Series 7 study plan: six weeks, week by week

Six weeks is the schedule this plan is built around: roughly 90 minutes on weeknights and a longer block each weekend, about 80 to 100 total hours. Firms commonly give new hires a study window in that range, and it is enough runway to cover the material once and then drill it hard. If your window is four weeks, compress the first two weeks into one; if it is eight, stretch the drilling weeks, never the reading weeks.

The principle the whole plan follows

91 of the 125 scored questions come from Function 3. So this plan spends two of six weeks on options alone, two more on the rest of Function 3's products, and arrives at the exam having spent almost nothing on the functions that carry 9 and 11 questions. That imbalance is not laziness, it is the exam's own blueprint.

Week 1: equities, debt, and the foundation

Common and preferred stock, rights and warrants, corporate bonds, yields and pricing, and the trading basics. End every study session with a 20-question drill on what you just covered, because reading feels like learning and only answering proves it. Target: a 60%+ drill average by Sunday, which is normal and fine at this stage.

Weeks 2 and 3: options, twice

Week 2 is mechanics: calls, puts, breakevens, maximum gain and loss for every single-leg position, then covered calls and protective puts. Week 3 is strategies: spreads, straddles, combinations, and the customer-scenario framing the exam actually uses. Options are the largest single block of Function 3 and the highest-yield drilling on the exam. Build the cheat-sheet table from memory at the end of each week; when you can reproduce it cold, the options questions turn into arithmetic.

Week 4: municipals, packaged products, and margin

Municipal types, analysis, and tax math (tax-equivalent yield until it is reflexive), then investment companies, variable annuities, DPPs and REITs, and a hard day on margin accounts. This week closes out Function 3's territory. Keep the nightly 20-question drills running on everything already covered, not just the new material, or week 1 will quietly leak away.

Week 5: full simulations and triage

Two full 125-question, 225-minute simulations this week, taken in one sitting each, no phone, no pauses. The score matters less than the diagnostic: every sim should end with an hour of reviewing what you missed and a list of your five weakest concepts, which become the next day's drills. Between sims, drill weak areas only. A second sim that beats the first by five points is the plan working.

Week 6: taper and dump

One final simulation early in the week, weak-concept drills through midweek, then progressively lighter days: flashcards and the cheat sheet only. The night before is for sleep, not for new material. On exam morning, write your brain-dump sheet the minute the clock starts, flag anything that stalls you, and remember there is no penalty for guessing, so nothing stays blank.

The lazy version of this plan

Everything above is a schedule you have to keep by hand. A free Passline account keeps it for you: enter your exam date and the study plan builds day-by-day assignments back from it, the 2,000-question bank powers the drills, the simulations run at the real length and weighting, and the diagnostics decide what you drill next so you never have to guess where the leaks are.