Macfarlanes sets judgement and critical reasoning inside its own practice-area scenarios

Macfarlanes says its online assessment uses scenarios from its practice areas to measure situational judgement and critical reasoning, and it points candidates to the Cappfinity Preparation Hub. Our reasoning test covers the critical reasoning half: judging what a short text does and does not support.

The situational judgement half is about how you would act, and our test does not imitate it. The scenarios are set in Macfarlanes' own practice areas, which our generic passages are not. The firm does not publish a time per section or a pass mark, so use the Cappfinity hub for the format.

Macfarlanes describes an online assessment in which candidates work through scenarios from different practice areas. That design gives the questions a flavour of the firm's actual work, so a little background reading on what its main practice groups do will make the scenarios feel familiar rather than foreign.

You are not expected to know the law. Read a short description of each main practice area on the firm's site, and note the kind of client and problem each handles. That context helps you read a scenario quickly and focus on the decision it asks for.

The assessment measures two things. Situational judgement asks what you would do and rewards sensible priorities: client first, accuracy, escalating early when unsure. Critical reasoning asks what follows from information and rewards strict reading.

Practise them differently. For judgement, read Macfarlanes' values and think about what a careful trainee would do. For critical reasoning, drill items where the passage is the only evidence allowed; our verbal reasoning questions and the situational judgement guide cover both.

Macfarlanes recommends visiting the Cappfinity Preparation Hub before completing its online assessments. That is the clearest signal the firm gives about format, and it costs nothing, so start there before any paid material.

Cappfinity platforms are used by several law firms, including Linklaters and Ashurst, so time on the hub can help across more than one application this season.

For the training programme, the online assessment is only the first stage. The second is a day in the life job simulation, and the last is an in-person written exercise and interview at the London office. Each step moves closer to the actual job.

A good rehearsal for both later stages is to take a short commercial news story, write a one-page note to a partner explaining what it means for a client, and time yourself at 40 minutes. Then explain your note aloud in two minutes.

The 2027 spring vacation schemes, 30 March to 9 April and 12 to 23 April, closed to applications on 30 October 2026. They pay £545 a week and include two practice areas over two weeks. The training programme and training scholarship are closed until 2027.

The First Year Insight Scheme opens on 2 November 2026 and closes on 15 January 2027, for a scheme from 28 June to 2 July 2027. It is open to first-year students on a three-year course and second-year students on a four-year course.