Is the CFA exam worth it?
What charterholders actually earn, why the quoted salary premiums do not mean what they look like, and the four questions that decide it for you.
Reviewed by the CFAQuiz curriculum team12 min readUpdated
You came here for a number, so here is the best one that exists. CFA Institute surveyed its members in 2024 and published what they earn. This is the median for a portfolio manager at the intermediate professional level, roughly where a charterholder sits five to ten years in.
Portfolio management, intermediate professional, from the CFA Institute Compensation Study 2024. Every person counted in that figure holds the charter.
That is a real number from a real survey, and it is the last one on this page you should take at face value. The reason is the line underneath it: every person counted in it holds the charter. So it tells you what charterholders earn. It does not tell you what the charter earned them, and those are different questions with different answers.
The charter opens roles that screen for it, mainly in asset management, equity research and risk. It does not add a percentage to the job you already have. If the work you want does not ask for it, roughly 900 hours buys you knowledge you could get more cheaply elsewhere.
What actually moves the number
Hold everything still. Same job function, same seniority band, same credential: portfolio managers at intermediate level, every one of them a charterholder. Now change only how long they have been working.
- 0 to less than 5 years$96,400
n = 195
- 5 to less than 10 years$115,000
n = 349
- 10 to less than 20 years$153,000
n = 129
Experience alone moves the median by 59%, among people who all already hold the charter.
Medians for 2023 total compensation, portfolio management, intermediate professional (n = 689), as reported in the CFA Institute Compensation Study 2024, quoted here to examine what the figures do and do not show. The study and its data are CFA Institute's.
Now hold experience still and change only geography. Same function, same seniority band, same credential again.
- Americas$130,500
n = 403
- EMEA$103,670
n = 202
- APAC$74,040
n = 84
Where you work moves the median by 76%, again among people who all hold the charter.
Medians for 2023 total compensation, portfolio management, intermediate professional (n = 689), as reported in the CFA Institute Compensation Study 2024, quoted here to examine what the figures do and do not show. The study and its data are CFA Institute's.
Two things that have nothing to do with the charter swing pay by 59% and 76% inside a single job title. Any headline premium smaller than that is inside the noise of who happens to be in each group.
Why the quoted premiums are unreliable
Search this question and you will be told charterholders earn 18% to 53% more, or 10% to 25% more, or 57% more than a Level I candidate. The figures contradict each other, most name no comparison group, and most sit on sites selling exam preparation.
Follow them back and they lead to the same CFA Institute survey quoted at the top of this page. So look at how it was built. It went to CFA Institute members, 17,358 usable replies came back, and that was an 8.6% response rate. Of those replies, 16,877 were charterholders and 481 were not.
The comparison group is 2.8% of a self-selected sample, and even those people are CFA Institute members. A survey shaped like that cannot weigh the charter against the wider industry, because the wider industry is not in it.
The "57% more than a Level I candidate" version has a simpler problem. A Level I candidate and a charterholder are usually the same person four years apart. The first chart above already showed you what four to ten years does on its own.
What the evidence can establish
One study tries to isolate the charter's effect rather than describe the people who hold it. Kang, Li and Su, in the Financial Analysts Journal in 2018, looked at roughly 9,900 US sell-side equity analysts between 1993 and 2015, about a third of them charterholders, and adjusted for the fact that people who sit the exams already differ from people who do not.
Charterholders' stock recommendations performed better, by about 4.7% a year in abnormal returns, and the charter raised the probability of making Institutional Investor's All-America Research Team by around two percentage points, a relative increase of roughly a fifth.
Read the limits as carefully as the result. It covers US sell-side research, so it says nothing about the buy side, compliance, corporate finance, private banking, or anywhere outside the US. It measures analyst output and recognition. It does not measure anyone's salary. And it appeared in a journal owned by CFA Institute, which does not make it wrong but is worth knowing. The paper is Assessing the Worth of the CFA Program. A page telling you to check the source owes you the source.
| Kind of source | What it says | What it proves |
|---|---|---|
| A compensation survey of members | Charterholders report a median of $115,000 in this role. | That the charter produced that figure |
| A prep provider's salary page | Charterholders earn 18% to 53% more. | Anything: the ranges contradict each other and name no comparison group |
| Kang, Li and Su (2018) | Charterholders' recommendations performed better and they were likelier to make the All-America Research Team. | That the charter tracks better analyst output in US sell-side research, after adjusting for ability |
| The job posting you want to answer | CFA charter required, or meaningful progress towards it. | That this specific door is gated, which is the only question that matters to you |
What CFA Institute's own data shows
Here is the part that decides how this page is written. In 2024 CFA Institute asked its members, for the first time, what the charter had actually done for their careers. The answers are not about money.
- 42% of entry-level members said pursuing the charter helped them secure their first job in the investment industry.
- 37% across all seniority levels said it helped them enter the industry at all.
