What happens if you fail the Part 107 test?

If you fail the Part 107 test, you must wait 14 calendar days before you can retake it, and the second attempt costs the full exam fee again. Nothing else happens. There is no mark on a record, no cap on future attempts, no requirement to complete remedial instruction before trying again, and no effect on any certificate you already hold. The FAA treats a failed knowledge test as exactly what it is: an attempt that did not clear 70 percent, documented on a report that tells you precisely where it fell short.

This article walks through what the failing score report contains and how to use it, the waiting period rule and where it comes from, and the mechanics and cost of booking the retake. It ends where a company running multiple pilots should start: treating a failed attempt as program data rather than a private embarrassment, because the timeline it creates affects scheduling either way.

What a failing score report tells you

A failed attempt still produces an Airman Knowledge Test Report, and it is the most useful study document you will ever get for free. Alongside the score, the report lists a code for every question answered incorrectly, keyed to the FAA's Airman Certification Standards for remote pilots. Each code resolves to a specific knowledge element, sectional chart interpretation, weather sources, loading and performance, operating rules, so the report converts a bad afternoon into a precise inventory of what to fix. A 65 with codes clustered in airspace is a very different problem from a 65 spread across every topic.

The right move on the drive home is to translate every code before the frustration fades, then build the next two weeks of study around the list rather than starting the whole curriculum over. Candidates who fail narrowly usually failed on two or three areas, and generic re-study wastes the waiting period on material they already know. Keep the failed report, too. It documents the attempt date that the retest clock runs from, and comparing its codes against the eventual passing report is the cleanest evidence that the preparation worked.

The 14 day waiting period and where it comes from

The waiting period is regulation, not testing center policy. Under 14 CFR 107.71, an applicant who fails the knowledge test may not reapply for 14 calendar days after the failure. Calendar days means calendar days: fail on the third of the month and the earliest new attempt is the seventeenth, weekends included. Testing vendors enforce the window automatically at scheduling, so there is no exception to request and no supervisor to ask. The two weeks exist to push candidates toward real preparation instead of rapid fire reattempts against a large question bank.

Used well, 14 days is enough. The knowledge areas are finite, the score report has already named the weak ones, and the study materials are unchanged from the first attempt. The trap is booking the retake for day 15 out of pride when the codes say the gaps need three weeks, or drifting for two months because no date is on the calendar. Pick the retest date the same week as the failure, anchor it to the report's code list, and the waiting period becomes a study plan with a deadline instead of a penalty box.

Booking and paying for the second attempt

The retake is scheduled the same way as the first attempt, through the FAA's testing vendor at an approved testing center, and it costs the full fee again, the same amount the first sitting cost. The fee is per sitting, not per certificate, and no portion of a failed attempt carries forward. Remote pilot applicants do not need an instructor endorsement to retest after a failure, which keeps the retake logistics simple: wait out the 14 days, book, bring the failing test report and the same identification the first sitting required, and sit the exam again.

There is no limit on attempts, and a later pass is worth exactly what a first time pass is worth: a result valid for 24 calendar months for the certificate application, with no asterisk. For a company sponsoring a candidate, the practical questions are budget and timeline. Each attempt is a fresh fee, and each failure moves the earliest possible certificate date by at least two weeks plus processing. Building one funded retake and a realistic study window into onboarding costs little and removes the temptation to rush a marginal candidate back into the booth.

A failed attempt is program data too

Inside a company, a failed test tends to vanish. The candidate quietly rebooks, the manager hears about it in passing, and the only trace is a delayed start date nobody can quite explain later. That opacity has real costs: schedules built on a certificate arriving in week three, client commitments made against a pilot who cannot yet fly, and no institutional memory of which knowledge areas keep tripping new hires. One failure is a personal event. A pattern of failures across a hiring class is a training problem the program cannot see if nothing is written down.

The fix is to log attempts the way you log any other qualification step: date, outcome, retest window, and the earliest realistic certificate date, visible to the people planning work. The score itself can stay private; the timeline cannot, because dispatch is already depending on it. Programs that record attempts also learn from them, adjusting study materials when the same code families show up across candidates. The difference between a stumble and a scheduling failure is whether anyone wrote the stumble down.

Common mistakes in retaking the Part 107 test

Rebooking for the first legal day by default. Day 15 is the earliest date, not the recommended one. If the report's codes span several knowledge areas, a retake booked out of pride meets the same exam with the same gaps and pays for the lesson twice.

Restudying everything instead of the codes. The AKTR already names what went wrong. Spending the waiting period rereading strong areas feels productive and changes nothing; translating each code and drilling those elements is what moves a 65 to an 80.

Throwing away the failed report. An applicant retesting after a failure has to submit the failing AKTR to the testing center before sitting again, and the same report names the exact deficiencies to fix. Discarding it costs the study map and the paperwork the retest requires.

Assuming an endorsement is required. Remote pilot applicants can retest after failure without instructor sign off. Candidates who wait on a training provider for permission that no rule requires add days to a timeline that is already two weeks longer.

Hiding the failure from the program. Managers plan against certificate dates. An unreported failure quietly moves that date by weeks, and the schedule finds out at the worst time. Report the attempt, book the retest, and let planning adjust early.

FAQ

How long do you have to wait to retake the Part 107 test?

Fourteen calendar days from the date of the failed attempt, under 14 CFR 107.71. The testing vendor will not seat you earlier, and the count includes weekends and holidays, so a failure on the first permits retesting on the fifteenth.

Do you have to pay again after failing the Part 107 exam?

Yes. Each sitting is a separate full fee paid to the testing vendor at scheduling, and nothing from a failed attempt carries over. Budgeting one funded retake per candidate keeps a single failure from becoming a negotiation.

Is there a limit on Part 107 test attempts?

No. You can retake the exam as many times as needed, with a 14 day wait after each failure and a fresh fee each sitting. A later pass carries the same 24 calendar month validity as a first attempt pass.

Does failing the test affect an existing certificate or future flying?

No. A failed knowledge test creates no enforcement record and does not touch any certificate you already hold. Its only lasting artifacts are the score report and the two week delay, both of which belong in your planning.

Closing thought

Failing the Part 107 test costs two weeks and a second fee, and that is all it costs if the response is organized. The score report names the gaps, the regulation sets the earliest retry, and the calendar does the rest. Candidates who treat the report as a study map usually pass the second sitting comfortably.

For a program, the failure is also a small preview of how it handles inconvenient information. If you are regrouping after a failed Part 107 attempt on your team, FlybyOps was built for the operational record problem at the center of regulated drone work. A pilot registry that tracks certification and currency, a project and job hierarchy that keeps schedules honest, and an append-only audit log are all part of how the platform keeps every attempt, waiting period, and eventual pass on one timeline the program can plan around.