Solicitor CPD Requirements in Ireland: 2026 Rules Explained

Every Irish solicitor has to hit a CPD hours target each year, and the rules around how those hours can be made up — how much can be done online, how much has to be face-to-face, which categories are mandatory — trip more people up than the headline number does. Here's what the Law Society of Ireland's current CPD scheme actually requires for 2026, and how to plan around it rather than scrambling in December.

How many CPD hours do solicitors need in Ireland?

For the 2026 cycle (1 January to 31 December 2026), the Law Society requires 25 hours of CPD for standard practising solicitors. Senior practitioners have a reduced requirement of 8 hours. Both figures apply to the calendar-year cycle, not a rolling 12-month window, so hours need to be completed within that window to count.

The mandatory categories

The 25-hour (or 8-hour) total isn't just any CPD you like — specific categories are compulsory within it:

• Professional development and solicitor wellbeing: minimum 5 hours
• Client care and professional standards: minimum 3 hours
• Accounting and anti-money laundering compliance: minimum 1 hour, specifically for sole practitioners and compliance partners

The remaining hours can be made up from any relevant CPD content, but these minimums have to be met regardless of how a solicitor chooses to fill the rest of their total.

Online vs in-person: the format rules

This is where a lot of solicitors get caught out. The scheme sets limits on format, not just content:

• Up to 80% (20 hours) of the total may be completed via eLearning
• At least 20% (5 hours) must be completed through group study, and for the 2026 cycle that group study portion must specifically be face-to-face / in-person
• A maximum of 12.5 hours (50%) can come from writing published material
• No more than 7 hours can be logged from a single day

In practice, that means a solicitor can't simply complete all 25 hours through on-demand online courses in one sitting close to year-end — the in-person group study requirement and the daily cap both force CPD to be planned across the year rather than crammed at the last minute.

What happens if you don't meet the requirement

Falling short isn't a one-off penalty that disappears at year-end. Solicitors who don't meet their CPD requirement are automatically subject to audit for the following two compliance cycles, and the Law Society can impose a contribution towards costs — up to €300 — where a solicitor fails to respond adequately to a compliance query. Given the audit exposure runs two full cycles beyond the year you fall short in, it's a longer-tail consequence than the missed hours alone suggest.

Planning your CPD hours across the year

The most reliable way to avoid the year-end scramble is to treat CPD as a running total rather than a single deadline. A practical split for the 25-hour requirement looks like: lock in the mandatory 5 hours of wellbeing/professional development and 3 hours of client care content early, book the required in-person group study session for a date well before December, and use eLearning for the remaining general hours as time allows throughout the year — while keeping an eye on the 7-hour daily cap so a single day's study doesn't accidentally exceed what's countable.

How this compares to England and Wales

Solicitors qualified in England and Wales work under a different system entirely. The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) moved away from a fixed CPD-hours model some years ago in favour of an outcomes-based "continuing competence" approach — there's no mandated minimum number of hours. Instead, solicitors follow a five-step reflective cycle: reflect on their practice, identify learning and development needs, plan and address them, record what they've done, and evaluate whether it worked. Each year, solicitors declare that they've kept their knowledge up to date, addressed any identified gaps, and remain competent to perform their role.

That's a meaningfully different compliance burden to Ireland's prescriptive hours-and-categories model, so a solicitor moving between the two jurisdictions — or a firm operating in both — needs to track two separate systems rather than assuming one CPD record satisfies both regulators. The SRA has also been consulting on strengthening its continuing competence approach, so it's worth checking for updates if you're relying on the current outcomes-based model.

FAQ

How many CPD hours does a solicitor need per year in Ireland?

25 hours for standard practising solicitors, or 8 hours for senior practitioners, within the January–December cycle.

Can Irish solicitors complete CPD entirely online?

No. Up to 80% (20 hours) can be eLearning, but at least 20% (5 hours) must be group study, and for the 2026 cycle that group study must be completed in person.

What happens if a solicitor misses their CPD hours?

They become subject to automatic audit for the following two compliance cycles, and may face a contribution towards costs of up to €300 if they don't respond adequately to a compliance review.

Learnsignal is building out a dedicated Legal CPD training track for solicitors and law firm compliance teams in Ireland and the UK — join the waitlist to be notified as courses go live, or explore our wider CPD course library in the meantime.