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The Philippine Bar Examinations is a yearly professional licensure examination for lawyers in the Philippines. As mandated by the Constitution of the Philippines, the Philippine Supreme Court exclusively administers the admission to the practice of law in the country.

History
The provision of a system of written examinations was first implemented during the American occupation of the Philippines where the system was greatly patterned from the American tradition of bar admissions. Its implementation was made through the efforts of former Justice Elias Finley Johnson and of the American Bar Association of the Philippine Islands. In 1901, the first bar examinations was conducted having only 13 examinees. Prior to the implementation of the written bar examinations, admission to the practice of law during the Spanish period was based on an individual's attainment of the degree and title of Licenciado de Juridicos (Licentiate in Law) or its equivalent, and by a period legal internship.

History
The third Philippine Bar Exam took place in 1903 but the results were released in 1905. José I. Quintos obtained the highest rating of 96.33%, Sergio Osmeña, Sr. was second with 95.66%, F. Salas was third with 94.5% and Manuel L. Quezon fourth with 87.83%. After the 1903 exam, rankings were again avoided until the 1913 exam, which meant that every other year from the inaugural 1901 examination to 1912 no scores were given other than pass or fail. The 2016 bar exam had the highest number of passers 3747 out of 6344 (59.06 percent) examinees, However, the Supreme Court of the Philippines' Office of the Bar Confidant announced that (a new and official record of) 7,227 candidates will take the 2017 Bar examinations.

Past Bar examinations were conducted every September at De La Salle University, however, due to security concerns after the 2010 Philippine Bar exam bombing, The Supreme Court moved the examinations to University of Santo Tomas every November.

The most notable was the 1999 bar examinations which recorded the lowest passing rate of 16.59% or with a total number of 660 successful examinees. Also, the 2003 bar exam was marred by controversy when the Court ordered a retake of the Mercantile law due to questionnaire leakage. In 2005, the High Tribunal implemented the "five-strike" rule, which disqualifies five-time flunkers from taking future bar exams.

Recent developments
Since the inception of the licensure exam, it was consistently administered in an essay-handwritten format. However, for the 2020/21 Bar examination, the examinations were answered in the examinees own laptops; the exams remained in an essay format.