Taking the Texas Electrician Exam in Spanish

If Spanish is your stronger language, you can take every Texas electrician exam in Spanish. It costs nothing extra. The catch is that your code book is still in English, so the real skill is moving between a Spanish question and an English NEC quickly.

Key facts

• PSI offers the exams in English and Spanish at no additional cost.
• You choose the language when you schedule the exam.
• Other languages need a paid translation request through PSI.
• You may bring a bound word-to-word translation dictionary, with strict rules.
• The NEC is the English 2026 edition, and the exam questions are based on it.
• PSI publishes a Spanish bulletin, the “Boletín Informativo para Candidatos”.

How to choose Spanish

The English PSI bulletin, under Foreign Languages, says the exams are available in English and Spanish for no additional cost and that you indicate your language preference when you schedule. That statement covers the TDLR electrician exams in general. It is not repeated under each license, but nothing limits it to one exam.

When you schedule online at PSI or by phone at (833) 333-4741, choose Spanish at that step. PSI does not say whether you can switch the language after booking, so decide before you schedule, or call PSI if you need to change it.

For any language other than English or Spanish, PSI says you can request a translation by contacting PSI and paying an extra cost that PSI quotes after it receives the request.

One line in the Spanish bulletin also mentions Vietnamese. The English bulletin names only English and Spanish, so treat that line as an error and do not count on a Vietnamese exam.

The dictionary rule

PSI allows a bound word-to-word translation dictionary. The rules, paraphrased from the bulletin:

Allowed	Not allowed
A bound, word-to-word translation dictionary	Pictures or definitions in the dictionary
	Extra papers, loose or attached
	Highlighting, underlining, indexing or marking, before or during the exam

PSI says a candidate caught marking the dictionary during the exam can lose the dictionary, have the exam ended, and be reported to TDLR. Note the difference from the NEC: you may highlight your NEC before the exam, but you may not mark the dictionary at all.

The NEC is in English

TDLR adopted the 2026 NEC, and PSI bases the questions on it. You bring your own soft-bound copy under PSI’s open-book rules. PSI does not say whether a Spanish translation of the NEC is accepted as your reference. Until PSI confirms it, plan to use the English book.

That means a Spanish question will send you to an English index. If the question says “caída de tensión”, you look up “voltage drop”. If it says “circuito derivado”, you look up “branch circuit”. Learn those pairs before exam day. Our code lookup drills and glossary help, and you can study every drill on this site in Spanish at the same address with /es/ in front.

Terminology: English to Spanish

The terms below come from PSI’s Spanish bulletin (marked PSI) and TDLR’s Spanish rule summary of March 31, 2026 (marked TDLR). Where neither uses a term, we give common usage and mark it suggestion, which means unconfirmed. PSI’s Spanish bulletin reads like a machine translation in places, so a few PSI terms are literal.

License and exam names

English	Spanish	Source
Journeyman Electrician	electricista oficial	PSI, TDLR
Master Electrician	maestro electricista (also electricista maestro)	PSI
Residential Wireman	“Instalaciones Eléctricas Residenciales” (exam title only, no word for the person)	PSI
Maintenance Electrician	electricista de mantenimiento	PSI
Candidate Information Bulletin	Boletín Informativo para Candidatos	PSI
Calculations exam	examen de cálculos	PSI
NEC knowledge portion	conocimientos del NEC (journeyman), entendimiento del NEC (master)	PSI
Open book	a libro abierto	PSI
Exam fee	tasa de examen, tarifa del examen	PSI
Score report	informe de calificaciones	PSI
Non-programmable calculator	calculadora no programable	PSI
Apprentice	aprendiz	suggestion

Technical terms

English	Spanish	Source
Branch circuit	circuito derivado	PSI
Feeder	alimentador (PSI mostly writes “cables de alimentación eléctrica”)	PSI
Service equipment	equipos de servicio	PSI
Separately derived system	sistema derivado por separado	PSI
Grounding	puesta a tierra	PSI
Bonding	conexión	PSI
GFCI	interruptor de circuito por falla a tierra	PSI
Wiring methods	métodos de instalación eléctrica	PSI
Disconnecting means	medios de desconexión	PSI
Motors and generators	motores y generadores	PSI
Special occupancies	ocupación especial (also “usos, equipamientos y condiciones especiales”)	PSI
Signs and outline lighting	letreros eléctricos e iluminación de contornos	PSI
Load calculation	cálculo de cargas	suggestion
Raceway	canalización	suggestion
Box fill	ocupación de cajas	suggestion
Voltage drop	caída de tensión	suggestion
Overcurrent protection	protección contra sobrecorriente	suggestion

If a Spanish question uses a word you do not recognize, it may be one of PSI’s literal translations. Read the question for the numbers and the thing being asked, then match it to the English index.

How to prepare in Spanish

1. Study the method in Spanish, the lookups in English. Every drill on this site, such as dwelling standard load, has a Spanish version under /es/ with worked steps in Spanish, while the table names point to the English NEC.
2. Make your own term list of every English index word you look up while practicing. Write it inside your NEC before the exam; notes in the NEC are allowed, but the dictionary may not be marked.
3. Practice timed. Translating costs seconds. The journeyman calculations portion gives about 4.2 minutes per item, so build that time into your practice on the practice tests.
4. Read the format guides for your exam: journeyman, master or residential wireman.

TDLR’s pass-rate tables do not separate English and Spanish candidates, so there is no official pass rate for the Spanish exam.

TexasElectricianExam is an independent study site, not affiliated with TDLR, PSI or NFPA.