The ASTB-E, aviation selection for the sea services
Updated Nov 6, 2026 · facts checked Nov 6, 2026
Flight training in the sea services starts with one exam, the Aviation Selection Test Battery: it decides entry for the Navy, the Marine Corps and the Coast Guard, and its first three subtests double as the Navy's officer test. The version in use is series E: 6 subtests that take 2 hours to 3 hours 15 minutes for the full battery.
Who takes it:applicants for Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard flight training (pilot and naval flight officer); its first three subtests (the OAR) also serve Navy Officer Candidate School. A student naval aviator is judged on AQR and PFAR, a student naval flight officer on AQR and FOFAR, and a Navy officer candidate outside aviation on the OAR alone. If that last group is you, the shorter OAR test covers the same three subtests without the aviation parts.
The Air Force and the Army run their own pilot tests, the AFOQT with TBAS and the SIFT. All three selection routes are compared on how to become a military pilot.
Six parts in one sitting
NAMI publishes no question counts or minutes per subtest, because the knowledge subtests are adaptive and their length varies. Math, reading and mechanics are shared with the OAR, so their practice lives on Math Skills, Mechanical Comprehension and the reading section of the practice test. The one knowledge subtest only this battery has is aviation and nautical information.
The OAR is built from MST, RCT and MCT. NAMI does not release which subtests make up AQR, PFAR and FOFAR or how they are weighted, only that the formulas are compensatory: strength in one part can offset weakness in another. What each rating predicts and the program cut-offs are on ASTB-E scores.
The U.S. Navy's Naval Aerospace Medical Institute (NAMI), Operational Psychology department
NAMI, Department 53OP Operational Psychology · NAMI [1][2]
Who takes it
Applicants for Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard flight training (pilot and naval flight officer); its first three subtests (the OAR) also serve Navy Officer Candidate School
NAMI, Department 53OP Operational Psychology · NAMI [1][2]
What the score decides
Aviation selection (pilots on AQR + PFAR, flight officers on AQR + FOFAR) and officer selection (OAR)
Computer-adaptive in the APEX system for MST, RCT, MCT, ANIT and NATFI, with no skipping, no going back and no changing an answer; PBM is a timed device-based battery
NAMI · NAMI, Department 53OP Operational Psychology [1][2]
Subtests
6 subtests (MST, RCT, MCT, ANIT, NATFI, PBM)NAMI's FAQ says "seven subtests" but lists six; the 2014 sample booklet's seventh part, a biographical inventory, is not on current lists.
NAMI, Department 53OP Operational Psychology · NAMI [1][2]
Questions
Not published, because the adaptive subtests vary in length
At most 3 attempts at the current version (OAR and ASTB-E attempts count together), at least 30 full calendar days apart, and the whole battery is retaken each timeAttempts at the older forms 1–5 do not count toward the three. A test taken under another name or SSN is voided and still counts.
NAMI, Department 53OP Operational Psychology · NAMI [1][2]
Score that counts
Your latest attempt counts, even if it is lower, whatever version you took
Over 250 sites, among them Navy officer recruiting stations, NROTC units, Marine Corps officer selection offices and other military institutions; you schedule with the site
The current battery has no Spatial Apperception Test and no fixed item counts, yet the 2005 Marine Corps overview of forms 3–5, with paper tests and 31- and 91-day retest waits, still circulates. This page follows NAMI's current ASTB-E pages, checked in November 2026.
4 sample items, one per knowledge subtest
0 of 4 answeredPick a letter: the reasoning for every choice opens under it.
Q1 of 4 · Aviation and Nautical Information Test (ANIT)
Who was designated Naval Aviator No. 1?
Lt. Theodore Ellyson, trained at Glenn Curtiss's school in 1911, received the designation Naval Aviator No. 1.
Rodgers, trained by the Wright brothers, became Naval Aviator No. 2, so this answer is one place off.
Curtiss was the civilian builder and instructor who trained Ellyson; he never held a naval aviator number.
Ely made the first shipboard takeoff and landing, but he was a civilian pilot and was never designated a naval aviator.
In 1944, the Allied armies racing across France outran their supplies. Trucks had to carry fuel hundreds of miles from the beaches, and tanks sat idle for lack of gasoline. To solve the problem, the Army created the Red Ball Express: some 6,000 trucks driving day and night on roads closed to all other traffic. At its peak it delivered more than 12,000 tons of supplies a day and kept the advance moving.
The author's main purpose in the passage is to
The passage states a problem (tanks idle without fuel) and then the solution that "kept the advance moving," so its purpose is to show how a supply problem was solved.
Tanks appear only as the vehicles left without gasoline; nothing is said about how they were designed.
Railroads are never mentioned, so the passage cannot be arguing that trucks beat them.
The beaches are mentioned only as the start of the supply route; the passage begins after the landing and does not explain its reasons.
ASTB-E practice test→Questions in the style of MST, RCT, MCT and ANIT, reasoning for every choice
ASTB-E exam facts→Adaptive format, length, retakes, PBM and NATFI explained
ASTB-E scores→OAR, AQR, PFAR, FOFAR and the published program minimums with dates
ASTB-E study guide→Study order for the six parts: what moves with study and what doesn't
ASTB-E: short answers
Is the ASTB-E harder than the AFOQT?
Neither the Navy nor the Air Force publishes a difficulty comparison, and the two are built differently. The ASTB-E adapts to you and takes 2 hours to 3 hours 15 minutes for the full battery; the AFOQT is a fixed-length, timed test of 12 subtests, about five hours including breaks; every subtest has its own time limit. The AFOQT guide covers its subtests.
Do Marine Corps and Coast Guard applicants sit the same battery as the Navy?
Yes, the same ASTB-E at the same kinds of sites. The minimum ratings differ by service and program, and the Marine Corps sets its own: see scores and cut-offs.
Is there still a spatial apperception section?
Not on the ASTB-E. Orientation is now tested inside the Performance Based Measures, described on exam facts. The Army's SIFT still has a spatial apperception subtest.
Can I take only part of the battery?
Only the OAR portion, if your program needs nothing else. A full ASTB-E attempt is always the whole battery, and OAR and ASTB-E attempts come out of the same limit: three attempts at most, 30 days apart.