25 Free Iowa Life & Health Exam Practice Questions (2026)

Iowa has no combined Life and Health exam. Pearson VUE runs the state's insurance licensing exams under contract with the Iowa Insurance Division and gives two separate ones. The Life exam (12-IA-01) has 87 questions, 77 scored plus 10 unscored pretest questions, in 2 hours for $44. The Accident & Health exam (12-IA-02) has 90 questions, 80 scored plus 10 unscored pretest questions, also in 2 hours for $44. The Iowa Insurance Division determines the passing score and does not publish it: the candidate handbook gives no number, and neither do Iowa Code chapter 522B or the Division's producer licensing rules. This guide therefore quotes none. Both exams can be taken at a Pearson VUE test center or online through OnVUE online proctoring.

Pearson VUE's content outline, effective January 1, 2026, gives each exam two parts. The General Knowledge part has 50 scored items on both exams. On the Life exam it covers Types of Policies at 15, Policy Riders, Provisions, Options and Exclusions at 15, Completing the Application, Underwriting and Delivering the Policy at 12, and Retirement and Other Insurance Concepts at 8. On the Accident & Health exam it covers Types of Policies at 16, Policy Provisions, Clauses and Riders at 15, Social Insurance at 6, Other Insurance Concepts at 5 and Field Underwriting Procedures at 8. The Iowa-specific part has 27 scored items on the Life exam and 30 on the Accident & Health exam. Both start with 15 items on Iowa laws, rules and regulations common to all lines: the powers of the Commissioner of Insurance and the Division, licensing, unfair and deceptive practices, the Iowa Insurance Fraud Act, producer responsibilities, the Guaranty Association and definitions. The Life exam adds 12 items on life insurance only, such as policy replacement, disclosure and solicitation, group life, individual life and annuities, and suitability. The Accident & Health exam adds 15 on accident and health insurance only, such as individual and group health, Medicare supplement, long-term care, the HAWK-I and HIPIOWA special programs, the Affordable Care Act and the No Surprises Act. A candidate who sits both exams sees the 15 common items tested separately on each one.

These 25 questions come from LanePrep's Iowa Life & Health quiz bank and sample across Chapters 1-8: 5 from Chapter 1, 2 from Chapter 2, 2 from Chapter 3, 3 from Chapter 4, 2 from Chapter 5, 5 from Chapter 6, 3 from Chapter 7 and 3 from Chapter 8. The eight-chapter grouping is LanePrep's, not Pearson VUE's. Chapter 1 teaches Iowa regulation, licensing and market conduct, the 15 common-to-all-lines items that appear on both exams. Chapters 2-4 teach the Life General Knowledge part and Chapter 5 the Iowa life insurance law. Chapters 6 and 7 teach the Accident & Health General Knowledge part and Chapter 8 the Iowa accident and health law. Counting Chapter 1 once for each exam, the 157 scored items of the two exams together are spread over the chapters as 30, 15, 15, 20, 12, 31, 19 and 15 in that order, so Chapter 6 on accident and health products and provisions is the heaviest single chapter and, with Chapter 1, supplies five of these questions. Each question shows its chapter, so a miss tells you exactly which chapter to go back to.

This sample leaves out some outline topics, and one worth knowing is the Iowa Life and Health Insurance Guaranty Association Act, which sits in the common-to-all-lines group. Its limits are tiered by type of benefit, not one flat figure (Iowa Code 508C.3(5)(a)): $300,000 in life insurance death benefits, with net cash surrender or withdrawal value capped at $100,000; $500,000 for health benefit plans; $300,000 for disability income protection and $300,000 for long-term care insurance; $100,000 for other health insurance benefits; $250,000 in present value of annuity benefits and $250,000 per payee of a structured settlement annuity. A combined cap of $350,000 per life applies across the life and annuity categories together, health benefit plans are capped separately at $500,000 per individual, and one owner of multiple nongroup life policies is capped at $5,000,000 overall.

A few exam-day facts shape how you should practice. Each exam includes 10 unscored pretest items on top of the scored ones. They look like any other question but still use your time, so don't sink a long stretch into one you can't crack. Online, you test on your own computer in a private room with a live proctor watching by webcam and microphone, and no unscheduled breaks are allowed. At a test center an unscheduled break is allowed, but the clock keeps running. If you fail, you must wait 24 hours before booking a retake, and the reservation is not made at the test center. To keep your exam fee, change or cancel at least 48 hours before the exam.

