Study for the California contractor license exams

Trade Forge Prep is the most effective way to prepare for the Law & Business and General Building (B) exams. You learn the right answers, and you learn why they are right.

You can start right now, without an account or a card.

How it works

  1. 1. Start with the study guideCSLB divides each exam into content areas, and every one of them has its own guide: what CSLB tests in it, the numbers worth memorizing, and the places people get tripped up. Each rule names the law or code section it comes from, so you can check it against the source.
  2. 2. Answer practice questionsThe questions are weighted the way CSLB weights the real exam. When you get one wrong, we show you why the answer you picked looked right, and we link you to the law or code section that settles which answer is correct.
  3. 3. Work through a job scenarioEach scenario puts you on a real job: a kitchen remodel, a permit nobody pulled, a sub who files a lien. You make the calls a contractor makes, and every call changes what happens next. You find out what a decision costs you, rather than being told you picked the wrong letter.
  4. 4. See where you standYou take a full-length practice exam under the same time limit as the real one. Nothing is revealed while the clock runs. When you finish, you go back through every question and see the law or code behind each right answer.

What's here for each exam

Each exam has its own page that collects everything we have built for it.

What you get

Without an account

Take one whole content area as far as it goes, and decide for yourself whether this works.

  • Every study guide, readable in full.
  • Every practice question in one content area on each exam.
  • The job scenarios in those content areas, playable to the end.

With an account

  • A second content area on Law & Business.
  • One full-length timed practice exam for each exam, reviewed question by question when you finish.
  • Progress saved to your account and carried to any device you use.

Creating an account takes an email address and nothing else. There is no password to set now and none to remember later, because signing in is always a link we email you.

Create an account

Full access

$99, one time (normally $199)

  • Every content area on both exams, and every job scenario.
  • Eight practice exams for each exam. No question appears on more than one.
  • A question at the end of each chapter that asks you to recall the rule before you move on.
  • A study plan that paces the reading to your exam date.
  • A readiness checklist showing which content areas you have covered.
  • Every number the exam asks about, on one page, each with its source.

You pay once, and it covers both exams. There is no subscription, no payment plan, and nothing to renew.

18 months of access, from the day you buy

If it takes you more than one attempt in that time, everything here is still yours. You keep the same questions and the same study guides, and there is nothing to buy a second time.

Payment is handled by Stripe. Your card details never touch this site.

Have you taken one of these exams before?

Your score report names the content areas that fell short, in CSLB's own words. Tell us which ones they were, and your practice will start with those instead of working through the exam from the top.

Choose your content areas