Which topic carries the most marks in the VCE Accounting external exam?

Recording and analysing financial data carries 36.5% of the marks across the 6 VCAA papers from 2020 to 2025, ahead of Extension of recording and reporting on 32.0%.

How are marks split between question types in the VCE Accounting exam?

Short answer carries 100.0% of the marks, measured across 6 papers and 600 marks from 2020 to 2025.

Has the topic balance changed in recent VCE Accounting papers?

Yes. Recording and analysing financial data moved down 5.2 percentage points, Budgeting and decision-making moved up 11.3 percentage points and Preparing and interpreting accounting reports moved down 5.8 percentage points between the 2020 to 2022 and 2023 to 2025 papers.

How many past papers is this VCE Accounting analysis based on?

6 VCAA external papers from 2020 to 2025, covering 53 questions and 600 marks. 0.0% of those marks carry no dot-point mapping and sit outside the percentages.

VCE Accounting most tested topics

Across the six VCAA Accounting external papers from 2020 to 2025, Recording and analysing financial data carries 36.5% of the marks against 14.9% for Preparing and interpreting accounting reports, so the paper rewards Recording and analysing financial data more than any other topic. At dot-point level 4.1.10 carries 5.4% of paper marks, and 34 of the 103 dot points that the board assesses externally have not appeared in one of these papers. Every percentage below covers the 100.0% of marks that map to a study design dot point.

Computed from 6 VCAA Accounting external papers, 2020 to 2025: 53 questions, 154 question parts and 600 marks.

Unit, topic and dot-point shares below are of the 600 marks that map to a dot point, so each of those tables adds to 100%. 133 of the 154 parts are assessed against more than one dot point, and their 554 marks are divided evenly between the dot points they cover.

What these papers are

Year	Exam	Questions	Marks
2025	Exam	8	100
2024	Exam	8	100
2023	Exam	8	100
2022	Exam	11	100
2021	Exam	8	100
2020	Exam	10	100

Marks by unit

Unit	Share of marks
Unit 3: Financial accounting for a trading business	51.4%
Unit 4: Recording, reporting, budgeting and decision-making	48.6%

Marks by topic

Topic	Share of marks	Papers it appears in	Years
Recording and analysing financial data	36.5%	6 of 6	6 of 6
Extension of recording and reporting	32.0%	6 of 6	6 of 6
Budgeting and decision-making	16.6%	6 of 6	6 of 6
Preparing and interpreting accounting reports	14.9%	6 of 6	6 of 6

Marks by dot point

Dot-point numbers and wording are VCAA's own. Where a dot point is written as a list, its items run together here separated by semicolons.

