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AP Microeconomics FRQ Practice

Ready to practice for you next free response exam? ReviewEcon.com has you covered! Below are some of my favorite Free Response Questions from past AP Macroeconomics Exams. Click on the question, try it out, then watch the review video to walk you through it! If you have any questions, ask them in the video comments. And don’t forget to like and subscribe! 

I’ll be adding new videos as often as I can, so check back regularly!

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I would like to acknowledge the work of Dick Brunelle and Steven Reff from Reffonomics.com whose work inspired many of the review games on this site. I would also like to thank Francis McMann, James Chasey, and Steven Reff who taught me how to be an effective AP Economics teacher at AP summer institutes; as well as the countless high school teachers, and college professors from the AP readings, economics Facebook groups, and #econtwitter. 

AP® Microeconomics: The Ultimate Solution Guide to the FRQs

• The Albert Team
• Last Updated On: March 1, 2022

AP® Microeconomics free response questions usually have a series of predictable patterns in terms of what can be asked of you. Recognizing the types of questions asked in the FRQ section is really important to your success. As you can see looking at the scoring distributions of past AP® Micro exams, you’ll notice that many students struggle when it comes to understanding the core intuition that is being tested on the exam. Here’s how we would recommend using this page. First, download the questions and attempt the questions yourself. Then, look over your answers one more time. Next, watch the corresponding video as we walk through the solution to the AP® Microeconomics free response question. Finally, check the scoring guidelines to see how your initial answer would have scored. The good thing about AP® Microeconomics is that only a few core concepts are tested so if you understand those core concepts, you’re going to do great. A few you should review before beginning these FRQs include monopolist behavior, perfect price discrimination, externalities (both positive and negative), game theory & Nash Equilibriums, and labor markets. Hope you enjoy our AP® Microeconomics FRQ solutions.

2014 AP® Microeconomics Free Response Question Solutions

• Download the questions here
• See the Scoring Guidelines here
• See how other students did here

2013 AP® Microeconomics Free Response Question Solutions

2012 AP® Microeconomics Free Response Question Solutions

2011 AP® Microeconomics Free Response Question Solutions

2009 AP® Microeconomics Free Response Question Solutions

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🤑 AP Microeconomics

📌 exam date: may 7, 2024.

Cram Finales

Study Guides

Practice Questions

AP Cheatsheets

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AP Micro Study Guides by Unit

Unit 1 – basic economic concepts.

Unit 1 Overview: Basic Economic Concepts

Unit 1: Basic Economic Concepts

18 min read

written by Jeanne Stansak

Basic Economic Concepts: Scarcity

written by dylan_black_2025

Resource Allocation and Economic Systems

Production Possibilities Curve (PPC)

Comparative Advantage and Trade

Unit 2 – Supply & Demand

Supply and Demand

written by Dylan Black

Determinants of Supply and Demand

Unit 2 Overview: Supply and Demand

Price Elasticity of Demand

Unit 3 – Production, Cost, & the Perfect Competition Model

Introduction to Unit 3

written by Hope Myers

Unit 3 Overview: Production, Cost, and the Perfect Competition Model

written by Maria Guerra

The Production Function

Short-Run Production Costs

Long-Run Production Costs

Types of Profit

Unit 4 – Imperfect Competition

Unit 4 Overview: Imperfect Competition

Introduction to Imperfectly Competitive Markets

Price Discrimination

Monopolistic Competition

Oligopoly and Game Theory

11 min read

Unit 5 – Factor Markets

Unit 5 Overview: Factor Markets

Introduction to Factor Markets

Changes in Factor Demand and Factor Supply

Perfectly Competitive Labor Markets

Monopsony Markets

Unit 6 – Market Failure & the Role of Government

Unit 6 Overview: Market Failure and the Role of Government

Socially Efficient and Inefficient Market Outcomes

Externalities

Public and Private Goods

The Effects of Government Intervention in Different Market Structures

Additional Resources

Study tools.

