Failed the Part 107? Here's exactly what to do next.
First, the thing nobody says out loud: you are not the only one, and it isn't close.
In 2025, 73,914 people took the Part 107. About 12,595 of them failed it. That's the FAA's own number, not mine. It's the most-taken knowledge test the FAA gives. It also has the lowest pass rate of any pilot certificate test they offer. The pass rate has been falling every year since 2018.
You didn't fail because you're not smart enough to fly a drone. Something in how this exam is taught didn't work for you. I'd like to help you fix it, and it won't cost you anything.
Here's what to do, in order.
You have to wait 14 calendar days. Book day 15 now.
Under 14 CFR 107.71, if you fail a knowledge test you cannot reapply for 14 calendar days. Calendar days, not business days. That's the whole rule and there's no way around it.
So do this now, before the sting wears off and it turns into six months: count 14 days forward, and book the retest for the day after. Having a date on the calendar is the difference between the people who come back and the people who don't. Then you have exactly two weeks, and two weeks is plenty if you spend them on the right thing.
The most useful thing you own right now is that piece of paper
Your Airman Knowledge Test Report lists ACS codes for the areas you missed. It looks like bureaucratic noise. It isn't. It's a list of exactly what to study, written by the people who wrote the test.
Most people glance at the score, feel bad, and put it in a drawer. Don't do that. Those codes are the single most targeted study plan you will ever be handed, and they cost you $175.
Decode them like this:
- UA.I. = Regulations
- UA.II. = Airspace
- UA.III. = Weather
- UA.IV. = Loading and performance
- UA.V. = Operations
Count how many of your misses fall in each. That's your ranking. Study the biggest pile first. Not the topic you like, not the topic you already half-know. The pile.
If UA.I.E.K13 is on your report, you're in extremely good company
The FAA publishes which codes people miss most often, nationally. For the whole Part 107 exam, exactly one code clears their 70% threshold, and it has done for two quarters running: UA.I.E.K13. Nearly four out of five people get it wrong.
It's the Declaration of Compliance, and here's why it catches everyone.
There are three pieces of FAA paperwork floating around a drone, and they all sound alike:
- Your remote pilot certificate is about you.
- Registration is about the aircraft's identity.
- The Declaration of Compliance is about whether the aircraft's design is safe enough to fly over a person.
Under time pressure, people grab the wrong one. That's it. That's the whole trap.
The short version: the manufacturer files the DoC, saying their aircraft meets a Category's injury limit. The FAA accepts it, they don't certify it. It's only needed for Category 2 and 3. Category 1 needs nothing but being small and not having blades that cut you. Category 4 needs a full airworthiness certificate instead. And the one job that's actually yours: if the Category label is missing from the aircraft, you have to label it yourself before you fly over anyone.
If you'd like to be honest with yourself about whether that stuck, try the questions on it. They're free.
It's almost never that you didn't study
People who fail this exam have usually studied hard. Here's what I see actually going wrong.
You memorized instead of reading. Most courses teach chart questions as "Figure 22, area 3, the answer is Class E." That works right up until the figure isn't the one you memorized. Then you're looking at a chart you've never seen with no idea how to read it. (This one is about to get much worse. See below.)
Nobody taught you the booklet. You get one reference in that room and most courses never mention how to use it. People burn ten minutes hunting for a page.
The wrong answers were designed to look right. This exam is written by people who know exactly which two facts you'll confuse. 0.55 pounds and 55 pounds. Blue circles and magenta circles. If nobody has shown you the traps as traps, you walk into them one at a time.
You ran out of time on the charts. Not knowledge. Speed.
None of those is a brains problem. All of them are a taught wrong problem.
If your retest is after October 27, you are taking a different exam
Starting October 27, 2026, the Part 107 will use chart images that are not in the testing supplement. The FAA is pulling them from current sectional charts instead, and they've said plainly that the specific images cannot be previewed.
Read that again if you studied by memorizing figures, because it means exactly what you think it means: the shortcut is gone. You can't memorize your way to the chart questions any more. You have to actually be able to read a sectional you've never seen.
You do still get the paper supplement. People are saying online that the booklet is going away. It isn't. The figures are moving into the questions, and the booklet is still handed to you for the legends and the tables. What changes is that you can't preview the charts any more, so knowing the booklet's figure numbers stops helping and knowing how to read one starts mattering a lot.
If you're retesting before Oct 27, the exam you failed is the exam you'll retake. If you're retesting after, and you prepare the way you prepared last time, you'll be preparing for a test that no longer exists.
A two-week plan that isn't "study harder"
- Days 1-2. Read your codes, not your feelings. Rank the five areas by how many misses each. Write the order on paper. That's your plan and it took ten minutes.
- Days 3-9. Work the biggest pile only. It's tempting to review everything, which is really just revisiting what you already know because it feels nice. Don't. Go where the misses are.
- Days 10-12. Charts, out loud. Pull up a sectional you have never seen and read it. Say what each thing means out loud. If you can't, that's the gap, and it's the gap that's about to matter more (see October 27, above).
- Day 13. One full practice exam, timed, no notes. Not to feel good. To find out.
- Day 14. Nothing. Seriously. Cramming the night before is how tired people make careless mistakes on questions they know.
- Day 15. Go take it.
And if you want help
I'm Robert. I built DroneWorthy because I didn't do well in classrooms either, and I got tired of courses that hand you a figure number to memorize and call it teaching.
It drills you on real charts. It teaches you the booklet you're allowed to use. And every practice question explains why the wrong answers are wrong, because the wrong answers are the whole game.
You don't need to buy anything to use it, and there's no login to try it. If it helps, it's free, the whole thing, to everyone. If it doesn't, you've still got your 14-day plan and your decoded score report, and I hope you pass without me.
no card required, and no guarantee to read the fine print on. You're not paying, so there's nothing to refund. Here's why it's set up that way. I'm not going to promise you'll pass. Nobody can. What I'll promise is that you'll understand why the answer is the answer.
Every number on this page comes from the FAA. The pass rate and volume are from their CY2025 Airman Knowledge Test statistics. The 14-day rule is 14 CFR 107.71. The most-missed code is from the FAA's own Frequently Missed ACS Codes report. The October 27 change is from the FAA's April 2026 Airman Testing Community Advisory. Sources: CY2025 test statistics, 14 CFR 107.71, Frequently Missed ACS Codes, April 2026 testing advisory.