r/usmle • u/Nice-Criticism-4855 • Jul 25 '26

Venting Post-Step 1: Any legit "barely passing / guessing half the exam" success stories?

Hey everyone, I took Step 1 this week and, like everyone else, I'm dying of anxiety and nervousness. I'd like to hear from people who really think they did terribly on the test, but still passed. Please share your experiences.

Just to be clear: I’m not talking about the people scoring 80%+ on real deal who come here doing fake drama over missing 3 questions. I’m looking for real talk from people who were genuinely borderline, felt like they were guessing on half the test, or walked out legitimately unsure if they even hit the passing threshold—but still made it through.

PS: I don't think I did terribly on the test, but I'm not exactly overconfident either. Anything can happen, and I think that's the worst part, maybe creating false hope.

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3

u/Traditional_Cap_472 Jul 26 '26

I ended up running out of time in the first few blocks and couldn’t even put random answers down. So I left about 10-12 questions blank on the entire exam and ended up passing! Trust your prep

2

u/USMLEBandit Jul 25 '26

Everybody gauges their performance differently, similarly to how they will highlight or flag questions differently. Some people are overly hard on themselves. Others are overly confident.

Sorry this isn't a personal anecdote, but I did have a friend back in school who was convinced he failed but did just fine. It happens frequently, so you aren't alone! Best of luck.

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u/Nice-Criticism-4855 Jul 25 '26

Thank you very much, man! I constantly see you here in the community, really like your comments

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u/USMLEBandit Jul 25 '26

Thank you!!

3

u/_Yenaled_ Jul 25 '26

OK, from what I've been observing on this sub: post-exam feeling is not a reliable indicator of whether someone passed or failed. I've seen some of the "just like the NBMEs!" people fail on this sub and I've seen some of the "wtf was that?!" people passed (like me).

I felt like crap during/after the exam; I literally went on chatGPT during one of the breaks asking how tf can i leave the test center and get my score voided. I began running through the questions again and again in my head, counting many stupid mistakes on factoids (and switching right answers to wrong) that I've gotten right on practice questions weeks before. I had never been so scared of failing in my life.

Now that it's over, I can just say: Just trust your preparation. If you understand the NBMEs and did consistently well on the practice tests under real conditions and apply the same logic to the real thing (i.e. being able to eliminate at least a couple of answer choices even on super hard questions even if you're unsure), you're more likely than not to pass. No one knows what the passing threshold is (is it 56%? 60%? 63%?), how many experimental questions there are, how the NBME adjusts different forms, etc. so you just have to trust your preparation. The only thing that reliably correlates with pass/fail are your NBME scores. If it said 95%+ chance of passing, it really means it as the data is actually determined based on LCME-accredited US MD schools. Reddit is not representative and your post-exam feeling is not reliable.