Dot point	Content	Topic	Share of marks	Papers
4.1.10	the recording and reporting of balance day adjustments prepaid expenses (asset approach), with GST being recorded at the time of payment; accrued expenses, with GST being recorded at the time of payment; the payment of accrued expenses in the subsequent reporting period; unearned revenue (liability approach), with no GST recorded at the time of the deposit; accrued revenue, with GST being recorded at the time of receipt; receipt of accrued revenue in the subsequent reporting period	Extension of recording and reporting	5.4%	6 of 6
3.1.22	identify and manually record financial data in the General Journal, General Ledger and inventory cards	Recording and analysing financial data	4.8%	6 of 6
4.1.20	manually record transactions in the General Journal and General Ledger and prepare accounting reports	Extension of recording and reporting	4.8%	5 of 6
3.1.8	the General Journal and General Ledger and their use in recording transactions, both manually and using ICT, including establishment of a double entry system; cash payments (GST on settlement discounts excluded); cash receipts (GST on settlement discounts excluded); credit sales of inventory; credit purchases of inventory; Sales Returns from accounts receivable; Purchase Returns to accounts payable; inventory write-down; inventory loss or gain; correction of errors; inventory used for advertising purposes (GST excluded); drawings of inventory by the owner (GST excluded); contribution of non-current assets at fair value by the owner	Recording and analysing financial data	4.6%	6 of 6
3.1.12	the creation of an allowance for doubtful debts using the Income Statement approach	Recording and analysing financial data	3.6%	6 of 6
4.1.9	the recording and reporting of the disposal of a non-current depreciable asset GST will apply to the cash disposal of a non-current asset; GST will not apply to a disposal where there is a trade in of a non-current asset	Extension of recording and reporting	3.4%	5 of 6
4.2.3	the characteristics and use of classified budgeted accounting reports Budgeted Cash Flow Statement; Budgeted Income Statement; Budgeted Balance Sheet	Budgeting and decision-making	3.1%	5 of 6
4.1.7	methods of depreciation: straight-line and reducing balance	Extension of recording and reporting	3.0%	5 of 6
4.1.28	analyse and interpret classified accounting reports, graphical representations and other information to evaluate the performance of a business	Extension of recording and reporting	2.9%	5 of 6
3.1.11	inventory valuation product cost and period cost; the lower of cost and net realisable value (NRV)	Recording and analysing financial data	2.9%	6 of 6
3.2.18	identify and record financial data manually in the General Journal and the General Ledger, and manually prepare accounting reports	Preparing and interpreting accounting reports	2.6%	5 of 6
3.2.8	the characteristics and use of classified accounting reports Income Statement; Balance Sheet; Cash Flow Statement	Preparing and interpreting accounting reports	2.6%	5 of 6
4.2.17	discuss strategies to improve the performance of a business	Budgeting and decision-making	2.6%	6 of 6
4.1.3	indicators and other relevant information (financial and non-financial) to measure business performance	Extension of recording and reporting	2.5%	4 of 6
4.2.16	analyse and interpret classified historical, budgeted and variance reports, graphical representations and other information to evaluate the performance of a business	Budgeting and decision-making	2.4%	5 of 6
3.1.10	inventory cards using the First-In, First-Out (FIFO) and Identified Cost methods for inventory sold; inventory purchased; inventory returned; drawings of inventory by the owner; inventory used for advertising; inventory loss or gain; inventory write-down	Recording and analysing financial data	2.4%	6 of 6
3.1.6	the characteristics of the General Ledger with T-form accounts for manual recording	Recording and analysing financial data	2.3%	5 of 6
4.2.13	manually prepare classified budgeted accounting reports and variance reports	Budgeting and decision-making	2.2%	3 of 6
3.1.28	distinguish between product and period costs in relation to inventory valuation	Recording and analysing financial data	2.0%	5 of 6

These 19 dot points carry 60.1% of the paper marks between them. Another 50 assessed dot points share the rest, and 34 of the 103 externally assessable dot points have not been assessed in any of these 6 papers. Content that has not appeared is still examinable.

What has moved between papers

Comparing the 2020 to 2022 papers with the 2023 to 2025 papers, three topics have moved by more than 3.0 percentage points.

Topic	2020 to 2022 share	2023 to 2025 share	Movement
Recording and analysing financial data	39.1%	33.9%	down 5.2 points
Budgeting and decision-making	11.0%	22.3%	up 11.3 points
Preparing and interpreting accounting reports	17.8%	12.0%	down 5.8 points

How the papers are built

Short answer carries 100.0% of the marks across these 6 papers.

Question type	Share of marks	Marks	Parts
Short answer	100.0%	600	154

Verb	Share of marks	Marks	Parts
prepare	26.0%	156	30
explain	24.0%	144	45
record	9.2%	55	13
discuss	7.7%	46	8
calculate	6.2%	37	17
determine	6.0%	36	6
justify	4.5%	27	8
describe	3.7%	22	9

What these percentages do not tell you

Where to practise

Every topic above links to its own page of real VCAA questions with marking criteria and average scores attached: Recording and analysing financial data, Extension of recording and reporting, Budgeting and decision-making and Preparing and interpreting accounting reports. For the full question bank start at VCE Accounting.

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