Alongside the oral Norwegian test, Norwegian citizenship requires passing either the citizenship test or the social studies test in Norwegian. They cover the same syllabus, both run for a maximum of 60 minutes on a computer, and they differ in three ways that matter: the language they can be taken in, the level of Norwegian the questions are pitched at, and what they cost.
Sources: UDI — krav om prøver for å få norsk statsborgerskap; HK-dir — les om statsborgerprøven; HK-dir — les om samfunnskunnskapsprøven; HK-dir — meld deg på statsborgerprøven; HK-dir — meld deg på samfunnskunnskapsprøven; HK-dir — muligheter til å klage, samfunnskunnskapsprøven.
The language rule, which decides most cases
Statsborgerprøven is taken in Norwegian — bokmål or nynorsk.
Samfunnskunnskapsprøven can be taken in one of 23 languages. You choose the language at the test centre when you start, not when you register. Questions can also be read aloud to you in one of ten languages. Whether a version exists in your mother tongue is something to check in advance.
Then the rule that catches people: if you are using the social studies test for citizenship, it must be taken in Norwegian. A pass in another language does not satisfy the citizenship requirement — even though it does satisfy the requirement for permanent residence.
So for citizenship purposes, both tests end up being Norwegian-language tests. The multilingual option is only useful for the permanent residence route.
Same syllabus, different level of Norwegian
This is the point most comparisons get wrong. The two tests do not differ in how much you have to learn. HK-dir states plainly that statsborgerprøven and samfunnskunnskapsprøven have the same pensum, published at samfunnskunnskap.no.
What differs is the Norwegian the questions are written in.
Statsborgerprøven is pitched at language level A2. HK-dir sets that explicitly.
Samfunnskunnskapsprøven’s Norwegian is reckoned to be higher than A2.
That single difference is the whole practical case for choosing one over the other. If both are open to you and Norwegian is your constraint rather than the subject matter, the citizenship test is the easier paper — not because there is less to know, but because the questions are written in simpler Norwegian.
The structure, as HK-dir publishes it
Both are multiple choice with three options per question, one correct, under a fixed time limit. Both also include a handful of trial questions that do not count towards your score.
| Statsborgerprøven | Samfunnskunnskapsprøven | |
|---|---|---|
| Questions | 36 | 38 |
| Questions that score | 32 | 34 |
| Correct answers to pass | 24 | 26 |
| Time | max 60 minutes | max 60 minutes |
The samfunnskunnskapsprøven also includes picture tasks where you mark the correct place in an image, rather than only choosing between written options.
Both tests reward being able to apply knowledge rather than recall dates. Knowing that Norway entered the Second World War in 1940 is memorisation; answering which historical event has a seventieth anniversary in a given year requires using it.
Cost, and the free attempt
Samfunnskunnskapsprøven is free once for people with a right to instruction in Norwegian and social studies — your test centre registers you rather than you doing it yourself. For everyone else HK-dir gives the range as 500–1 300 kroner, set by the municipality.
Everyone pays for statsborgerprøven. There is no free attempt: HK-dir’s registration page states that you must pay for the test when you register. The published range is 300–1 800 kroner.
That reverses the usual advice for anyone entitled to free instruction: if the free attempt is available to you and you can manage the harder Norwegian, it saves the fee. If Norwegian is the limiting factor, paying for the citizenship test may be the better use of money.
Prices are set locally, and municipalities also set their own dates for both tests — unlike the Norskprøve, which runs on fixed national dates. Some centres run them several times a month.
Which one applies to you
The starting point is your own position rather than a general rule.
For permanent residence, the requirement is the social studies test, and you choose the language yourself.
For citizenship, UDI’s requirement is the citizenship test or the social studies test in Norwegian. Which of those is expected of you can depend on your circumstances, so read the decision or guidance you have received from UDI rather than assuming the choice is free.
One trap worth knowing if you have been relying on an exemption route: where a one-year deadline has expired and a required 75-hour course was not completed, the option of applying to the municipality for exemption from social studies can close — leaving the social studies test in Norwegian as the remaining route. If you are unsure whether a deadline has passed, ask your adult education centre before booking anything.
Results and appeals
You cannot appeal the result of either test. What you can appeal is a formal error in how the test was conducted — a technical fault on the day that you believe affected your result, for example. The deadline for that is three weeks after taking the test, and the appeal goes to the test centre, not to HK-dir.
If you need the test adapted — extra time, a separate room — contact your test centre as soon as possible and at the latest three days after you registered. That deadline runs from registration, not from the test date.
Where the language sits
Both tests, used for citizenship, are read and answered in Norwegian under time pressure. That is a reading and comprehension task rather than a speaking one — which makes it a different skill from the oral subtest that carries the B1 requirement.
The two requirements are separate and are prepared for separately. What the CEFR levels describe covers the level the oral test is measured against, which is the part that no amount of subject revision will cover.