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# NMC Revalidation: A UK Nurse's Complete Guide (2026)
- URL: https://www.logbook.co.uk/nmc-revalidation-uk-nurses-complete-guide/
- Published: 2026-04-22T10:03:27.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-28T19:00:21.000Z
- Description: A UK nurse's complete guide to NMC revalidation: the eight requirements with exact figures, which forms are mandatory, how verification works, what to record for three years, and where the 2026 reform consultation now stands.
- Author: Jamie Dawson
- Tags: Healthcare Logbooks

**Quick answer:** Every nurse, midwife and nursing associate on the NMC register must revalidate every three years, by the first day of the month in which their registration expires. You need 450 practice hours (900 if you hold two registrations), 35 hours of CPD of which 20 must be participatory, five pieces of practice-related feedback, five written reflective accounts on the NMC's form, a reflective discussion with another NMC registrant, a health and character declaration, an indemnity declaration, and a confirmation from an appropriate confirmer. You submit through MyNMC. Each year the NMC selects a sample of applicants for verification and gives them 21 days to provide further information. The requirements are unchanged for 2026: the NMC's planned consultation on a refreshed process has been deferred by at least six months.

Revalidation sounds administrative. In practice the evidence you keep over three years is the difference between a 20-minute online submission and a scramble to reconstruct records from two years ago. Nothing in this guide is a substitute for the NMC's own guidance, which is linked at every point, but it puts the whole cycle in one place and tells you what to write down, when.

## Who must revalidate, and when

Everyone on the register: nurses in all four fields (adult, mental health, learning disability, children's), midwives, nursing associates, and anyone with a specialist community public health nurse (SCPHN) qualification. The cycle is three years from the date your registration was last renewed or you joined the register.

- **Your revalidation date** is shown in your MyNMC account. Your application is due on the first day of the month in which your registration expires.
- **The NMC sends a Registration Renewal Notice 60 days before** that date. You can submit at any point in that 60-day window.
- **Annual fee:** registration also needs an annual fee every year, separate from revalidation. From 1 October 2026 the fee rises from £120 to £143 for notices issued on or after that date.
- **Need more time?** You can apply for an extension from within your MyNMC account. If you do not revalidate, your registration lapses and you cannot practise as a registered nurse, midwife or nursing associate until you are readmitted.

## The eight requirements, with the exact figures

1. **450 practice hours** in the three years, in a role where you rely on your skills, knowledge and experience as a registrant. That includes direct care, but also managing teams, teaching others and helping to run or shape a service. Two registrations (nurse and midwife, or nursing associate and nurse) need **900 hours**, 450 for each. Triple registration needs **1,350**. If you cannot reach the hours, the NMC requires an approved return to practice programme or a Test of Competence before you apply.
2. **35 hours of CPD** relevant to your scope of practice, of which **at least 20 must be participatory**: learning that involves interaction with other professionals, in person or online.
3. **Five pieces of practice-related feedback.** Written or verbal, formal or informal, from patients, service users, colleagues or managers. Team performance reports and your annual appraisal count.
4. **Five written reflective accounts**, each on the NMC's reflective accounts form, each about an instance of CPD and/or a piece of feedback and/or an event in your practice, and how it relates to the Code.
5. **A reflective discussion** with another NMC registrant covering your five accounts, recorded on the NMC's reflective discussion form.
6. **A health and character declaration.** You must declare any charge, conviction (including a conditional discharge) or formal caution, and any finding by another regulator that your fitness to practise is impaired. Anything you have already declared and the NMC has already considered does not need declaring again.
7. **A professional indemnity declaration.** Indemnity is a legal requirement to practise. Most employers provide it; the self-employed arrange their own. You declare it, you do not evidence it.
8. **Confirmation** from an appropriate confirmer that you have met the requirements, recorded on the NMC's confirmation form.

## Which forms are mandatory, and which are only recommended

This is the distinction people miss. The NMC publishes six forms and templates. Three are **mandatory**: you must use the NMC's own form, no substitutes.

