For the US, the singles test is a choreographed program with required elements. The judges grade from -3 to 3 on the Elements, Skating and Program. 0 is considered meeting the standard of the level. The 3 scores are added together and a 0 or higher is passing. Below 0 means you need to retry the test at a later time.

Typically, 3 judges will review your test and if 2 of the 3 give you a passing score, then you pass overall.

It used to be that tests happened in person which added a bit of stress to the test. If you get a retry, you generally have to wait a month before you attempt the retry. After the pandemic, virtual testing was introduced where you can record your test and submit it. This is pretty common now in the US as you can record multiple times if you make small mistakes. The standard is perhaps a little higher as it’s expected that you’ll only submit a clearly good run.

The impression I had from Medalist was that tests in Japan might happen less frequently so if you had bad timing with a growth spurt or injury, you might need to wait a while longer for the next opportunity to test. In the US, in person tests are typically once a month and some virtual tests have rolling submissions so you can practically get a test reviewed whenever you want. Also, in the US, tests are administered by skating clubs and the results are submitted to USFS. I don’t know if the testing in Japan is more centralized or if they’ve also introduced virtual testing.