

Many successful SQE1 candidates recommend building your own flashcard system rather than relying entirely on someone else's. The process of creating a card is itself a study activity, and you end up with cards calibrated to your exact gaps rather than someone else's.

If you want a purpose-built flashcard experience specifically designed for SQE1 content, our SQE1 flashcard tool covers all 14 FLK subject areas with verified, examiner-aligned content.

4. Free SQE1 Study Notes and Open-Access Materials

Community-Shared Study Notes

The SQE candidate community shares study notes extensively through:

• Google Drive links posted on Reddit (r/lawuk) and The Student Room SQE threads
• Notion pages made public by candidates who have completed their sitting
• Law school open-access resources — several universities publish their SQE1 preparation materials publicly as part of widening access initiatives

The most useful community notes tend to be condensed subject summaries (two to four pages per FLK area) rather than comprehensive textbook-style documents. For the SQE1 specifically, dense notes are often counterproductive — you want distilled rules and principles you can recall quickly under exam conditions.

University Open-Access Materials

Several UK universities publish law lecture notes and materials under open licences. The University of London's online resources, materials from the Open University Law programme, and various university library reading lists are all accessible without enrollment.

These are particularly useful for foundational understanding of subjects like Contract, Tort, and Land Law. They are less useful for SQE-specific content like Solicitors Accounts (SAR rules) or the SRA Standards and Regulations, where you really need materials written specifically for the SQE format.

SRA Published Guidance

The SRA's own published guidance — the SRA Code of Conduct, Standards and Regulations, and the Accounts Rules — are available free on the SRA website and are primary source material for a significant portion of FLK1 and FLK2 questions.

For structured, SQE-specific study notes covering all FLK subject areas, our study notes section provides concise, examiner-aligned summaries designed for the format and difficulty level of the real exam.

5. Free YouTube Channels and Video Lectures for SQE1

YouTube has become a surprisingly strong resource for SQE1 candidates, with several channels producing genuinely useful content.

The Digest (by BARBRI)

BARBRI's YouTube channel includes a number of free SQE overview lectures and subject introductions. These are professionally produced and give a good structural overview of key FLK areas, though they are clearly designed to funnel viewers toward paid courses.

Law Simplified

Law Simplified on YouTube covers core English law subjects at a level directly applicable to SQE1 preparation. The property law and land law videos in particular are well-regarded in the SQE community for their clarity.

University Channel Lectures

Search YouTube for "[subject] law lecture UK" and you will find openly published lecture recordings from UK universities covering most SQE1 subjects. These are particularly good for subjects like Contract, Tort, and Equity where the law is stable and lectures from any recent year remain accurate.

Limitation: YouTube and podcast content is rarely structured for SQE1 exam technique. Watching lectures builds understanding but does not build the pattern recognition and speed that the multiple-choice format demands.

6. Free Study Planning Tools and Timetable Templates

Google Sheets and Notion Templates

The SQE community has produced numerous free study planning templates available through Reddit and The Student Room. A basic Google search for "SQE1 study timetable template free" will return several downloadable options.

The most useful templates include:

• A subject coverage tracker showing all 14 FLK areas and sub-topics
• A weekly schedule template with time blocks for each subject
• A practice question log to track performance by subject area
• A revision calendar counting down to the exam date

The SRA's Syllabus as Your Master Checklist

The SRA publishes the full SQE1 assessment specification, which functions as a comprehensive checklist of every topic that could appear on the exam. Print this out and use it as a master revision tracker, ticking off topics as you cover them.

If you are preparing while working, the structured approach matters even more. Our guide on passing SQE1 while working full time covers how to build a realistic study schedule around a demanding job.

7. Free Communities and Forums for SQE Candidates

r/lawuk (Reddit)

The r/lawuk subreddit is the most active English-language community for UK law students and SQE candidates. You will find:

• Shared free resources (notes, Anki decks, question links)
• Honest peer reviews of prep providers
• Study strategy discussions and post-exam debrief threads
• Question-specific help from candidates who have covered the same material

The Student Room

The Student Room's SQE section is less active than r/lawuk but contains a substantial archive of older threads with useful resource recommendations and provider comparisons.

Law Society and Junior Lawyers Division Resources

The Law Society publishes free guidance for SQE candidates, and the Junior Lawyers Division (JLD) runs webinars and events that are free or low-cost for members.

WhatsApp and Telegram Study Groups

Numerous SQE1 study groups operate on WhatsApp and Telegram, many coordinated through Reddit or The Student Room. These vary enormously in quality but the best ones share resources daily, quiz each other on practice questions, and provide accountability.

