Most CAMS candidates study alongside a full-time job. Six weeks at five to seven hours a week is enough for most people with some AML experience. If you are new to the field, stretch the same plan over eight to ten weeks.
Week 0: find your baseline (1 hour)
Take a free diagnostic before you open the study guide. Note your two weakest domains. That's where the extra hours go.
Week 1: money laundering risks and methods
Read the study guide chapter on risks and typologies. Then practise the sections laundering stages and typologies and high-risk products, sectors and channels. Aim to understand why each red flag is a red flag, not to memorise lists.
Week 2: international standards
FATF Recommendations, the Egmont Group, Wolfsberg and Basel. Make your own short table of the Recommendations that come up most: 1 (risk-based approach), 10 (CDD), 12 (PEPs), 16 (wire transfers), 20 and 21 (reporting and tipping off), 24 and 25 (transparency of legal persons and arrangements). Our CAMS flashcards cover these.
Week 3: regional regimes and sanctions
US (BSA, PATRIOT Act sections 311, 314(a) and 314(b), CTRs, SARs), the EU 2024 AML package and AMLA, the UK framework. Add sanctions basics: OFAC, the 50 percent rule, blocking versus rejecting.
Week 4: compliance programmes
The largest domain. Risk assessment, CDD/EDD, governance, the role of the board, independent testing, training, transaction monitoring and tuning. This is where "what should you do first" questions live, so practise those specifically.
Week 5: investigations, then a full mock
Investigations and law enforcement requests early in the week. At the weekend, sit a full timed mock. Don't review it on the same day.
Week 6: close the gaps
Review the mock. Use section training on every section below 75%, choosing wrong last time so you only see questions you missed. Sit a second mock mid-week. If you clear the pass line comfortably on both, you are ready.
The last two days
No new material. Flip through flashcards, re-read your notes on the sections you found hardest, and sleep.
Start with the free diagnostic, or see what full access includes.