2024 AP Microeconomics Exam Guide

written by A Q

Exam Skills

This is all you need to know about the AP Microeconomics exam. We'll cover how to manage the multiple choice questions (MCQs) and how to write great FRQs. Review exam logistics, types of questions (such as table questions), how to draw graphs, helpful tips, and practice some sample questions

AP Microeconomics Multiple Choice Questions (MCQ)

Score Higher on AP Microeconomics 2024: MCQ Tips from Students

Score Higher on AP Microeconomics 2024: Tips for FRQ 1

Score Higher on AP Microeconomics 2024: Tips for FRQ 2 & 3

AP Cram Sessions 2021

Download AP Microeconomics Cheat Sheet PDF Cram Chart

AP Microeconomics Cram Unit 1: Basic Economic Concepts

slides by Hope Myers

🌶️ AP Micro Cram Review: Unit 1: Basic Economic Concepts

streamed by Hope Myers

🌶️ AP Micro Cram Review: Unit 2: Supply and Demand

AP Microeconomics Cram Unit 2: Supply and Demand

AP Microeconomics Cram Unit 3.6: Production and Cost

Previous Exam Prep

Unit 1: Scarcity, Opportunity Costs, PPC, Trade

streamed by Allison Powell

🤑 AP Micro 5-Hour Cram Finale

streamed by Emily Guo

Unit 1 Review

streamed by Shriya Buragadda

Unit 2 Part 1: Supply, Demand, and Elasticity

AP MICRO Units 1 & 2 Review CRAM 🌶🌶🌶

U1/2 Micro Review

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AP Microeconomics Practice Tests

The AP Microeconomics Exam includes 60 multiple-choice questions and 3 free-response questions. See the table below:

If you are a mobile user, click here: Do AP Microeconomics Practice Questions .

AP Microeconomics Multiple-Choice Practice Tests

• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Pacing Drills
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Basic Microeconomics Concepts
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Models of Consumer Choice
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Firm Production, Costs, and Revenues
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Factor Markets
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 1
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 2
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 3
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 4
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 5
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Discipline of Economics
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Demand and Supply: The Basics
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Applications of Demand and Supply-Elasticity
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Theory of Consumer Choice or Behavior
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Government and Public Sector: Market Failure, Rents, Externalities, Public Goods, Efficiency
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Costs, Production, Supply
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Product Markets: Types, Characteristics, Pricing Strategies
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Perfect Competition
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Monopoly
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Imperfect Competition: Monopolistic Competition, Oligopoly
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Resource Markets with Applications to Labor
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 6
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 7
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 8
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 9
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 10
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Fundamentals of Economic Analysis
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Demand, Supply, Market Equilibrium, and Welfare Analysis
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Elasticity, Microeconomic Policy, and Consumer Theory
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: The Firm, Profit, and the Costs of Production
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Market Structures, Perfect Competition, Monopoly, and Things Between
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test: Public Goods, Externalities, and the Role of Government
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 11
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 12
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 13
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 14
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 15
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 16
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 17
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 18
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 19
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 20
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 21
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 22
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 23
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 24
• AP Microeconomics Practice Test 25

AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Tests

• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practie Test 1
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practie Test 2
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practie Test 3
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practie Test 4
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practie Test 5
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practie Test 6
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 1
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 2
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 3: The Discipline of Economics
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 4: Economic Systems
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 5: Demand and Supply: The Basics
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 6: Elasticity, Taxation, and Consumer Choice
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 7: Costs of Production
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 8: Perfect Competition

AP Microeconomics Flashcards

• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 1
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 2
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 3
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 4
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 5
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 6
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 7
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 8
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 9
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 10
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 11
• AP Microeconomics Flashcards Set 12

AP Microeconomics Downloads

• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 3
• AP Microeconomics Free-Response Practice Test 4
• More AP Microeconomics Downloads

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Sat / act prep online guides and tips, the expert's guide to the ap microeconomics exam.

Advanced Placement (AP)

Are you taking AP Microeconomics? If so, you'll likely be taking the AP exam this spring? In 2022, the AP Micro exam will be held on Friday, May 6, at 12 pm . Knowing what to expect from the Microeconomics exam will help you feel calm and confident on exam day.

Read this guide to learn everything you need to know about the AP Microeconomics exam, including what its format is, what questions will look like, and the steps you need to take in order to get your best score on the exam.

How Is the AP Microeconomics Exam Structured?

The AP Micro exam has two main parts. First you'll complete the multiple-choice section, then the free-response section.

Multiple-Choice Section:

• 60 questions
• Lasts 1 hour 10 minutes
• Worth 66% of final exam score

Free-Response Section:

• 3 questions
• 1 long question (worth 50% of section score)
• 2 short questions (each worth 25% of section score)
• Lasts 1 hour (including 10 minute reading period)
• Worth 33% of final exam score
• Students will need to:
• Make assertions about economic concepts, principles, models, outcomes, and/or effects
• Explain economic concepts, principles, models, outcomes, and/or effects
• Perform numerical analysis
• Create graphs or visual representations

What Topics Does the AP Microeconomics Exam Cover?

