Free resources to prep for USMLE Step 1

Written by

ChartFlow Team

Date published

September 5, 2023

If you’re in medical school, you’re probably also in debt. That’s why we hate to see students shelling out thousands of dollars on test prep materials only to turn around and spend thousands more on the exams themselves. Thankfully, you can find plenty of free USMLE prep resources online without paying a dime. In addition to the resources below, “question of the day” mailing lists are becoming popular, and although it’s tempting to dismiss these as insignificant, we suggest signing up for every single question of every single day. Why? Pretty soon you’ll be getting 10 test prep questions a day and before your 2nd pre-clinical year draws to a close, you’ll already have done thousands of practice questions.

For more focused review, we’ve separated these free USMLE test prep resources into categories:

Free Lectures
Qbanks
Multi-Function Apps/Websites

Free Lectures

Ninja Nerd - NinjaNerd can take you from pre-med all the way through Step 1 and as of now, everything he has on YouTube is still free. These videos are structured by topics that align with standard pre-clinical curriculum but they go into more comprehensive detail than many others. That does not mean you’re stuck watching 10 hours of lectures with 5 minutes of high-yield information. What it means is that he’s going to walk you through the process from injury to clot, step-by-step, framing it within the larger picture of our bodies instead of just naming off some clotting factors for you to memorize. We’ve found that one 20 minute NinjaNerd lecture will anchor the information in our brains longer than 20 one-minute, high-yield recaps.

Dirty Medicine - This free Youtube channel covers all major pre-clinical topics and a lot of basics needed for clinical internships as well. If you search his channel for “USMLE”, you’ll find videos directly related to exam prep, so it’s easy for you to search high yield topics.

Medicosis Perfectionalis - These videos tend to be under 10 minutes and the host talks pretty quickly. However, we find that each one is exclusively high yield and if you had a first pass of textbook material or half-heartedly listened to your professor already, these videos would be perfectly suited to the task of clarifying information and making it stick.

Osmosis - We used to love osmosis for quick refresher videos, but they’ve recently started charging for access. If you search Osmosis on YouTube, you’ll still find a handful of their USMLE-relevant content for free, but we’re not linking to it here since they seem to be slowly moving videos away from free access and exclusively including them on their pay-gated platform.

Free practice exams and Qbanks:

USMLE - There’s nothing better than getting questions from the source. The USMLE site has a downloadable PDF of sample questions as well as a free testing experience. We suggest doing this at the end of pre-clinical year 1 or during pre-clinical year 2 so you know what type of questions you’ll encounter and how you should be focusing your review in the year(s) leading up to the exam.

Kaplan - Kaplan and other major publishers are not going to give away access to their property for free. However, they do usually provide enough sample questions to get you hooked. If you take advantage of all the publishers’ free trials, spaced out throughout the year before Step 1, you’ll find that you’ve done thousands of practice questions. You can also sign up for their question of the day at no cost.
Lecturio - This site charges for access to it’s larger Qbank and lectures, but it has a set of free questions available for both the USMLE Step 1 and Step 2 CK. We’re big fans of getting as many free questions you can, anywhere you can find them.

TrueLearn - You can review a handful of sample questions with detailed explanations on this site. While it won’t give you enough to serve as your sole Qbank, it will give you enough to add in to a larger pool of questions if you can’t afford to sign up for a singular question bank. Take the free resources where you can find ‘em!

Free Many-in-One Apps and Sites:

Medtutors is one of two sites we found that offers more than just one thing without charging. This is a fairly comprehensive Step 1 prep program that’s absolutely free. They have practice questions, a personalized study plan and an app.

BluePrint - This site appears to only have a few free features at first glance – but wait! – once you start clicking around you’ll see the free resources just keep coming. As long as you’re willing to submit your email, you can get access to free practice questions, study guides, a comprehensive study planner, and more. Make sure to click into their “free resources” to see all the extras they have.

Games, flashcards, and more

MedGames.io - When it comes to memorizing long flowcharts and cascades, this is the site you want to use. It has a lot of major pathways like glycolysis, the krebs cycle, gluconeogenesis, the pentose phosphate pathway, the coagulation cascade, etc. that aren’t so much about learning as they are about memorizing. Memorizing works well with games, which is why we love these drag and drop options. Much more fun than flashcards!

Quizlet - While this is an unpopular opinion, we prefer Quizlet to Anki. The design is much more appealing and we’re big fans of playing matching games and changing from “learn” to “flashcard” mode to keep things interesting. Plus, you don’t need to create your own sets. This one has nearly 4,000 cards for USMLE prep and this one is designed for rapid review of 200 cards.
Anki - The all-time test prep favorite. While it’s not our preferred study tool, we feel obligated to mention it due to it’s extreme popularity. Upload study sets, do times repetition, and save multiple decks. You can find links to download the most popular study sets including Zanki, Brosencephalon and LightYear on TestPrepNerds.

No matter what, preparation is key. Put in the hours and stay calm. You’ve got this 👍👍

-The ChartFlow Team