Test day

Equipment and Pre-Exam Checklist

The AP Biology exam is a hybrid digital assessment administered in the afternoon session (Monday, May 3, 2027). Your desk setup must bridge screen reading and handwritten execution without friction.

Mandatory and Permitted Gear

• Testing Device: A fully charged device that runs Bluebook (a Windows laptop or tablet, a Mac laptop, an iPad, or a school-managed Chromebook) with the app installed and updated, plus your power cord. Verify your College Board login credentials the night before.
• Writing Instruments:
  • 2–3 black or dark blue ballpoint pens for Section II prose responses. Free-response booklets are scanned for grading; gel pens that smear or faint ink can obscure your work.
  • 2–3 sharpened #2 pencils with clean erasers for scratch work and constructing the Question 2 Part B graph (always plot axes, data points, and error bars in pencil first so you can correct scaling mistakes cleanly, then darken or trace if needed).
• Approved Calculator: A physical four-function (with square root) or scientific calculator. While Bluebook embeds a Desmos scientific calculator, punching $\chi^2$ or Hardy–Weinberg values ($p^2 + 2pq + q^2 = 1$) on a physical keypad is faster and leaves your full screen unobstructed for reading experimental tables.

Mastering the Hybrid Bluebook-and-Booklet Setup

Understanding the transition between digital and paper prevents costly administrative errors.

Section I: Digital Multiple Choice (90 Minutes)

• You read and answer all 60 questions directly inside Bluebook.
• You will receive physical scratch paper. Use it immediately whenever a question presents a multi-step signal transduction cascade (Unit 4) or pedigree/cross (Unit 5): sketch a quick flow diagram (Ligand $\rightarrow$ Receptor $\rightarrow$ Inhibited Kinase $\rightarrow$ No Transcription) rather than holding five variables in working memory.
• Use the built-in Mark for Review flag and option-eliminator tool liberally.

Section II: Screen-to-Paper Free Response (90 Minutes)

• You view all 6 free-response questions inside Bluebook, but you write every answer—including your Question 2 graph—by hand in a paper Free-Response Booklet.
• Desk Ergonomics: Angle your laptop slightly to your non-dominant side at the top edge of the desk so the paper booklet sits squarely in front of your writing hand. You should be able to read data tables on the screen and write in the booklet by shifting only your eyes, not your posture.
• Booklet Discipline: Each question has designated pages in the paper booklet. Before writing a single word of Question 3, verify that the header at the top of your paper page matches the question number on your screen. Writing Question 4 in the Question 3 space requires tedious cross-outs and page redirection notes.