- **Reflective accounts form** (mandatory): all five written reflections go on this form.
- **Reflective discussion form** (mandatory): your discussion partner completes it with their name, NMC Pin, email, professional address and postcode, and the date.
- **Confirmation form** (mandatory): completed by your confirmer.

Three are **recommended**, which means the NMC would like you to use them but any record holding the same information is acceptable:

- **Practice hours log template**
- **Continuing professional development log template**
- **Practice-related feedback log template**

The NMC also publishes a single combined document containing every form, and a set of completed examples. All forms must be completed in English. None of them is sent to the NMC when you apply; you keep them, and produce them only if you are selected for verification. Our own [NMC revalidation log template](https://www.logbook.co.uk/nmc-revalidation-log-template/) covers the three recommended logs on one workbook with running totals against the 450, 35 and 20-hour targets, plus a checklist of all eight requirements. It does not replace the three mandatory forms, and does not try to.

## What to record for each requirement

### Practice hours

The NMC's log asks for the dates, the number of hours, the name and address of the organisation, your scope of practice and your work setting. Keep it as you go. Reconstructing a year of shifts from payslips is possible but a poor use of an evening, and agency or bank staff with several employers find it hardest. Record enough that a confirmer could verify the hours with a phone call.

### CPD

For each activity the NMC wants: the method (course, conference, e-learning, reading, supervision), a brief description of the topic and how it relates to your practice, the dates, the number of hours and how many of those were participatory, the part of the Code it relates to, and the evidence you hold (certificate, notes, programme). Participatory learning means interaction with other professionals, in physical or virtual settings: conferences, workshops, training courses, and structured group meetings outside routine practice to discuss an event or a new approach. An e-learning module completed alone, a journal article, or a recorded lecture are CPD but not participatory. Twenty of your thirty-five hours must be the interactive kind, and mislabelling the other kind is the most common way a verification goes wrong.

### Feedback

Note the date, the source (patient, colleague, manager, appraisal, team report), the content, and what you did with it. The NMC's recurring warning is about identifiable information: a thank-you card is fine to reference, a photocopy naming the patient is not. Feedback that could identify another person is a data protection problem before it is a revalidation one.

### Reflective accounts

Each account describes what happened, what you learnt, how you changed or improved your practice, and how it relates to the Code. They do not have to be long or academic. Link to a named part of the Code, not the Code in general. The four themes of the Code are *prioritise people*, *practise effectively*, *preserve safety* and *promote professionalism and trust*; name the one you mean.

## The reflective discussion and the confirmer

These two steps involve other people, so they need booking, not just doing.

- **The reflective discussion** must be with another NMC registrant (nurse, midwife or nursing associate), face to face, covering your five accounts. They do not need to be senior. If your confirmer is an NMC registrant, the reflective discussion can be part of the confirmation discussion. If your confirmer is not NMC-registered, the reflective discussion must happen first. When you apply, MyNMC asks for your discussion partner's Pin, and will not let you enter your own.
- **Your confirmer** should be your line manager where possible, and a line manager does not have to be NMC-registered. If you have no line manager, choose an NMC registrant; if you have access to neither, another healthcare professional regulated in the UK. Family members and close friends cannot be your confirmer. Get your confirmation in the final year of the cycle so it is recent. The NMC publishes separate information for confirmers; send it to yours before you meet, so they know what they are signing.

## Submitting through MyNMC

MyNMC replaced NMC Online in February 2026\. The application itself is a series of declarations: you confirm you have met each requirement, enter your reflective discussion partner's and confirmer's details, complete the health and character and indemnity declarations, and pay. You upload nothing at this stage. Note that MyNMC has planned maintenance windows; the NMC announces them on its website, so do not leave submission to the last night of your window.

## Verification: what happens if you are selected

Each year the NMC selects a sample of nurses, midwives and nursing associates to give more information about their application. If it is you:

- You are told **within 24 hours** of submitting your application and paying your fee.
- You have **21 days** to provide further information through MyNMC, and the NMC may ask for further evidence in some cases.
- Selection does not mean the NMC has concerns about your application, and **you can continue to practise** while it is reviewed.

