What Is the Casper Test? Format, Timing & Scoring for 2026-27

The Casper test is an open-response situational judgment test (SJT) run by Acuity Insights, used by medical, nursing, dentistry, veterinary, and teacher-education programs across the US and Canada. You watch or read short everyday scenarios, then answer open-ended questions about what you'd do — some answers typed, some recorded on webcam. There are no multiple-choice questions and no answer key: trained human raters score how you think.

If your program list includes Casper, here is the whole test, as officially published for the 2026-27 cycle.

The 2026-27 format: 11 scenarios in two sections

Casper was shortened for the 2025-26 cycle and kept that shape for 2026-27. The current test:

• 11 scenarios total, always in this order: 4 video-response scenarios first, then 7 typed-response scenarios.
• 2 open-ended questions per scenario.
• Video responses: questions appear one at a time. You get a 10-second countdown, then 1 minute to record each answer.
• Typed responses: both questions appear on one page, and you get 3.5 minutes total for the pair. When the timer ends, your answer submits as-is, even mid-sentence.
• Before answering any scenario, you get an optional 30-second reflection period.
• Two optional breaks: 10 minutes after the video section, 5 minutes after the first four typed scenarios.
• Total sitting time: 65-85 minutes.

Test takers consistently report that video answers are one take — no re-recording, no pausing — though Acuity does not publish that rule. Our simulator is built for one take.

Scenarios come in two prompt styles — short video clips with a role prompt ("you are a co-worker"), or text-based dilemmas. Either style can require either response mode. The situations are everyday interpersonal and ethical dilemmas, deliberately not specific to medicine or any profession, and test takers in the 2026-27 cycle commonly report a mix that includes personal-experience questions ("describe a time you…") alongside classic dilemmas.

If you find older guides describing 12 or 14 sections, 5-minute typed answers, or a 90-110 minute test — that format is gone. It changed in 2025, and prep material built on it will train you for the wrong clock.

How Casper is scored

Every response is scored by trained, certified human raters — Acuity states explicitly that no AI scores responses. A different rater scores each scenario, your responses are anonymized, and typos are officially not penalized. Question-level scores are averaged and standardized against everyone who took the same test, producing a z-score.

What each side sees is asymmetric: programs receive your z-score and percentile roughly 2-3 weeks after you test. You receive only your quartile — first (0-24th percentile) through fourth (75-100th) — about 4-5 weeks after test day. There is no per-question feedback and no score breakdown. Acuity's Terms of Use describes the quartile as covering the typed section; its Help Centre does not state the scope. Treat it as a coarse signal rather than a diagnosis.

Rules, logistics, and the one-attempt reality

You can take Casper once per test type per admissions cycle. Retakes exist only for verified technical problems, and your result is valid for the cycle you tested in — it does not carry forward. That single-attempt rule is most of why timing practice matters: test day is the first and only time your answers count.

Logistics worth knowing before you book: tests run at fixed dates and times, and you should reserve at least three days ahead. You'll need a desktop or laptop with Chrome or Firefox, a working webcam and microphone for the entire test, and you must pass a system-requirements check within six hours of your start time. The test is remote-proctored — the webcam keeps recording even during breaks. Paper, a pen, and a hardcopy dictionary are allowed; pre-written notes, phones, wearables, and any AI tools are not. Fees are a base testing fee plus a per-program distribution fee; the exact amounts live in Acuity's official Dates and Fees tool, so check there rather than trusting third-party numbers.

Where Casper fits in your application

In the US, Casper runs alongside your secondaries — the 2026-27 window opened in March 2026, and each school sets its own final acceptable test date, some as early as November. In Canada, testing clusters around the fall OMSAS cycle, and several schools pin hard cutoffs: Dalhousie ran only three test dates for this cycle, and McGill cancels applications without a completed Casper. Check which programs require Casper for the current, dated list — requirements genuinely change mid-cycle.

One asymmetry worth planning around: candidates widely report that Canadian programs weight Casper heavily in pre-interview screening — at one Canadian veterinary program it is officially 20% of the first-phase score — while most US programs treat it as one requirement among many. If you're applying in Canada, this test deserves real preparation time.

How to prepare (honestly)

Acuity provides a free, unlimited practice test in every applicant account, and states plainly that it does not endorse third-party prep. Start there — it's the only practice that runs in the real interface. For the full order of operations, see how to prepare for Casper.

What the free test doesn't give you is feedback, repetition under pressure, or any way to review your video answers. Building our simulator to this exact spec taught us where the format actually bites: the shared 3.5-minute typed timer and the 60-second video stop are the two constraints nobody meets comfortably the first time. That's the gap our AI-scored practice sim works on: the same 11-scenario structure and exact timings, and then the part nothing else gives you — AI reads every answer and scores it 0-100 against the nine competencies Casper says it measures, with a rating per competency, what worked, what to fix, and a rewritten example line. Plus a readiness band per session, timing diagnostics, and playback of your recorded answers. It's an independent AI practice score, not an official Casper result, and it will never pretend to know your quartile.