Starting next year, roughly 2 million Nigerian students will take their West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) on computers instead of paper. No pen, no paper, no printed booklets. The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) has officially released the timetable for the 2025 GCE 2nd Series (November/December) Computer-Based Test (CBT) examinations, with exams running from October 24 to December 18, 2025—marking the first-ever WAEC GCE conducted fully via CBT.
The reason behind this shift is straightforward: integrity. WAEC confirmed that Computer-Based Testing aims to improve transparency, reduce examination malpractice, and speed up grading and result processing. For decades, Nigeria’s examination system has been plagued by paper leakage—exam papers circulating before test day, mass copying, organized cheating networks. Digital delivery makes coordinated fraud exponentially harder.
WAEC has launched a sensitization campaign in Lagos ahead of the 2026 full rollout, aimed at familiarizing students, parents, and schools with the upcoming digital format. Dr. Amos Josiah Dangut, WAEC’s Head of the National Office, reassured candidates: “CBT is the way to go. It’s the future of exams.” He addressed concerns about subject changes, explaining that some subjects have been modified in name only—content, syllabus, and questions remain the same.
The timeline is aggressive. By November 2025, both WAEC and NECO will administer objective papers via CBT. Full migration—including essay components—is slated for 2026. The infrastructure challenge is real. While acknowledging challenges in remote areas, the Minister of Education assured that scalable solutions are in progress: “Are we going to be ready to provide every single needed infrastructure by November? Absolutely not. But as we move into the future, we will be ready.”
This candidness is refreshing. Government infrastructure projects usually promise perfection. Minister Alausa admitted the obvious: Nigeria won’t have perfect CBT centers everywhere in November. But he committed to building toward it.
The real test? Execution. WAEC emphasized that the move to CBT will not disadvantage any student and is part of its commitment to advancing education through technology. But moving 2 million students from paper to digital simultaneously carries risks—network failures, power outages, inadequate center preparation, students unfamiliar with computer-based testing formats.
WAEC has already piloted this. Private candidates used CBT in 2024, and 1,973,253 students participated in Nigeria’s first-ever Computer-Based Test version of the WASSCE for school candidates in 2025. The organization has real-world data on what works and what breaks.
For Nigeria’s education sector, this is the moment. Digital exams aren’t just about stopping cheaters—they’re about preparing millions of students for a workforce where digital literacy is essential. The question now is whether Nigeria’s infrastructure can keep pace with the ambition.
