CPD requirements by profession

SRA continuing competence: the CPD requirements for solicitors

Last reviewed 16 October 2026

Solicitors who qualified before 2016 often still think in terms of 16 hours a year. That requirement is gone, and has been for almost a decade — but what replaced it is widely misunderstood as “no requirement”, which is not the same thing at all.

What actually changed in 2016

The shift was from input to judgement. The regulator stopped prescribing a quantity and started asking whether you had honestly assessed what your practice needed and done something about it.

The declaration is the requirement

All solicitors are required to make a declaration to the SRA each year confirming they have reflected on the standard of their work, identified any learning and development needs, and addressed them.

It is worth sitting with what that means. The declaration is a regulatory statement about your own competence. Making it without having done the reflection is not a paperwork shortcut — it is a false declaration to your regulator, which is a materially different category of problem from having logged too few hours under the old regime.

“No hours” is not “no evidence”

Because there is no target, some solicitors keep no record at all. That is a mistake for two reasons.

First, reflection you cannot describe is hard to evidence if your competence is ever questioned — in a complaint, in a negligence claim, or in a supervisory conversation. Second, firms increasingly set their own internal expectations precisely because the regulator no longer does, and those are often stricter than 16 hours ever was.

A short, honest record — what you identified, what you did, what changed — costs little and answers both.

Where CPD accreditation fits — and where it doesn't

The SRA does not approve, endorse or accredit external training providers. There is no such thing as an “SRA-approved” CPD course, and under a competence-based model there could not be: the regulator assesses your judgement about your needs, not a provider's catalogue.

So the honest position is that independent CPD accreditation does not discharge an SRA obligation, because the obligation is a declaration about your own reflection. What it does is make the learning easier to assess and to record: an AssuredCPD-accredited course states what it intends to teach, which lets you judge in advance whether it addresses the gap you identified, and carries a verifiable reference if you ever need to show the activity was real.

Any provider telling a solicitor that accreditation satisfies the SRA is wrong. We are explicit with our own providers about where the line sits — see what you can and can't claim once a course is CPD accredited.

What to look for in a course

Whatever body you report to, the same four questions separate learning that will stand up from learning that won't:

• Are the learning outcomes written down? You cannot reflect on what a course changed if it never said what it intended to teach.
• Is the hour claim justified, or just asserted? An inflated figure is the single most common reason a course fails our assessment, and it is the figure you will be putting your name to.
• Was anything actually assessed? A completion certificate for watching a video is not evidence of learning.
• Can the certificate be checked by someone else? A PDF proves nothing on its own. A reference a third party can verify does.

How the UK bodies compare

CPD requirements are set independently by each body, and they differ more than most people expect. Three of the eight below set no hours target at all. Knowing which model you are under matters more than knowing any single number — it changes whether you should be counting time or evidencing impact.

Two practical points fall out of that table. First, an hours figure from one body tells you nothing about another — a nurse counting 35 hours over three years and a Chartered IOSH member counting 30 a year are doing very different things. Second, if you hold dual registration, you are under both regimes at once, and the stricter one governs your planning.

Five mistakes that cost people their CPD year

These come up across every regime, and all five are avoidable at no cost.

1. Planning against the wrong year. Some bodies run January to December, some from your own renewal or registration date. Diarise your date, not a colleague's.
2. Leaving the interactive part until last. Participatory hours, peer discussions and facilitated sessions all need another person's time. They are the components most likely to slip, and the least possible to do in a hurry.
3. Collecting certificates that prove attendance but not learning. If the certificate does not state learning outcomes and hours, you are reconstructing the detail from memory months later — and under a verifiable-CPD regime you may not be able to count it at all.
4. Recording activity but not impact. Every records-based and standards-based regime asks what changed in your practice. A list of course titles answers a different question.
5. Believing a provider's claim of regulator approval. None of the bodies above approve or endorse external CPD providers. A course advertised as “approved” by your regulator is misdescribed, and repeating that claim in your own record is your exposure, not the provider's.

Common questions

How many CPD hours do solicitors need in the UK?

None. The SRA removed the annual requirement to complete 16 hours of CPD on 1 November 2016. There is no CPD hours target, and solicitors decide for themselves how much learning and development they need.

What replaced the 16-hour CPD requirement?

An annual declaration of competence. Solicitors must declare to the SRA each year that they have reflected on the standard of their work, identified any learning and development needs, and addressed them.

Do solicitors still need to keep CPD records?

The SRA does not prescribe a record format or a number of hours, but keeping a short record of what you identified, what you did and what changed is sensible. Reflection you cannot describe is difficult to evidence if your competence is questioned, and many firms set their own internal expectations.

Does the SRA approve CPD courses or training providers?

No. The SRA does not approve, endorse or accredit external training providers, and there is no such thing as an SRA-approved CPD course. Any provider claiming otherwise is misrepresenting what it holds.

When did the SRA continuing competence approach start?

It became compulsory for all solicitors on 1 November 2016.

Do CPD hours from one professional body count for another?

Usually yes, if the learning is relevant to your practice under both, but the arithmetic does not transfer. Each body sets its own requirement, period and recording rules, so the same activity may need to be logged twice in different formats. If you hold dual registration, plan against the stricter regime.

Can any training provider be approved by my regulator?

Generally no. The UK professional bodies covered here do not approve, endorse or pre-authorise external CPD providers or courses. A provider advertising itself as regulator-approved is misdescribing what it holds, and repeating that claim in your own CPD record is your exposure.

What should a good CPD certificate show?

The provider, the date, the hours claimed, the learning outcomes covered, and a reference someone else can check independently. A certificate stating only that you attended is the most common reason people struggle to evidence an activity later.

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AssuredCPD is an independent CPD accreditation body. We are not a government or regulatory body and do not award regulated qualifications. AssuredCPD accreditation is not endorsement, approval or recognition by any professional body named on this page, and we have no affiliation with them. Requirements are summarised from each body’s own published guidance and were checked on 16 October 2026; those bodies change their rules from time to time, so always confirm against the official source linked above before relying on it.