New Jersey CLE Requirements

New Jersey New Admit CLE Requirement

Total CLE Requirements:

Every active lawyer is required to complete 24 credit hours of continuing legal education (CLE) every 2 years.
Of those 24 credits, at least 5 credits must be in ethics and/or professionalism, including 2 credits of
coursework in diversity, inclusion, and elimination of bias.


During the newly admitted lawyer’s first full two-year compliance period, within the general 24 credit CLE
requirement, a newly admitted lawyer with a plenary license in New Jersey must obtain 16 credit hours in at
least 6 of the following 12 subject areas: New Jersey basic estate administration; New Jersey basic estate
planning; New Jersey civil or criminal trial preparation; New Jersey family law practice; New Jersey real
estate closing procedures; New Jersey attorney trust and business accounting fundamentals; New Jersey
landlord/tenant practice; New Jersey municipal court practice; New Jersey law office management; New
Jersey administrative law; New Jersey workers’ compensation law; and New Jersey labor and employment
law. At least one credit of the required sixteen credits must be in New Jersey attorney trust and business
accounting fundamentals. A “newly admitted lawyer” is defined by the Board on Continuing Legal
Education (Board) as a lawyer who becomes an active member of the New Jersey bar for the first time.
Newly admitted attorneys with a limited license do not have to take the 16-credit new admit coursework.
A newly admitted lawyer may obtain credit for CLE courses taken after his or her graduation from law school
but before admission to the New Jersey bar towards their first compliance reporting period, so long as those
courses were taken no more than 12 months prior to the lawyer’s date of admission to the New Jersey bar.
Attorneys may carry over no more than 12 extra credits from the preceding compliance period into the next.
A nonrefundable $50 CLE noncompliance fee will be assessed against attorneys who report they did not
complete the required courses by the deadline for course completion. A grace period is afforded once the
deadline has expired. An additional nonrefundable $50 (for a total of $100) will be assessed against attorneys
who fail to complete their CLE courses within the afforded grace period or who fail to report regarding CLE
compliance at all. In addition, attorneys who remain noncompliant are subject to being declared
administratively ineligible to practice New Jersey law.
The first compliance reporting period for newly admitted lawyers begins January 1 of the year immediately
following admission to the New Jersey bar. For lawyers who were admitted to the New Jersey bar in 2024,
your CLE requirement will begin on January 1, 2025. Newly admitted lawyers are automatically assigned to a
compliance reporting group based on their birth month.

New CLE Requirement effective January 1, 2024: Newly admitted New Jersey attorneys required to meet the newly admitted attorney requirement must take 16 total credits in a minimum of 6 New Jersey new admit subject areas.  A minimum of one credit must be taken in New Jersey attorney trust & business accounting fundamentals.

 

State Contact Info:

Supreme Court of New Jersey Board of Continuing Legal Education
PO Box 970
Trenton, NJ 08625
(t) 609-633-9733
E-mail: sctle.mailbox@judiciary.state.nj.us
http://www.judiciary.state.nj.us/cle/index.htm