AP® U.S. Government & Politics Score Guide

AP U.S. Government and Politics Scoring Guidelines and Rubrics

Remember the scoring guidelines and rubrics we discussed earlier? Well, every year, the College Board publishes a document that helps students and teachers understand how points are allotted to each FRQ answer.

These scoring guidelines and rubrics can help you learn what kinds of answers can earn you points and what skills you need to focus on while addressing the FRQs.

You will earn points if your answer fulfills any or all of the following criteria, depending on the question's intent:

1. Identify a clause, fact, excerpt, evidence, or context of the prompt.
2. Describe and/or explain relevant facts and information pertaining to the question.
3. State a claim in response to the prompt and support it based on evidence, documentation, data, and facts.
4. Explain why a piece of evidence supports the claim or thesis.

The table below shows the number of points per FRQ for the 2021 and 2022 AP Gov exams. You can use the rubric to get a rough idea of how the FRQs are graded and apply it while practicing for your exam:

Usually, a question has multiple parts, with each part containing a specific prompt. Typically, one prompt earns one point. However, in cases where you need to present various pieces of evidence or facts to support your claim, more than one point may be awarded depending on the number of examples or evidence you cite. This is most commonly the case with Part (b) of the SCOTUS FRQ, where you receive one point for identifying or describing a relevant detail about a ruling/opinion from a required case and then another point for using that detail to compare or contrast the required case with the non-required case. To learn more about these criteria, check out our How to Approach U.S. Gov FRQs page.

Now that we have reviewed the AP Gov grading criteria, it is time to examine how your AP scores affect your college applications. Let’s determine which AP scores can earn you placement, recommendations, and college credits!

AP U.S. Government and Politics Scoring Table

Your AP U.S. Government exam results are forwarded to the universities you have chosen for admission after being recorded on the AP grading system. Check out our page on AP Exam Scores if you want to learn how to send your AP scores directly to your college.

While each college may have its own requirements for admission based on AP scores, most colleges use a standard method to translate your AP U.S. Gov score into the corresponding college grade. The AP score table below shows the conversion of AP scores into equivalent college grades for the AP Gov exam:

As you can see, colleges do not consider scores below 3 during admissions. The rule of thumb is to achieve a score of 3 or higher if your goal is to earn college credit for your AP Gov exam score. Make it a point, however, to still check the minimum AP course credit requirements for each of your potential colleges.

AP U.S. Government and Politics Score Distributions

AP Gov is among the most popular AP exams students take each year. This is because U.S. Gov is one of those versatile subjects that students like to pair with other similar AP courses like U.S. History, World History, and Comparative Government and Politics. In addition to complementing these subjects, scoring well in U.S. Gov can potentially earn college credits and fulfill graduation criteria. Another benefit of taking the AP U.S. Government and Politics exam is that it can amp up your career game.

Did you know? Of around 300,000 students globally, just 17 scored a perfect 5 on the 2022 AP U.S. Government & Politics Exam.

If you are preparing for the exam, it is recommended that you look at past years' AP U.S. Government score distributions to get an idea of how rigorous this course can be. This can also help you see if you are ready to add this heavy-weight course to your schedule, especially if you have already signed up for other AP courses. Let’s crunch some numbers below to get an idea of how students performed on the AP U.S. Gov exam during the last four years:

As you can see from the table, scoring well on the U.S. Gov exam has become difficult over the past three years, with nearly 2% fewer students scoring a 3 or above in 2022 compared to students in 2021. In 2023, almost 332,000 students took this exam, with only about 49% scoring a 3 or higher. AP Gov is a challenging exam, but with the right study tools, course instruction, and dedication, you can be a 5-pointer student, too!

Did you know?

Only 43 students scored a perfect 5 on the 2023 AP U.S. Gov exam.

At Uworld, we believe that reviewing the course material regularly and taking frequent practice tests will help you form a solid foundation of core concepts. If you need help, check out our AP U.S. Gov practice exams with detailed answer explanations, quick notes, and flashcards to retain concepts efficiently.

Scoring pattern for the 2023 and 2022 AP U.S. Government and Politics exams

While knowing score distributions for an AP exam can give you an idea of your probability of success on it, try to be aware of the test’s scoring pattern, too. A scoring pattern tells you how students have historically performed in various sections of the exam, meaning it can help you gauge which sections are the most difficult and which sections are the easiest.

On the 2023 AP Gov exam, students demonstrated their impressive aptitude for knowledge in the MCQ section, especially with regard to SCOTUS cases. About 36% of students earned all the possible points in this section–impressive!

Students also excelled in their understanding of course content, with 24% answering all Unit 3: Civil Liberties & Civil Rights questions correctly–a remarkable achievement.

The highest overall FRQ performance was on Q2 - Quantitative Analysis. Students seemed to excel in this particular question across all exam versions.

On the 2022 AP U.S. Gov exam, students scored especially high on Unit 1: Political Systems, Regimes, & Governments and Unit 3: Political Culture & Participation.

The Argument Essay section is arguably the most challenging part of the AP U.S. Gov exam because it requires you to apply all three of your faculties – argumentative reasoning, memorizing, and good writing skills. Not only do you need to establish your point of view logically, but you also need to substantiate your answer with a thorough knowledge of foundational documents to prove its viability. You will also need to have excellent narrative skills in order to present your argument succinctly. This section is a tricky one to ace. Hence, understanding how students performed in this section on the 2022 AP Gov exam will help focus on the most difficult concepts that could be tested.

The table below lists the skills tested and the corresponding percentage of test-takers who received points for each competency. Let's take a look: