Counseling Compact states, with dated status

How a privilege to practice works

Your license stays with your home state, the state where you live. With an active, unrestricted license there, you apply through the Compact commission (counselingcompact.gov) for a privilege in each remote state you want to work in, pay the fees, and complete its jurisprudence requirement if it has one. The privilege covers in-person work and telehealth with clients located in that state, and you follow the remote state's law while you practice there.

Two conditions trip people up. Both states must be members, and the state you want a privilege in must already be issuing them; joining the Compact by law and issuing privileges are months apart. The Compact covers the professional counselor license under any of its state names (LPC, LMHC, LPCC and the rest); it does not cover an LMFT or a social work license.

States issuing privileges

iTable checked Oct 30, 2026 against each state board; confirm the current rule with your board before you register. Counseling Compact: as of Oct 30, 2026 · changes often; check the Compact map. In order of start date. Dates from the Compact's news page, which in October 2026 was ahead of the map's text.

Members not yet issuing privileges

These 29 jurisdictions have passed the Compact law but were not issuing privileges on Oct 30, 2026: Alabama, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Florida, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

For a counselor licensed in one of them, membership alone is not enough: the commission opens privilege applications state by state as each one goes live, so check your home state's status before you plan on a privilege, and remember that privileges exist only for the states in the table above. Pennsylvania, the newest member, signed its law in July 2026.

States outside the Compact

Alaska, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Mexico, New York, Oregon and Texas are not members. To work with clients in these states you need that state's own license, usually by endorsement of the one you hold, and each board sets its own rules for it.

That is also the practical answer to "LPC reciprocity": outside the Compact, moving a license generally runs through endorsement, where the new board reviews your degree, exam and hours against its own rules. If the new state uses a different exam, for example New York's NCMHCE-only rule, you may have to sit it. Each board's route: requirements by state.

Jurisprudence requirements for privilege holders

The Compact's jurisprudence page lists a state law exam for privilege holders in Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma and Tennessee, and a laws-and-rules video in Ohio. Several of these states are not issuing privileges yet, so the requirement applies once they do. North Carolina is different: its jurisprudence exam is required of every LCMHC applicant, privilege or not. Whether first-time applicants in the other states take the same exam is not settled by our sources; check with the board.

Related pages

• Counseling license typesLPC, LMHC, LPCC, LCPC and the rest: one license under state names, plus LMFT and LCSW
• How to become an LPCDegree, licensing exam, associate stage, supervised hours and the full counseling license
• Counseling ethicsThe 2014 ACA Code section by section, the NBCC Code beside it, and ethics questions
• Counseling theoriesFifteen counseling theories: founder, goal, techniques and the trap, plus practice
• NCC certificationNCC requirements, the CACREP waiver, fees, retakes and the CCMHC
• How to become an LMFTDegree, supervised hours, board approval and the AMFTRB exam, with the states that differ