Verification is where the three years of records earn their keep. Keep all of your revalidation evidence safe until your next revalidation, in a form you can send within three weeks. The NMC's current reform proposals would **double the number of people selected** and move to a fully random sample (see below), so the odds of being asked are going up, not down.

## What is changing: the 2026 reform consultation, and its delay

This section is the one to re-read before you rely on anything you were told in the staff room.

- **July 2026:** the NMC's council approved public consultations on a new draft Code and a refreshed revalidation process, planned to run from September to December 2026\. The revalidation proposals included **12-week extensions** for people with a valid need such as ill health, parental leave or bereavement; **doubling the verification sample** and making it fully random; and a larger role for confirmers and reflective discussion partners. Under that timeline the new Code would go live in October 2027 and revalidation changes would begin from April 2028.
- **September 2026:** papers for the council's 23 September meeting, reported by Nursing Times on 18 September, delayed the Code consultation by four weeks and deferred the revalidation consultation by **at least six months**, so that lessons from the Thirlwall Inquiry's final report can be fully considered. That inquiry found that the revalidation process in place in 2017 allowed Lucy Letby to re-register despite suspicions having been raised, and its chair called for the process to be strengthened.
- **What this means for you:** if you revalidate in 2026 or 2027, the eight requirements, the three-year cycle and the current forms apply. The 2015 Code (updated 2018) remains in force. Expect the eventual changes to bear on confirmers and verification rather than the hour counts, but nothing is settled until the consultation runs. We will update this guide when it does.

## Common mistakes

- Counting non-participatory CPD as participatory. The 20-hour line is the one verification checks hardest.
- Reflective accounts with no named link to the Code, or written somewhere other than the NMC's form.
- Feedback records that identify a patient or colleague.
- A confirmer who signs without reviewing the evidence, or a confirmation obtained early in the cycle rather than the final year.
- Practice hours claimed from before the three-year period, or from work that did not use your registration.
- Treating the application as the deadline for gathering evidence rather than the deadline for submitting the declarations. The evidence window closes when you press submit; the verification window opens 24 hours later.

## FAQs

### How often do I revalidate with the NMC?

Every three years. Your revalidation application is due on the first day of the month in which your registration expires, and the NMC sends a Registration Renewal Notice 60 days before that date. You can find your exact date in your MyNMC account.

### What happens if I am selected for verification?

The NMC tells you within 24 hours of submitting your application and paying your fee. You then have 21 days to provide further information about your application through MyNMC, and the NMC may ask for more evidence in some cases. You can carry on practising while it is reviewed. Being selected does not mean the NMC has concerns about you.

### I have been on maternity leave. Do my hours still count?

Time on leave is not practice, so it does not add to your 450 hours, but hours worked before and after the leave within the same three-year period do. If you cannot reach 450 hours by your application date, the NMC's rule is that you must complete an approved return to practice programme or a Test of Competence before you apply. If you need more time to submit, you can apply for an extension through your MyNMC account, and the NMC's current reform proposals include 12-week extensions for reasons such as ill health, parental leave or bereavement.

### I am dual-registered as a nurse and midwife. How many hours do I need?

900 practice hours in total, made up of 450 hours for nursing and 450 for midwifery. The same 900-hour rule applies to someone registered as both a nursing associate and a nurse. Triple registration as nurse, midwife and nursing associate needs 1,350 hours. CPD stays at 35 hours whatever your registration.

### Can one CPD activity count towards both CPD and a reflective account?

Yes. The NMC's reflective accounts form asks you to reflect on an instance of CPD, a piece of feedback or an event in your practice, so a study day you log as participatory CPD can also be the subject of one of your five written reflections.