A passing result is valid for 90 days. Apply for the license within 90 days of passing, or the result is void (IAC 191-10.4(4)). Iowa does not require a pre-licensing course: Iowa Code chapter 522B and the Division's producer licensing rules list the conditions for a resident license, and a course is not among them. Fingerprints are required for an initial resident license. You give them through Fieldprint after you apply for the license, not before the exam. For perspective, the NAIC reports first-time pass rates of 58.4 percent in 2024 and 60.1 percent in 2025 on the Life exam and 59.3 percent in 2024 and 54.1 percent in 2025 on the Accident & Health exam, with test center and online candidates combined in each year.

Work them before you read the answer. Every question has the explanation folded underneath it. Guessing first and reading second teaches more than reading first and agreeing.

All five questions come from Chapter 1, the Iowa laws and rules common to all lines that both exams test. It opens with the authority under which the Commissioner of Insurance can examine an insurer's books and records, then asks what an insurer must do when it hires a producer to sell its life insurance products and how Iowa classifies an insurer that is incorporated elsewhere but authorized to do business in the state. The last two ask whether a nonresident producer who already meets her home state's continuing education requirement must also meet Iowa's, and where the Commissioner's power to adopt rules stops.

Chapter 2 moves into life products: the policy that gives a young couple lifelong coverage, a constant premium and cash value, and the place where a Variable Whole Life policy's investment sub-accounts are legally held. Chapter 3 turns to riders and dividends. It asks what a Waiver of Premium rider provides after a policyowner is totally disabled in an accident and which dividend option applies a participating policy's $500 dividend to the next premium. Chapter 4 begins with the application and asks whose signatures are required when a mother buys a policy on her adult son.

Chapter 4 continues with contract law and needs analysis. It asks which element of a legal contract is at risk when a 16-year-old signs a life insurance application, and what the period after a breadwinner's death is called while the children are still at home and depend on the surviving spouse. Chapter 5 on Iowa life insurance law then asks for the minimum free-look period the replacing insurer must provide when a producer replaces a whole life policy with a universal life policy, and when the producer must give the applicant the Notice Regarding Replacement. Chapter 6 opens with the policy a sole proprietor needs to cover her shop's rent, utilities and her assistant's salary if she becomes disabled.

Chapter 6 supplies five of the 25 questions, four of them here. A major medical calculation with a $500 deductible and an 80/20 coinsurance clause asks what the insurer pays on $2,500 of covered expenses. A Business Disability Buyout question asks how benefits are paid when one of two law partners becomes permanently disabled. The next asks how an insurer handles the claim of an insured hurt while attempting a robbery when the policy carries the optional Illegal Occupation provision, and the last Chapter 6 question names the dental plan that pays a fixed dollar amount for each procedure. Chapter 7 then starts on social insurance with the part of Medicare that covers an inpatient hospital stay.

Chapter 7 continues with the tax treatment of benefits from a group disability income plan whose premium the employer pays in full, and with what a producer must obtain at delivery when no initial premium was collected with a health insurance application. Chapter 8 on Iowa accident and health law closes the set with three Iowa rules: the statute that protects a diabetic whose insurer calls an insulin pump elective equipment, the option a long-term care producer must offer an applicant, and what an insurer must offer each covered individual when it discontinues a class of individual health insurance.

Misreading what the Commissioner can do. The Commissioner of Insurance's power to examine the books and records of any person involved in the insurance business comes from the Code's specific examination provisions. The public hearing procedures, the general administrative powers and the provision on cease and desist orders are the distractors in question 1, and none of them is the source of the examination power. Question 5 asks where rule-making stops. The Commissioner does have real power to adopt rules, so a limit to interpreting existing statutes is wrong, but the rules must be consistent with and authorized by the Iowa Insurance Code. They cannot create new laws that supersede the Code or expand or limit its provisions without legislative approval, and they are not confined to domestic insurers.