- Around 80% agreed it improved their ability to compete with other candidates in the job market, consistently across regions and seniority levels.
When CFA Institute set out to demonstrate the charter's value, the evidence it produced was about getting in and standing out, not about being paid more. That is the honest case for the charter, and it is a good one.
What it really costs
The fees are the small number. CFA Institute's guidance is about 300 hours of study per level, so the minimum path is roughly 900 hours, and failing a level earns you no discount on the next attempt: it costs you the whole level again.
- Through Level I~300 hours
CFA Institute's own guidance, and most candidates report needing more.
- Through Level II~600 hours
Widely reported as the hardest of the three, on the same nominal budget.
- Through Level III~900 hours
The minimum path, if you pass all three at the first attempt. Roughly six months of full-time work.
- With one failure anywhere~1,200 hours
A failed level costs the whole level again, plus six to twelve months of waiting for the next sitting.
Study hours are CFA Institute's own guidance of about 300 per level. Fees change every cycle and vary by how early you register, so check CFA Institute for the current schedule rather than trusting any figure on a third-party site, including this one.
| Registration, everything early and first time | Roughly $3,500 in total |
|---|---|
| Each retake | Another registration fee, in full |
| Typical time to complete | Three to four years |
| After passing Level III | 4,000 hours of qualified work experience before you hold the charter |
Fees change every cycle and depend on how early you register, so treat any figure on a third-party site, this one included, as approximate and check CFA Institute for the current schedule. The last row is the one people forget: passing Level III does not make you a charterholder. The work experience requirement runs alongside, and if your job does not qualify, the exams alone do not finish the job.
All of it has to be weighed against your honest chance of finishing, which is lower than most people assume. Pass rates over the last decade have run near 40% at Level I, 45% at Level II and 50% at Level III. Survivable one at a time. Multiplied, not.
- Sit Level I100
The starting cohort.
- Pass Level I40
At the ten-year average of roughly 40%.
- Pass Level II18
Roughly 45% of those who go on to sit it.
- Pass Level III9
Roughly 50% again, and still not a charterholder without the work experience.
Modelled from CFA Institute's published pass rates for the last decade (roughly 40% at Level I, 45% at Level II, 50% at Level III). It is an illustration of how three exams compound, not a figure CFA Institute publishes.
The expected value of starting is not the value of the charter. It is the value of the charter multiplied by your honest chance of finishing, minus 900 hours you spend either way. Anyone selling you this decision on a salary figure has quietly assumed you are in the last bar.
How to decide, in four questions
Ignore the averages. Four questions settle this faster than any comparison table.
- Do the jobs you actually want ask for it? Open twenty real postings for the role you are aiming at and count. This single check beats every statistic on this page, because it measures your market instead of a global average.
- Are you already in the industry, or trying to get in? CFA Institute's own data says the charter is strongest at the point of entry and as a differentiator between candidates. It is a weak substitute for experience if you are far outside the field.
- Will your employer pay, and give you study leave? Support changes both the cost and your odds of finishing, which are the two terms in the whole calculation.
- Can you find 300 hours, three times, without wrecking something else? The people who regret it are rarely the ones who failed an exam. They are the ones who spent two years half-studying and never sat Level II.
If you have decided to start, the next honest question is how ready you are, and what actually predicts passing Level I. You can also try ten free questions per topic to see what the exam asks before you pay anyone anything.
Common questions
How much do CFA charterholders earn?+−
The CFA Institute Compensation Study 2024 reports a median 2023 total compensation of $115,000 for portfolio managers at intermediate professional level. That figure describes charterholders; it does not isolate what the charter contributed, because everyone counted in it holds one.
Does the CFA charter increase your salary?+−
There is no reliable evidence that it raises pay in a job you already hold. Within a single role and seniority band, all of them charterholders, experience alone moves median pay by 59% and region by 76%, which is larger than any premium usually attributed to the charter.
Is the CFA worth it if I don't work in finance?+−
Usually not on its own. CFA Institute's own member data shows the charter working hardest at the point of entry and as a differentiator between candidates, and it still requires 4,000 hours of qualified work experience before you can hold it.
How many people who start the CFA actually finish?+−
CFA Institute does not publish a completion rate. Applying a decade of published pass rates to 100 first-attempt Level I candidates leaves roughly 9 through all three levels; retakes raise that, and candidates who stop after passing a level lower it.
How much does the CFA cost in total?+−
Registration is roughly $3,500 if you register early for every level and pass each first time, with a full fee for every retake. The larger cost is time: about 300 hours per level on CFA Institute's own guidance, so around 900 hours minimum.
Is the CFA better than an MBA?+−
They do different jobs. The charter is narrow and technical and signals investment expertise; an MBA is broad and much of its value is the network and the recruiting pipeline. If you want a specific investment role that screens for the charter, the charter is the cheaper route to it.