So what will the AP Micro questions actually be about? The AP Microeconomics course has six major units. They're listed below along with their subunits. Reviewing these will give you an excellent idea of what concepts to expect on the exam. For a more in-depth look at what the course (and exam) cover, check out the AP Microeconomics Course and Exam Description .

Unit 1: Basic Economic Concepts (12-15% of exam)

The foundations of microeconomic thinking, including how to evaluate decisions based on constraints and trade-offs and make rational economic choices. 

• Resource allocation and economic systems
• The Production Possibilities Curve
• Comparative advantage and gains from trade
• Cost-benefit analysis
• Marginal analysis and consumer choice

Unit 2: Supply and Demand (20-25% of the exam)

How markets work with an introduction to the supply and demand model. 

• Market equilibrium, disequilibrium, and changes in equilibrium
• The effects of government intervention in markets
• International trade and public policy

Unit 3: Production, Cost and the Perfect Competition Model (22-25% of the exam)

The factors that drive the behavior of companies and learn about the perfect competition model. 

• The production function
• Short- and long-run production costs
• Types of profit
• Profit maximization
• Perfect competition

Unit 4: Imperfect Competition (15-22% of exam)

How imperfectly competitive markets work and how game theory comes into play in economic models. 

• Price discrimination
• Monopolistic competition
• Oligopoly and game theory

Unit 5: Factor Markets (10-13% of exam)

How concepts such as supply and demand and marginal decision-making apply in the context of factor markets. 

• Introduction to factor markets
• Changes in factor demand and factor supply
• Profit-maximizing behavior in perfectly competitive factor markets
• Monopsonistic markets

Unit 6: Market Failure and the Role of Government (8-13% of exam)

Conditions under which markets may fail and the effects of government intervention in markets. 

• Socially efficient and inefficient market outcomes
• Externalities
• Public and private goods
• The effects of government intervention in different market structures
• Income and wealth inequality

AP Microeconomics Sample Questions

Looking at sample questions is one of the best ways to get a feel for what the AP Microeconomics exam will be like. Below are three sample questions: one multiple choice and two free response. The multiple-choice question comes from the AP Microeconomics Course and Exam Description , and the free-response questions are from the 2021 exam .

Multiple-Choice Question

For this question, you'll need to understand the principles behind economic surpluses and how prices and quantities affect them. You'll learn this information beginning in Unit 1 and build upon it in the later units.

The correct answer is C.

Long Free-Response Question

There will be one long free-response question on the AP Micro exam. It's the first free-response question in the section, and it's worth 10 points . You'll typically need to create multiple AP Microeconomics graphs for this question.

Part A (4 points)

Here's a graph that would earn you the full four points for Part A.

Your own graph must include:

• A correctly labeled graph for NCHart showing downward-sloping demand (D) and marginal revenue (MR) curves with the marginal revenue curve below the demand curve. (1 point)
• The marginal cost (MC) curve and the profit-maximizing quantity, labeled Q m , where MR=MC. (1 point)
•  The profit-maximizing price, labeled P m , above Q m from the demand curve. (1 point)
• The ATC below the demand curve at Q m with the MC curve rising and intersecting the ATC curve at its minimum. (1 point)

Part B (1 point) 

Part C (2 points)

To earn the second point, you must state that there is a deadweight loss at Q Z and that P (or D)<MC.

Part D (3 points)

You need to include the following three things in your response to Part D. Each is worth one point.

• State that no, TXDrug does not have a dominant strategy, and explain that if NCHart chooses Q m , then TXDrug’s best response is to Enter because $1 > $0, but if NCHart chooses Q Z , then TXDrug’s best response is to Stay Out because $0 > −$1.
• State that the best response for NCHart is to produce Q m .
• Identify the Nash equilibrium as NCHart produces Q m and TXDrug chooses to Enter.

Short Free-Response Question

Part A (1 point)

Part B (1 point)

Part C (1 point)

Part D (1 point)

Part E (1 point)

How Is the AP Microeconomics Exam Scored?

As we mentioned above, the multiple-choice section of the exam is worth 66% of your total score. This is more than the multiple-choice section for many other AP exams. There are 60 questions, and you'll earn 1 point for each question you answer correctly. No points are deducted for incorrect answers, so you should answer every question!

