What Is ARLH?

What Is ARLH?

ARLH stands for the Arkansas Life & Health Insurance Producer Exam - the state licensing test that anyone who wants to sell life or health insurance products in Arkansas must pass. The exam is regulated by the Arkansas Insurance Department and administered on its behalf by PSI, the testing vendor that delivers the exam at approved test centers and through remote proctoring.

It's worth clarifying up front because the acronym "ARLH" is shared by other, unrelated credentials in other industries. On this site, and in this article, ARLH means exactly one thing: the Arkansas producer licensing exam for life and health lines. If you're researching this exam because you want to sell life insurance, annuities, or supplemental health products to Arkansas residents, this is the test standing between you and that license.

Arkansas actually splits this into separate Life and Health examinations. Candidates can schedule both on the same day if they're pursuing both lines, but each is a distinct test with its own content outline. This site focuses specifically on the Life examination - its structure, its domains, and what it takes to pass it. If you're also studying for the Health portion, treat it as a separate exam with separate prep, even though the appointment logistics may overlap.

How the ARLH Exam Is Structured

The current Life examination consists of 110 total questions - 100 scored and 10 unscored pretest items - delivered in a 150-minute window. You won't know which questions are pretest items, so every question deserves your full attention. A passing score requires 70% on the scored portion.

The test is computer-based and closed book. There's no reference material, no formula sheet, and no calculator allowed at the workstation. If you choose remote proctoring instead of an in-person test center, be aware that remote sessions come with tighter restrictions: no scratch paper and no breaks during the session. That detail alone is a reason many candidates prefer a physical test center, where standard testing-center break policies typically apply.

For a full breakdown of exactly how the scoring works and what 70% translates to in raw question counts, see ARLH Passing Score 2026: Exactly What You Need to Pass. And if you're trying to gauge how the format and time pressure compare to other state exams, How Hard Is the ARLH Exam? Complete Difficulty Guide 2026 walks through the difficulty profile in more depth.

The 8 ARLH Exam Domains

The ARLH content outline is organized into eight domains, each weighted by percentage of the scored exam. Two domains are tied for the heaviest weighting, which tells you exactly where to concentrate your study hours.

For a section-by-section study plan built around these exact weightings, see ARLH Exam Domains 2026: Complete Guide to All 8 Content Areas. Notice that the two 20% domains - Life Policy Provisions, Riders and Options, and Arkansas-specific statutes - together account for 40% of your scored questions, more than the bottom four domains combined.

Registration, Fees, and Permit Rules

Before you can sit for the ARLH Life exam, you must complete 20 hours of approved prelicensing education for the life line. Once that's finished, you submit your application through NIPR along with criminal-background-check materials, and wait for authorization to test.

The exam fee is $50. Once you're authorized, you receive a 90-day testing permit - you have to schedule and pass within that window. Within the permit period, you're allowed up to three attempts. If you fail three times, you don't just retake it; you have to wait four weeks and then restart the entire application process from scratch, including re-authorization.

For the complete cost picture - including what happens financially if you need to retake - see ARLH Certification Cost 2026: Complete Pricing Breakdown. If you're still working through prelicensing hours or background-check steps, ARLH Requirements 2026: Eligibility, Prerequisites & How to Qualify covers the full eligibility checklist in order.

Who Takes the ARLH Exam and Who Hires for It

Candidates for the ARLH Life exam are typically people entering the insurance industry as producers - captive agents joining a carrier's Arkansas sales force, independent agents planning to write life and annuity business, and career-changers moving into financial services roles that require a life line of authority. Some candidates are pursuing the Life exam alongside the separate Health exam because their intended role (or their agency's appointment requirements) calls for both lines.

Employers hiring into these roles range from national life insurance carriers and regional agencies to independent brokerages and financial planning practices that need licensed staff to legally discuss and sell life and annuity products in Arkansas. A passed exam and active resident license are the entry ticket; what happens after that - territory, book of business, carrier appointments - varies widely by employer.

If you're weighing whether pursuing this license is worth the time and cost relative to the opportunities it opens, Is the ARLH Certification Worth It? Complete ROI Analysis 2026 looks at that question directly, and ARLH Salary Guide 2026: Complete Earnings Analysis breaks down how compensation in these roles is typically structured.

Licensing and Renewal After You Pass

Passing the exam isn't the finish line - it's the gate that lets you finalize your resident producer license application. Once licensed, Arkansas resident producers renew their license every two years (biennially), and renewal requires 24 hours of continuing education, including 3 hours specifically in ethics.

That renewal cycle is a separate, ongoing obligation from the initial exam - it doesn't require retesting, but it does require documented CE hours reported before your renewal deadline. Producers who let CE lapse risk having their license go inactive, which is a bigger problem to fix than simply scheduling a course on time.

Preparing for the Specific Content on This Exam

Generic study advice only goes so far here - what matters more is sequencing your review around the domain weights above. A practical approach is to spend early study time on the two 20% domains (Life Policy Provisions, Riders and Options, and Arkansas-specific statutes) since together they represent 40% of your scored questions, then work down through Types of Life Insurance Policies and Life Insurance Basics, and finish with the smaller domains - Annuities, General Insurance Concepts, the life-only Arkansas statutes domain, and Federal Tax Considerations - as final review and practice-question drilling.

For a structured walkthrough of this kind of plan, see ARLH Study Guide 2026: How to Pass on Your First Attempt, and once you're in final review mode, a condensed reference like ARLH Cheat Sheet 2026: One-Page Review of Must-Know Facts can help lock in the details you're most likely to mix up under time pressure. Running full-length timed practice questions on our practice test platform before exam day is one of the most direct ways to get comfortable with the pacing this exam demands.

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