Overview
Many Mexican institutes, colleges and universities use the EXANI exams from Ceneval, a non-profit national evaluation centre, as a support tool in their admission decisions. Each institution decides how to use the results. This page covers the EXANI-II, the exam used for entry to undergraduate (licenciatura) and technical university programmes. Check each university's call to see whether it requires EXANI-II.
Levels or stages
The EXANI family has three levels.
EXANI-I supports entry to upper secondary school. It has 130 items on basic skills plus 30 diagnostic English items, in 4.5 hours.
EXANI-II supports entry to technical university and licenciatura programmes. This is the one this page describes.
EXANI-III supports entry to graduate programmes. See the separate EXANI-III page.
Who can apply
EXANI-II is for people who have finished upper secondary education and want to enter higher education at an institution that has contracted Ceneval. It is not offered to individual applicants: you take it because the university you apply to requires it.
Exam pattern
The exam is taken in a single session of up to 4.5 hours, with multiple-choice items that have three answer options. The scored part has 138 items. A separate 30-item English diagnostic is not counted in the global score, and Ceneval adds unscored pilot and control items.
| Area | Items |
|---|---|
| Discipline module 1 | 24 |
| Discipline module 2 | 24 |
| Reading comprehension | 30 |
| Indirect writing | 30 |
| Mathematical thinking | 30 |
| Scored subtotal | 138 |
| English (diagnostic only) | 30 |
The institution picks the two discipline modules to match the programme. The 16 specific modules are Administration, Physics, Arithmetic, History, Biology, Literature, Differential and integral calculus, Financial mathematics, Health sciences, Pre-medicine, Law, Probability and statistics, Economics, Chemistry, Philosophy and Psychology. Pre-medicine has 48 items, so it cannot be combined with another module. Alternatively an institution can use two general modules, Experimental sciences and Social sciences, which are applied together and cannot be mixed with specific modules. English is measured at B1 level.
How to apply
You do not register with Ceneval. Each institution publishes its own call with dates, venues, costs and exam format, and registers you itself. EXANI-II can be applied on paper, online at the institution, or from home.
After the exam
Each institution decides how to use your score alongside other criteria and publishes its own results and enrolment steps.
Preparation tips
Find out which discipline modules your target programme uses, then study those first.
Use Ceneval's published syllabi for the cross-cutting areas and for each module.
Check each university's call; registration windows differ between institutions.
Do I register with Ceneval for EXANI-II?
No. Ceneval says the exam is not applied to individual applicants. You register through the institution that requires it.