EPSO Preparation Platforms Compared (2026): What Each One Publishes, and What It Actually Costs

Why this comparison did not exist

If you search for the best EPSO preparation platform, the page that answers you is usually written by one of the platforms. The most-cited list in this market was last updated in May 2025, and it does not compare platforms at all — it lists official EPSO material, a book, and the products of the company that published it.

That is not a scandal. It is just what happens when nobody writes the other thing.

So here is the other thing, with three rules that make it checkable:

1. Every figure is what the provider publishes on its own site. No estimates, no "sources say", no judgements about anyone's quality. Where a provider does not state something, this page says so rather than filling the gap.
2. Every figure is dated. The first seven providers were read on 27 August 2026; the five added below, and our own updated figures, on 6 September 2026. Prices and question counts move; a comparison without a date is a comparison you cannot trust six months later, including this one.
3. We are in the table. EU-now is one of the platforms compared here, and the section on where we are the wrong choice is not decoration.

The table

The headline numbers are not comparable

Two of the figures in that first column mean something different from the rest, and both differences run in the same direction.

A catalogue is not a package. EU Training publishes "over 35,000 practice exam questions", and that is a real number — it covers every competition and profile the company has built for since 2006. What an AD5 candidate can actually buy is set out on its packages page: 540 questions for €135, 1,150 for €275, and 2,500 in the largest package at €395. The company also sells questions individually, at €0.17 each for reasoning, €0.21 for EU knowledge and €0.20 for digital skills, which is the clearest statement of what the catalogue figure means in practice.

Questions used is not questions available. The same homepage reports "17 million+ Questions used". That counts answers given by candidates over two decades, not the size of the bank. It is a fair thing to be proud of and a misleading thing to compare against a bank size — and we say that having made exactly this mistake ourselves: until this month our own homepage advertised a figure that turned out to be a count of translations rather than of questions. It is corrected, and the correction is why this section exists.

So the axis that survives contact with reality is not how many questions exist. It is what you get for what you pay, over the months you will actually prepare.

On that axis, the shapes are genuinely different rather than better or worse. EU Training's €395 package is yours permanently and includes two written tests marked by a person. EU-now's €29.99 gives you the full bank for a month and stops when you stop paying. Over thirteen months those two cost the same. Which is better value depends entirely on how long your competition runs — and EPSO competitions now run long.

Five more platforms arrived within ten days

When this page was written in August it compared seven providers. Ten days later a search for EPSO preparation returns five more with visible, working products: EPSOready, EPSO Genius, EPSOHQ, EU Campus and Open Exam Prep. They are in the table above under the same three rules as everyone else.

Three things about them are worth reading rather than skipping.

The catalogue-versus-package confusion has a second case. EPSOHQ publishes "43,000+" questions. On the same site it also publishes the count for each family: 1,357 verbal, 2,616 numerical, 1,192 abstract, 1,119 EU knowledge and 440 digital skills, plus "80+" essay prompts. Those five add up to 6,724. Both figures are theirs and both may be perfectly true — a catalogue can hold far more than the five core families. But if you are sitting the AD5, the second set is the one that describes what you would practise on, and it is the one that took a click to find. Same lesson as EU Training's 35,000, same fix: read the number next to the thing you are buying.

One-off pricing is now the majority shape in this market. EPSOready sells packs at €39.99 to €69.99 with access "until your exam day". EPSO Genius sells the same product two ways — €69 once or €14.99 a month — which is the clearest statement anyone has published of what the two shapes are worth against each other. EU Campus sells per module, €127 to €293 for a single AD5 component, with lifetime access. Ours is a monthly subscription and stays one. If your competition runs eighteen months, do the multiplication before you choose; if it runs two, do it the other way.

Free now means several different things. Open Exam Prep publishes its ICT practice with no account and no payment at all. EPSOready has a Free Starter with no card, and a 30-day money-back guarantee on the paid packs. EPSO Genius gives three tests a day free and a seven-day trial of the paid tier. Ours is ten questions a day that never expires, plus the SHL simulator. These are not the same offer, and the difference between "free tier" and "free trial" is the one worth checking before you plan a week of study around it.

Italy has a separate market, and it is 45% of the field. Of the 174,727 AD5 applications, 79,343 came from Italy — more than four times the next country. Three Italian-language providers serve it and appear in none of the English-language searches above: Concorsando (which publishes "13,952 quiz", broken down by area, and whose parts add up exactly to its headline), Futura ("up to 25,000 quiz") and EUQP (Italian and English, free quizzes every Sunday). None of the three publishes a price on the pages we read on 6 September 2026 — the mirror image of the international market, which publishes prices and blurs catalogue into package. The Italian version of this page covers them in full.

Match the platform to what you are actually sitting

Catalogue size stops mattering quickly once you know your profile.

AD5 generalist. The widest field: all seven providers above address it in some form. Compare on package contents and on whether the written test is marked by a human, because that is where the prices separate.

Specialist AD7 (field-related MCQ). The field narrows sharply. Most providers cover reasoning well and specialist fields thinly or not at all. This is where our own bank is concentrated: 9,230 of our 13,200 active questions are specialist, across the ICT, law, audit, finance, economics, procurement and other profiles.

Commission internal competitions (SHL). The most confused corner of the market. The paid packs on sale here are general SHL bundles — JobTestPrep's, at £59 to £99 for one month, includes the OPQ personality questionnaire and mechanical comprehension alongside the reasoning tests. Those are real SHL products; they are not in the Commission's internal competitions. Before buying any pack for this route, read the contents list against the notice of competition. And start with SHL itself, which publishes around 25 free practice tests including the interactive formats — we wrote up what is genuinely free for this test.

CAST Permanent. A rolling database rather than a competition, so a monthly plan and a one-off package behave very differently here. Buy the shape that matches how long you will be in the pool.

Where EU-now is the wrong choice

Three cases, stated plainly.

If you want the largest catalogue, we are not it. EU Training's is larger, and it has been built since 2006 against 180,000+ registered users. We have 13,200 active questions. Ours are each available in five languages, which makes 65,312 localised items — but that is a different claim, and by now you know why we are careful to say which one we mean.

If you need your written test marked by a person, EU Training and ORSEU both sell that; EU Training prices expert evaluation at €79 per piece. Our essay evaluation is automated. It is fast and it is available at any hour, and it is not a human examiner.

If you want to be tested in one of the other 19 EU languages, we cover five: English, French, German, Spanish and Italian. Pass EPSO states 24. If your L1 is Polish or Greek and you want to practise in it, that is a real reason to look elsewhere. And it is no longer only Pass EPSO: EPSOHQ declares 14 localised libraries and EPSOready declares 8, both including Polish or Greek. On this axis the market has moved past us.

How to check any of this

Every provider above is linked in the sources at the foot of this page. The checks that take five minutes and change decisions:

1. Find the number next to the package, not on the homepage. Ask how many questions are in the thing you are about to buy, for your competition.
2. Find the access period. One-off, monthly, or one month dressed as a one-off purchase — all three exist in this market.
3. Read the contents list against your notice of competition. If a pack contains tests your competition does not use, you are paying for them.
4. Test any exclusivity claim. They are the easiest claims to check and the most likely to be out of date.

Apply the fourth one to this page too. We have an interest in what you conclude, which is exactly why every line here is a link to somebody else's site and a date. If you find a figure that has moved, it has moved — and we would rather hear it than keep publishing it.

If you would rather start from the competition than from the platforms, our EPSO preparation guide covers the selection process end to end, the specialist competitions guide covers the AD7 routes, and our free daily practice needs no account.