### Does my confirmer have to be an NMC registrant?

No. The NMC says your confirmer should be your line manager where possible, and a line manager does not have to be NMC-registered. If you have no line manager, choose an NMC-registered nurse, midwife or nursing associate, and failing that another UK-regulated healthcare professional. Family members and close friends cannot act as your confirmer.

### Is NMC revalidation changing in 2026?

Not yet. The eight requirements and the three-year cycle are unchanged for anyone revalidating in 2026\. The NMC's council approved a consultation on a refreshed revalidation process in July 2026, but council papers for its 23 September 2026 meeting deferred that consultation by at least six months so that lessons from the Thirlwall Inquiry can be included. The earlier plan had changes taking effect from April 2028; that date should now be treated as provisional.

## Related guides

- [NMC revalidation log template](https://www.logbook.co.uk/nmc-revalidation-log-template/): practice hours, CPD and feedback logs with running totals, plus an eight-requirement checklist
- [Nursing logbooks and NMC revalidation](https://www.logbook.co.uk/nursing-logbook-nmc-revalidation-uk/): how to organise the evidence itself
- [CPD logbooks for UK healthcare professionals](https://www.logbook.co.uk/cpd-logbook-healthcare-revalidation-uk/)
- [GMC appraisal and revalidation for doctors](https://www.logbook.co.uk/gmc-appraisal-revalidation-uk-doctors-complete-guide/): the five-year equivalent
- [Mandatory training records and the CSTF](https://www.logbook.co.uk/mandatory-training-records-uk-healthcare-cstf-complete-guide/)
- [Controlled drugs registers on the ward and in the pharmacy](https://www.logbook.co.uk/controlled-drugs-register-pharmacy-uk/)

## Sources and further reading

Every figure in this guide was checked against the following NMC pages on 22 September 2026.

- [NMC: What you need to do](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/?ref=logbook.co.uk) (requirements overview), with the individual pages for [practice hours](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/practice-hours/?ref=logbook.co.uk), [CPD](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/cpd/?ref=logbook.co.uk), [practice-related feedback](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/practice-related-feedback/?ref=logbook.co.uk), [written reflective accounts](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/written-reflective-accounts/?ref=logbook.co.uk), [reflective discussion](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/reflective-discussion/?ref=logbook.co.uk), [health and character](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/health-and-character/?ref=logbook.co.uk), [professional indemnity](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/professional-indemnity-arrangement/?ref=logbook.co.uk) and [confirmation](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/requirements/confirmation/?ref=logbook.co.uk)
- [NMC: Forms and templates](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/resources/forms-and-templates/?ref=logbook.co.uk) (which are mandatory, which are recommended)
- [NMC: Find out your revalidation date](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/online-application/revalidation-date/?ref=logbook.co.uk) and [NMC: Verification](https://www.nmc.org.uk/revalidation/online-application/verification/?ref=logbook.co.uk)
- [NMC: Paying your fee](https://www.nmc.org.uk/registration/your-registration/paying-your-fee/?ref=logbook.co.uk) (£120 to £143 from 1 October 2026)
- [The Code](https://www.nmc.org.uk/standards/code/?ref=logbook.co.uk)
- [NMC, 22 July 2026: NMC to launch landmark consultation on new Code and revalidation process](https://www.nmc.org.uk/news/news-and-updates/nmc-to-launch-landmark-consultation-on-new-code-and-revalidation-process/?ref=logbook.co.uk)
- [Nursing Times, 18 September 2026: NMC delays both 'landmark' Code and revalidation consultations](https://www.nursingtimes.net/professional-regulation/nmc-delays-both-landmark-code-and-revalidation-consultations-18-09-2026/?ref=logbook.co.uk)
- [RCN: Revalidation support](https://www.rcn.org.uk/Professional-Development/Revalidation?ref=logbook.co.uk)

*First published 22 April 2026\. Rewritten and re-checked against NMC guidance on 22 September 2026 by Jamie Dawson, Editor. Logbook.co.uk is independent of the NMC; this guide is general information, not professional or legal advice. Corrections: corrections@logbook.co.uk*