8. How to Combine Free Resources Into an Effective Study Plan

Here is a realistic structure for building a free-only SQE1 study plan:

Weeks 1–4 (Foundation building):

• Read through the SRA syllabus and mark all 14 FLK areas
• Use YouTube lectures and university open-access materials for subject-by-subject overview
• Begin building or downloading Anki decks for each subject
• Join r/lawuk and at least one WhatsApp/Telegram study group

Weeks 5–12 (Active revision):

• Work through community study notes for each subject
• Begin practice questions from free provider banks (save SRA samples for later)
• Do flashcard review daily using spaced repetition
• Track performance by subject and adjust time allocation accordingly

Weeks 13–16 (Exam preparation):

• Complete SRA official sample questions as a calibration exercise
• Work through all remaining free mock exams from providers (QLTS, AllAboutLaw)
• Focus additional revision on weakest subject areas identified through practice
• Use timed practice to build exam pace

The challenge with this plan is that free question volume runs out relatively quickly. By the time you reach the exam preparation phase, you may have exhausted the freely available questions and still not have done enough practice to feel genuinely exam-ready.

9. Honest Assessment: Where Free SQE1 Resources Fall Short

It would be dishonest to suggest that free resources alone give you the same preparation as a structured paid toolkit. Here is where the gaps are significant:

Limited Question Volume

The total volume of high-quality free practice questions across all providers is roughly 400–600 questions. Research on multiple-choice exam preparation suggests that candidates need 1,500–3,000+ questions to build reliable exam technique. Free resources get you about a third of the way there.

No Performance Tracking

Free question banks do not provide meaningful performance analytics. You cannot easily see which subjects you are weakest in, how your performance is trending, or which specific topic areas within a subject need more attention.

No Structured Progression

Free resources are largely unstructured. Anki decks, YouTube videos, and community notes do not guide you from foundation to exam readiness — they sit there waiting to be used.

Outdated Materials

The SQE1 syllabus incorporates statutory and regulatory changes, and community-created materials are often not updated when the law changes. Using outdated materials for regulatory content is a meaningful risk.

No Examiner-Aligned Question Style

Community-created practice questions are rarely written in the specific style and difficulty level of actual SQE1 questions.

10. When It Makes Sense to Invest in Paid Resources

If your budget is genuinely very tight, a free-only approach is viable, especially if you have a strong law background from an LLB or GDL. However, there are circumstances where investing in at least a modest paid supplement makes clear sense:

• You are sitting SQE1 for the first time without a law degree background. The structure and volume of paid resources significantly reduces risk on your first attempt.
• You have a busy schedule with limited study time. Paid resources with structured progression and performance tracking make your limited hours more efficient. See our guide on passing SQE1 while working full time.
• You have failed SQE1 once. If you are resitting, targeted preparation based on your previous weaknesses is essential.
• You find yourself running out of practice questions. When you have exhausted the free question banks and still have weeks to your sitting, investing in a paid question bank is clearly the right call.

For a full comparison of paid prep course providers, see our SQE1 prep course providers compared guide.

11. The Minimum Viable SQE1 Study Toolkit: Best Free + Affordable Paid Combination

Here is a practical recommendation for candidates who want to be smart about spending.

Free Foundation (Cost: £0)

Targeted Paid Supplements (Prioritised by Impact)

1. A structured practice question bank — this is where free resources fall shortest and where the investment return is highest. A question bank with 1,000–2,000 SQE1-standard questions, subject filtering, and performance analytics fills the most critical gap in a free-only toolkit. Our SQE1 practice question bank is designed specifically for this purpose, with exam-standard questions, detailed explanations, and subject-level performance tracking.

2. Examiner-aligned flashcards — if the Anki community decks feel inconsistent or you are worried about outdated content, purpose-built SQE1 flashcards for all 14 subject areas give you confidence that what you are memorising is accurate and current. See our flashcard tool.

3. A timed full mock exam — you want at least one experience of sitting a full 180-question paper under realistic time pressure before your actual sitting. Our full mock exam replicates the timing, format, and difficulty of the real FLK papers.

For full pricing details, see our pricing page.

Final Thoughts

The free SQE1 resources available in 2026 are genuinely better than they were when the assessment launched in 2021. The SRA's 170 official questions, the community Anki decks, the free provider mocks, and the r/lawuk community together form a real preparation foundation that candidates a few years ago did not have access to.

But free resources have clear limits — in question volume, in structure, in accuracy, and in performance tracking. The candidates who use free resources most successfully are those who are honest about those limits and fill the gaps strategically rather than hoping that more YouTube videos will make up for the lack of exam-standard practice questions.

Start with the free foundation. Use the SRA samples wisely. Build your Anki system. Join the community. Then, when you hit the limits of what free gives you, invest narrowly and precisely in the tools that fill your specific gaps.

The SQE1 pass rate matters. Your chances matter. Spend where it makes a difference, and not a penny more than that.