CPA License Reciprocity by State (2026)

The pathways, applied to cpa / accounting

Reciprocal license by substantial equivalency (the standard path)

In most states the transfer is administrative. The destination board confirms you hold a CPA license in good standing — usually through the CPAverify.org lookup or a letter from your current board — and issues its own reciprocal license without re-examining your qualifications. Your education and experience are taken as satisfied by the license you already hold, so the 150-hour transcript review that first-time candidates face does not repeat. What is left is the destination's own layer: a background check, a state ethics or rules-of-conduct exam where one applies, and proof your CPE is current.

Practice privilege / mobility (often no license at all)

Before you apply for anything, ask whether you even need a license. Practice privilege lets a CPA whose principal place of business is in one state serve clients in another with no new license, no notice filing, and no fee — the traveling consultant, the multistate tax preparer, the CPA working an out-of-state client's engagement. The reciprocal license is the other mechanism, and it matters when the new state becomes where you are principally based. Mobility, not a transfer, is the right tool for temporary or cross-border work.

The experience-test track (the alternative route)

Some boards do not simply hand a reciprocal license to every out-of-state CPA. They run two parallel routes: you either meet the state's current entry requirements or you qualify on an experience test, commonly framed as active practice in four of the last ten years — a route that lets a seasoned CPA from a technically non-equivalent background still qualify. Where a board reviews applicants individually rather than granting the automatic license, the state page states its documented rule, not its reputation.

The 2025 UAA Ninth Edition (a moving target)

NASBA and the AICPA approved the Ninth Edition of the Uniform Accountancy Act in 2025, adding a bachelor's-plus-two-years-experience path to the CPA and shifting mobility from a state-by-state model to an individual-based one, with a safe harbor for anyone licensed before December 31, 2024. States are enacting these changes at their own pace. We re-check the roster quarterly and date every claim; confirm the current position with your destination board before relying on the new rules.

This site tracks the individual CPA license. Opening or owning a CPA firm in the new state — anything involving attest or audit work — requires a separate firm permit and often peer-review compliance, a distinct application from your personal reciprocal license.

The licensing body is usually the State Board of Accountancy, though some sit inside a department of commerce or regulation and New York's is the State Education Department's Office of the Professions. Every state page names the exact board and links its reciprocal-application page.