AP Calculus AB Study Guide
Free AP Calculus AB exam prep: official exam format and unit weightings, six annotated FRQ walkthroughs, a scoring-rubric breakdown, a tips-for-a-5 checklist, and a unit-by-unit study guide for every unit in the College Board AP Course & Exam Description.
About AP Calculus AB
AP Calculus AB is one of the 38 College Board Advanced Placement courses offered to US high school students. Like every AP exam, AP Calculus AB is scored on a 1–5 scale, with most US colleges granting credit or placement for scores of 3 and above; specific policies vary by institution and should be checked using the College Board AP Credit Policy Search. The exam runs 3 hours 15 minutes end-to-end and is split between a multiple-choice section and a free-response section, with the official section breakdown documented on the exam format page.
The 12-unit framework below mirrors the order in which the College Board AP Course and Exam Description presents the material. Work through it in sequence if you are using ExamEdge US as a primary review, or jump to a specific unit if you are patching a weakness identified by a practice exam. Every unit guide on this site has the same four-part structure — a short narrative explainer, five key ideas you can copy onto a study card, four multiple-choice practice questions with explanations, and links to the neighboring units.
Pair this index with the scoring-rubric breakdown and the tips-for-a-5 checklist from week 1. The fastest path from a baseline diagnostic to a real score lift is rubric awareness, not additional content review — and that's what the rubric and tips pages are designed to install.
Course pages
Exam format
Section timing, official unit weightings, and FRQ types.
Scoring rubric
How raw scores combine into the 1–5 AP score, plus the four most common scoring errors.
How to get a 5
A 10-item checklist of practical, rubric-aware moves.
FRQ walkthroughs
6 annotated FRQs with rubric, sample response, and grader commentary.
Recommended resources
Curated free-first list — College Board, Khan Academy, OpenStax.
Units in the AP framework
- 1Limits and Continuity
- 2Differentiation: Definition and Fundamental Properties
- 3Differentiation: Composite, Implicit, and Inverse Functions
- 4Contextual Applications of Differentiation
- 5Analytical Applications of Differentiation
- 6Integration and Accumulation of Change
- 7Differential Equations
- 8Applications of Integration
- 9Review: Free-Response Strategies
- 10Review: Multiple-Choice Drills
- 11Calculator-Active Problem Sets
- 12Full-Length Practice Exam
FRQ walkthroughs
- F1FRQ 1 — Function Defined by an Integral (calculator)
- F2FRQ 2 — Particle Motion / Rate Problem (calculator)
- F3FRQ 3 — Tabular and Graphical Analysis (no calculator)
- F4FRQ 4 — Differential Equation with Slope Field (no calculator)
- F5FRQ 5 — Analytical Application of Derivatives (no calculator)
- F6FRQ 6 — Area, Volume, and Accumulation (no calculator)
Suggested approach
Treat each unit as a single study session: read the four short paragraphs of notes, copy the five key ideas onto a physical card, attempt the four practice questions before revealing the explanations, and self-score honestly. If you score three or four, mark the unit as "maintain" and revisit weekly. If you score two or fewer, mark as "rebuild" and schedule a return visit within seven days. Spread the unit sessions across the weeks before your test date using the six-week study planner.