Mixing up appointments, domicile and nonresident continuing education. An insurer that takes on a producer to act for it appoints the producer and files notice of the appointment with the Commissioner (Iowa Code 522B.13). A separate business entity license for the producer, a salary-only arrangement and an annual company training requirement are not part of the rule. An insurer is classified by where it is domiciled. One that is licensed to transact insurance in Iowa but incorporated elsewhere is a foreign insurer, a domestic insurer is organized in Iowa, and an alien insurer is organized in another country. Continuing education depends on residence and on the home state. A resident producer needs 36 credits per three-year term, including 3 in ethics, with no carryover of excess credits. A nonresident producer whose home state has its own continuing education requirement and who complies with it is exempt from Iowa's (IAC 191-11.1(3)). Neither "every nonresident must comply" nor "no nonresident ever has to" is right, and there is no half-credit option.

Matching the policy to the description. Ordinary Whole Life, also called Straight Whole Life, is the policy with lifelong coverage, level premiums that stay constant and cash value that builds over time. Annually Renewable Term and Decreasing Term are temporary policies, and Universal Life is not the constant-premium policy the couple in question 6 describes. In Variable Whole Life the cash value is invested in sub-accounts similar to mutual funds, and performance is not guaranteed. Those sub-accounts are held in a separate account maintained by the insurer, kept apart from the insurer's general account. They are not held in the policyholder's own brokerage account or in a trust run by a third-party fiduciary.

Confusing what a rider or a dividend option does. A Waiver of Premium rider keeps the policy in force by waiving the premiums that fall due while the insured is totally disabled, so the coverage continues without the policyowner paying. It does not end the policy with a premium refund, use the cash value to pay premiums or pay the face amount as a lump sum. Among the dividend options on a participating policy, Reduction of Premium applies the dividend to the next premium due, which cuts the amount the policyowner has to pay out of pocket. Paid-up additions buy extra paid-up insurance, accumulation at interest leaves the dividend with the insurer to earn interest, and the one-year term option buys one-year term insurance. None of those three lowers the premium bill.

Missing a signature, a contract element or a planning period. When a parent buys a policy on an adult child, the application needs three signatures: the proposed insured, the policyowner and the producer. Each wrong option in question 10 leaves one of the three out. A 16-year-old who signs an application puts the Competent Parties element at risk, because every party to a contract must be competent, which generally means of legal age and mentally sound. Legal purpose, consideration, and offer and acceptance are the other elements and are not the problem in that scenario. In needs analysis, the dependency period is the time when the surviving spouse has dependent children at home to support, typically the time of greatest financial need. The blackout period, a gap in Social Security survivor benefits, is a different and later stage.

Applying the wrong free look and the wrong replacement deadline. An individual life policy or annuity carries a free look of 10 days after receipt (IAC 191-15.9). A policy that replaces an existing one gets a longer window, not a shorter one: the replacing insurer must give the owner notice of the right to return the policy within 30 days of delivery for an unconditional full refund of all premiums (IAC 191-16.26(1)(d)). Question 13 asks for that figure, and the 10-, 15- and 20-day options are the traps. The 15-day trap deserves a note: Iowa does have a 15-day minimum free look, but it applies only to a variable annuity whose Buyer's Guide or disclosure document was not provided at or before application (IAC 191-15.64(3)), not to a replaced policy. The Notice Regarding Replacement has its own timing. A producer whose applicant has an existing policy or contract must present and read the notice no later than the time of taking the application, not within 30 days after delivery, not only on request and not when the commission is paid. Iowa's life insurance replacement rules run from IAC 191-16.21 through .29.

Choosing the wrong business disability product and fumbling the coinsurance math. A Business Overhead Expense (BOE) policy pays a business's actual overhead, such as rent, utilities and employee salaries, while the owner is disabled. An individual disability income policy replaces the owner's own income, and Key Employee Disability and Business Disability Buyout address different risks. A Business Disability Buyout policy provides the funds to buy out a disabled partner's interest, so it pays a lump sum or scheduled installments to the other partner. It is not a monthly income to the disabled partner, not a reimbursement of office rent and utilities and not a death benefit. For the major medical question, subtract the deductible first and then apply the insurer's 80 percent share to what is left: $2,500 less the $500 deductible leaves $2,000, and the insurer pays 80 percent of that, which is $1,600. Taking 80 percent of the full $2,500, or stopping after the deductible, gives $2,000 either way, which is wrong.