The free-response section is worth 33% of your total score. Within that, the long free-response question is worth 50% of the section score, and each of the two short free-response sections is worth 25% of the section score. You can earn up to 20 points on the free-response section (10 points for the long question and 5 points for each short question).

For each section (multiple-choice and free-response) your points will be added up then scaled to properly fit the weight of that section. Those scores are added together, then converted to the standard AP scoring scale of 1-5 . The exact formula for doing this can change slightly from year to year.

And how well do students do on the AP Microeconomics exam? Here's what score distributions looked like for students who took the exam in 2021. The mean score was a 2.96, or just under passing, and 59.1% of students who took the exam passed (scored a 3 or higher).

Source: College Board

3 Tips for Preparing for the AP Microeconomics Exam

Now you know what to expect when you take the AP Microeconomics exam, but what can you do to make sure you're well prepared for it? Follow these three tips throughout the year to put yourself in a great place on test day.

#1: Become an Expert Grapher

You'll need to analyze numerous graphs on the AP Micro exam, and you'll need to create a few of your own, particularly for the long free-response question. For many students, creating AP Microeconomics graphs is one of the more intimidating parts of the exam. There's a lot of information to include, and it all needs to be accurate for you to get full credit. So, start practicing!

If you spend time practicing with the graphical representations that are included in your AP Macro course content and complete practice free response questions, you’ll be prepared to do well on this part of the exam. 

#2: Know Your Vocab

Soon after you begin taking AP Microeconomics, you'll notice that there's a lot of terminology being tossed around. Even in the example questions above there are mentions of "profit- maximizing quantities," "payoff matrices, " "deadweight losses," and "Nash equilibrium." If you don't know what these terms mean, you won't be able to answer questions about them. Many students who take AP Micro believe that most of the questions the exam asks are pretty straightforward, you just need to be solid on your microeconomics knowledge, and a lot of that includes knowing the vocab.

Throughout the school year (and well before you take the AP test), be sure to review the core topics that were covered in the class. Consider using the waterfall flashcard method (which is also recommended for studying SAT vocab) to keep different vocab terms straight.

#3: Take Practice Tests

Taking practice tests and answering practice questions is one of the best ways to prepare for any AP exam, including AP Microeconomics. Official resources (those made by the College Board) are the best to use as you can be sure they're very close to what you'll see on exam day. There's a limited number of official multiple-choice questions available, but in the AP Microeconomics Course and Exam Description , there are 15 multiple-choice questions you can answer beginning on page 126.

Fortunately there are many more official free-response questions available for free online. Questions from within the last five years will be the most useful because they'll be closest to the current exam format.

AP Microeconomics FRQ from 2021

AP Microeconomics FRQ from 1999-2020

Because there are so many official FRQ available, we recommend only using them instead of looking online for unofficial questions (those not created by the College Board) because unofficial questions can be hit or miss in terms of quality. 

Summary: AP Microeconomics Exam

The AP Microeconomics exam has two sections: multiple choice (worth 66% of your final score) and free response (worth 33% of your final score). The multiple-choice section contains 60 questions while free response has three questions: two short, and one long. During the exam, you'll need to use multiple skills and draw on knowledge from six main microeconomics topics. For AP Microeconomics FRQ, expect to draw multiple graphs. The AP Microeconomics graphs you create will often need to show multiple trends in order for you to earn full points.

In order to prepare for the AP Microeconomics exam, keep these three tips in mind during your review:

• Get strong graphing skills
• Know your vocab
• Take AP Microeconomics practice tests

What's Next?

How does AP Microeconomics compare to AP Macroeconomics? And which course is better for you? Read our article to learn all the Micro vs Macro similarities and differences.

Have you decided to take AP Macroeconomics too? Get the best study resources available by checking out our guide to the best AP Macroeconomics practice tests.

Many students take an AP economics class as a precursor to majoring in economics. Is economics the right major for you? Learn the answer by reading our guide on majoring in economics.

Christine graduated from Michigan State University with degrees in Environmental Biology and Geography and received her Master's from Duke University. In high school she scored in the 99th percentile on the SAT and was named a National Merit Finalist. She has taught English and biology in several countries.

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AP Microeconomics Practice Exams

Ap micro practice exams.

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ALBERT AP Microeconomics Questions

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