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You have an SQE prep course. Who's keeping track of the rest?
Last updated: 4 November 2026 · The Legal Blueprint
Short answer: an SQE prep course tracks the work you do on its own platform. To see where your whole preparation stands, keep one record of every study session (from your course, textbooks, other question banks and your own flashcards), logged against the SRA specification’s topics, with the type of work, any score and the date.
A prep course gives you the material: lectures, workbooks, a question bank, mocks. What it usually can’t give you is a single record of everything you’ve done across all of it, plus the textbook you borrowed, the flashcards you made and the questions you answered somewhere else. That record is what tells you where you stand, and most candidates end up keeping it themselves, in a spreadsheet, a notebook or their head.
What does an SQE prep course track?
Most providers track activity inside their own platform. You’ll typically see:
which lectures or units you’ve opened or completed;
your scores on their questions, often by subject;
your mock results.
That’s useful, and you should use it. But every one of those numbers describes your work inside that one platform.
What does a prep course miss?
Almost nobody prepares for the SQE with a single source. A typical week might include your provider’s lectures, a chapter from a textbook, a second question bank for extra MCQs, flashcards you made yourself and a study group on Sunday. Each lives somewhere different, so three questions get hard to answer:
Which topics have I studied at all? Your course knows which of its units you opened. It doesn’t know you read Land Law: easements from a textbook last week.
Which have I tested myself on, rather than just read? Reading a topic and answering questions on it are different kinds of work. It’s easy to read most of the specification and test yourself on far less of it.
What’s due a review? A topic you studied six weeks ago and haven’t touched since is not in the same state as one you studied on Monday, even if both are ticked as “done”.
None of this is a failing of your course. A provider can only see what happens on its own platform.
How do you keep one record across every source?
Record every study session against the topic it covered, whatever the source. For each session, note:
The topic, using the SRA specification’s headings, so every source maps to the same list.
The type of work: reading or notes, or testing yourself (recall, flashcards, MCQs, a practice answer, a timed mock).
The result, if there was one: for MCQs, how many you attempted and how many you got right.
The date.
With that record you can answer the three questions above for any topic, whatever mix of resources you use, and you can see the gaps: subjects you’ve hardly started, and topics you’ve read but never tested.
Can you do this in a spreadsheet?
Yes. If you do:
Start from the specification, not your course’s unit list. Courses group topics differently. The SRA’s specification is the one list every source can be mapped to.
Keep reading and testing in separate columns. The difference between them is the most useful thing the record will show you.
Add a “last studied” date and check it weekly. Anything you haven’t touched in a few weeks is due a review, however well it went at the time.
The hard part isn’t setting it up. It’s keeping it up on the days you’re tired, and turning it into a decision about what to study next.
Where StudyFlow fits
StudyFlow, made by The Legal Blueprint, is a study app for SQE1 and SQE2 candidates built for exactly this record. You log each session against the topic it covers, from any course, book or question bank. StudyFlow keeps track of what you’ve covered, what you’ve tested yourself on and what’s due a review, and suggests what to do next in the time you have that day. Each suggestion says why.
It doesn’t teach the law and it doesn’t replace your course. It sits alongside whatever you already use and keeps the one record your course can’t.
StudyFlow is opening to a first group of candidates in November 2026, with a 14-day free trial. Join the waitlist.
Frequently asked questions
Does my SQE prep course track my progress?
It tracks your progress on its own platform: units completed, its question scores and its mocks. It doesn’t see work you do elsewhere, such as textbook reading or another question bank.
What should an SQE revision tracker record?
For each session: the topic (using the SRA specification), the type of work (reading or testing yourself), any score, and the date. Those four details show coverage, testing and what’s due a review.
Is a spreadsheet enough to track SQE revision?
It can be, if you keep it up every week. Its limit is that it records what you’ve done but doesn’t tell you what to study next.
Does StudyFlow replace an SQE prep course?
No. StudyFlow doesn’t teach the law. It records and organises your preparation across whatever course, books and question banks you use.
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