Ignoring what an optional provision allows. The Illegal Occupation provision is optional, but when a policy includes it the insurer is not liable for a loss to which a contributing cause was the insured's commission of, or attempt to commit, a felony. An insured hurt while attempting to rob a store therefore gets a denial. The insurer does not pay and then cancel, does not pay and raise the premium by 500 percent, and does not pay because the clause is rarely enforced. A scheduled (basic) dental plan pays a fixed dollar amount for each covered procedure. A nonscheduled plan pays on usual, reasonable and customary charges instead, and the two are easy to swap when you read quickly.

Assigning the wrong Medicare part, the wrong tax treatment or the wrong delivery paperwork. Medicare Part A is hospital insurance. It covers inpatient hospital care, including a semi-private room, meals and nursing services. Part B covers outpatient and doctor services, and Part C is Medicare Advantage. When an employer pays 100 percent of the premium for a group disability income plan, the premium is deductible to the employer and the benefits are fully taxable to the employee as ordinary income. Being a group plan does not make the benefits tax-free, and the employer does not pay the employee's tax. If the initial premium was not collected with the application, the policy is not in force. At delivery the producer must collect the premium together with a signed Statement of Good Health, which confirms that the applicant's health has not changed since the application. A new application, a waiver of the free-look period and a copy of the MIB report do not make the coverage effective.

Missing the Iowa health rules and the options an insurer must offer. In question 23 the insurer calls an insulin pump and glucose monitoring supplies elective equipment. The Iowa statute that protects the insured is the diabetes coverage mandate, which requires individual and group health policies to cover equipment, supplies and self-management training for treating diabetes. The other Iowa Code sections among the options address other subjects. In question 24 the producer's duty is to make an offer: no insurer may offer a long-term care policy unless it also offers each applicant, at the time of purchase, the option to buy inflation protection. A policy limited to acupuncture, one that cannot be canceled for nonpayment of premium and one that covers 100 percent of all medical expenses are not what the rule requires. When an insurer discontinues a class of individual health insurance, it has to meet conditions, including giving the required notice, and one of them is offering each covered individual the option to purchase any other individual health coverage it currently offers. A cash payout of a year of premiums, enrollment in HAWK-I regardless of income and a right to sue for breach of contract are not what the statute provides.

How did you score?

20 or more correct: You're clearing most of the outline across all eight chapters. Work the two deeper sets next: the Life insurance exam set and the Accident & Health insurance exam set, then read how to pass the Iowa Life & Health exams on the first try for the full study plan.

12-19 correct: You're getting a good share of it, but these 25 questions stand in for two exams with 157 scored questions between them. Note the chapter of every question you missed and replay that chapter's audio lesson before moving to the deeper sets above.

Under 12 correct: You need the material, not more questions yet. Start with the free preview at /ia/l-and-h/preview and work through the audio chapters in order before testing yourself again.

For the full cost picture beyond the $44 fee for each exam, including the $50 license fee for each 3-year term (a term ends in your birth month) and the 36 credits of continuing education each term (3 in ethics, with no carryover of excess credits), see how much an Iowa Life & Health license costs. The LanePrep Iowa Life & Health course preview is a click away whenever you're ready to go deeper.

Exam structure, fees, retake and cancellation rules and content outline item counts from Pearson VUE's Iowa Insurance Licensing Candidate Handbook (publication 121600, July 2025) and Iowa Insurance Content Outlines (publication 121601, effective January 1, 2026); passing score determination from the same handbook; exam result validity from IAC 191-10.4(4); license fee from Iowa Code 522B.5 and IAC 191-10.26(3); license term from IAC 191-10.6(1); continuing education from IAC 191-11.1(3) and 191-11.3; fingerprinting from Iowa Code 522B.5A and the Iowa Insurance Division's fingerprinting page; free-look periods from IAC 191-15.9, 191-15.64(3) and 191-16.26(1)(d); guaranty association limits from Iowa Code 508C.3(5)(a); pass rates from the NAIC compiled pass-rate workbooks for 2024 and 2025. Read October 2026.