KPSS

Overview

The Kamu Personeli Seçme Sınavı (KPSS, Public Personnel Selection Examination) is the central exam that Türkiye's Measurement, Selection and Placement Centre (ÖSYM) runs for first-time entry into most public-sector jobs. Anyone being appointed to a public post for the first time under the general rules for these exams needs a valid KPSS score.

KPSS scores are used in two ways:

• Group A posts are career tracks such as assistant inspector, assistant specialist and assistant auditor in ministries and similar bodies. Here KPSS works as a screening exam: an institution either appoints directly on KPSS scores, or invites candidates above a cut-off score to its own entrance exam and hires on that result. Candidates apply directly to the institution after it publishes a vacancy notice.

• Group B posts are the wider range of first-time civil service jobs. For these, ÖSYM itself places candidates into vacancies according to their KPSS score and their list of preferences.

The 2026 General Ability and General Culture session at bachelor's level was taken by 1,708,329 candidates across 145 exam centres.

Levels or stages

KPSS is held at three education levels. A candidate may sit only one level in a given cycle.

KPSS Lisans (bachelor's level)

For graduates of four-year (or longer) degree programmes and final-year students who can graduate in time. Anyone who completed a bachelor's degree on or before 13 July 2026 had to take the 2026 exam at this level. Holders of master's or doctoral degrees apply on the basis of their bachelor's field.

Every Lisans candidate must sit the General Ability and General Culture session. The subject-knowledge (Alan Bilgisi) sessions are optional; candidates choose them according to the score types required by the posts they want.

KPSS Ön Lisans (associate level)

For graduates of two-year vocational colleges and two-year open-education programmes who have not completed a bachelor's degree. It is held on a separate day from the Lisans exam, and the score type used for Group B hiring at this level is KPSSP93.

KPSS Ortaöğretim (secondary level)

For graduates of high schools and equivalent vocational schools who have not completed a bachelor's degree. It is also a separate exam day, and the Group B score type is KPSSP94.

Religious Services Subject Test (DHBT)

Candidates who want to work in religious services under the Presidency of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) also take the DHBT. It is taken at the same education level as the candidate's KPSS, and the General Ability and General Culture results also feed into the scores used for these appointments.

Exam pattern

KPSS Lisans tests, 2026

How the 2026 Lisans subject-knowledge sessions were grouped

Within each subject-knowledge session the test booklets are handed out one at a time; each booklet is collected when its time is up before the next one is given. All questions are multiple choice and are answered on an optical answer sheet.

Syllabus

• General Ability is split roughly equally between a verbal section (verbal reasoning, grammar and spelling) and a numerical section (numerical and logical reasoning).

• General Culture covers Turkish history, the geography of Türkiye, basic citizenship (introduction to law, constitutional and human-rights law, administration; about 15 percent of the test) and general, cultural and socio-economic topics about Türkiye and the world (about 10 percent).

• Subject-knowledge tests follow their own topic lists. For example, Law covers constitutional, administrative, criminal, civil, obligations, commercial, and enforcement and bankruptcy law; Economics covers the history of economic thought, micro and macroeconomics, money and banking, international economics, development and the Turkish economy; Public Finance covers public finance theory, revenue, expenditure, debt, the budget, tax law and fiscal policy.

Marking and results

• Each test is scored on its own. The raw score (net) is the number of correct answers minus one quarter of the number of wrong answers.

• Raw scores are converted into standard scores, which are then weighted into the different KPSS score types and rescaled to a 100-point scale.

• A candidate who does not reach at least 1 net in a test gets no standard score for it, and any score type that uses that test is not calculated.

• There are many Lisans score types. KPSSP3 weights General Ability and General Culture equally (50 percent each) and is the score used for Group B hiring at bachelor's level. Other types, such as KPSSP4 to KPSSP48, combine General Ability and General Culture with one or more subject-knowledge tests; DHBT-based types (such as KPSSP122 to KPSSP124) combine General Ability and General Culture with the two DHBT parts. Institutions state in their notices which score type they will use.

• Results are published on ÖSYM's results site and mobile app. No paper result certificate is posted; the result shows correct and wrong answers per test and the KPSS scores.

• 2026 KPSS results are valid for two years from the date they are announced. If no new exam is held in that time, they stay valid until the next exam's results are out.

• If someone who sat the 2026 exam at associate or secondary level later sits the next Group B bachelor's exam, their associate or secondary result stops being valid when the bachelor's result is announced.

Important dates

For the 2026 cycle:

• Lisans: applications 1–13 July 2026 (last day to pay, 14 July); late applications 22–23 July 2026. General Ability and General Culture on 6 September 2026 at 10:15; subject-knowledge sessions on 12–13 September 2026.

• DHBT: applications 22–30 September 2026; test on 1 November 2026.

• Ön Lisans: applications 29 July – 10 August 2026; exam on 4 October 2026.

• Ortaöğretim: applications 27 August – 8 September 2026; exam on 25 October 2026.

Fees

For the 2026 Lisans exam, the General Ability and General Culture session costs 800 TL, and each subject-knowledge session costs 500 TL. The DHBT costs 800 TL. Applications made on the late-application days pay a fee 50 percent higher. Spouses and children of martyrs, veterans (gazi), and veterans' spouses and children pay neither the exam fee nor the application-centre service fee. Fees are not refunded or carried over if a candidate does not sit the exam.

How to apply

Candidates apply through ÖSYM's candidate system (ais.osym.gov.tr), the ÖSYM mobile app, or an ÖSYM application centre (which charges a service fee). An application is only complete once the exam fee is paid within the deadline; unpaid applications are deleted. Candidates add subject-knowledge sessions during the same application and pay for each session they choose.

After the exam

For Group A posts, candidates watch for vacancy notices from individual institutions, which set their own conditions and score type, and apply to them directly. For Group B posts, candidates follow ÖSYM's preference-and-placement announcements or institutions' own recruitment notices that use KPSS scores.

Preparation tips

• Decide which posts you are aiming for before applying, and check which score type they use; that tells you which subject-knowledge sessions are worth paying for.

• Since every Lisans candidate sits General Ability and General Culture, and KPSSP3 is built only from those two tests, they matter for nearly everyone.

• Because wrong answers cost a quarter of a correct one, avoid guessing blindly on questions you cannot narrow down.