Registered Nurse (RN) License Renewal in Maine
Maine RNs renew every 2 years with no continuing education required, only an attestation of continued competency. Maine is a Nurse Licensure Compact state.
| Renewal cycle | Every 2 years |
|---|---|
| CE hours required | Check with your board Maine requires no continuing education to renew an RN license. Renewal includes an attestation of continued competency, but the Board sets no continuing-education hour count. |
| Renewal fee | $75.00 |
| Mandatory CE topics | None prescribed |
| Licensing board | Maine State Board of Nursing |
Sourced from Maine State Board of Nursing, verified July 25, 2026. Requirements change. Confirm with your board before relying on this.
Maine is the go-to example of a no-continuing-education state, and it earns the title. There is no CE requirement to renew a registered-nurse license here. You attest that you’re maintaining your competence, renew, and you’re done. It’s one of the shortest renewal checklists in the country.
No continuing education, just an attestation
Maine’s Board of Nursing sets no continuing-education hour count for RN renewal. What renewal asks is an attestation of continued competency, you affirm that you’re keeping your practice current, without documenting a specific number of contact hours to prove it. Maine trusts nurses to maintain competence and doesn’t translate that into a CE tally, so there’s nothing to buy, log, or upload. Because there’s no hour target, the CE calculator on this site isn’t shown for Maine.
The practical upshot: a Maine renewal is mostly the disclosure questions and the fee. Answer those honestly and you’ve done the substance of it.
The cycle
Maine renews RN licenses every two years, on the licensee’s birthday. That ties your deadline to something permanent about you, easy to remember once you know it, and personal rather than a shared statewide date. Renew online through the Board’s portal before your birthday in your renewal year.
The fee
Renewal is $75, listed in the Licensing Fees table on the Board’s own Fees and Fines page, the same $75 Maine charges for licensure by exam or by endorsement. The statute caps it: 32 M.R.S. section 2206 lets the Board set a renewal fee “not to exceed $100,” so the current $75 sits under a ceiling the legislature wrote.
Spread over two years that’s among the cheapest renewals in the country, well under Virginia’s $140 and below North Carolina’s $100. Miss the deadline and a lapsed Maine license carries a $10 reinstatement charge on top of the current renewal fee, which is a small penalty by national standards but not a reason to drift.
Maine is a compact state
Maine implemented the Nurse Licensure Compact on January 19, 2018, and it’s easy to miss, some guides still describe Maine as single-state. If Maine is your primary state of residence, your RN license can be a multistate license, letting you practice in the other compact states without applying separately in each. That’s a real advantage in northern New England, where a Maine nurse with a multistate license reaches far more of the region. Note that Massachusetts has enacted but not yet implemented the compact, so it doesn’t connect the same way yet. The privilege follows your legal residence, so it holds as long as Maine stays home. Use the compact checker below to see exactly which states a Maine license reaches.
How renewal works: online, by your birthday
Maine renews registered nurse licenses every two years, expiring on your birthday. That is written into 32 M.R.S. § 2206, which issues each renewal “for a period of 2 years, expiring on the anniversary of the applicant’s birth.” The Board’s own license FAQs add how the clock starts: your first license runs for at least one year and no more than two, depending on your birthdate, and after the first renewal you renew every two years on or before your birthday.
What renewal involves, from the statute and the Board’s FAQs:
- Online only. Since January 1, 2020, every renewal application has had to be completed online, and the Board’s FAQs answer “Is online license renewal mandatory?” with “Yes.”
- A credit card. The FAQs say you must use one to renew online; a family member’s or employer’s card works with authorization, and so does a prepaid Visa card bought at a retail store.
- A conviction in the last two years, or discipline from a Board of Nursing, does not take you off the online route: you complete the renewal online, print it, and send it to the Board office with your explanation and documents.
- A move goes through the same portal, which prompts you to complete a Declaration of Primary Residence form.
Section 2206 conditions renewal on the application and the fee. It sets no continuing-education hour count.
There is no grace period
The Board’s FAQs say plainly that it “does not offer a grace period”: miss your birthday in a renewal year and the license lapses, and you cannot keep practicing until the lapse is resolved with the Board office. The statute goes further and treats anyone practicing on a lapsed license as an illegal practitioner.
What a lapse costs comes from the Board’s Fees and Fines page:
- Reinstating an RN license after a lapse: $85, which is the $75 renewal fee plus the $10 reinstatement fee in § 2206.
- Practicing unlicensed for 90 days or less: a Lapsed License Letter of Concern, kept in your file for 5 years.
- Practicing unlicensed for 91 days or more: a consent agreement with an admission, a warning and a $500 fine, or a meeting with the Board at the Executive Director’s discretion.
- Practicing unlicensed with a Letter of Concern already on file: a consent agreement with an admission, a warning and a $500 fine.
Not practicing in Maine for now
Section 2206 lets a nurse who is not practicing professional nursing in Maine stop paying the renewal fee, on one condition: notify the Board of inactive status in writing. Before you resume practice, you notify the Board again and pay the renewal fee for the current period.
Add your renewal deadline to your calendar
Enter your expiration date and download a calendar file. Your own calendar will remind you at 90, 60, 30, and 7 days out. We don't ask for your email, we store nothing, and the date never leaves your device.
Works with Apple Calendar, Google Calendar, and Outlook. This is a convenience, not a compliance service. Confirm your exact deadline with the Maine State Board of Nursing.
Renewal fee
Maine charges $75. The median across the 49 states that publish a figure is $100, running from $50 to $245. Ranked cheapest to dearest, Maine is 10 of 49.
Each mark is one state. The taller line is the median, the filled dot is Maine. States that set no flat hour count, or publish no fee, are left out of that comparison rather than counted as zero.
Where can you practice with your license?
The Nurse Licensure Compact lets a nurse who lives in a compact state hold one multistate license and practice in every other compact state. Pick where you live to see whether that's you, and where it reaches.
Member data from the NCSBN Nurse Licensure Compact map, verified July 2026. A multistate license requires the compact state to be your primary residence. This is a convenience, not legal advice. Confirm your status with your board or at nursecompact.com.
What will this renewal cost?
Maine's renewal fee is filled in from the board below. Add what you expect to spend on CE courses, plus a late fee if you're past due, for a running total. Nothing you type is stored.
The renewal fee is from the Maine State Board of Nursing and dated on this page; the CE and late-fee figures are your own estimates. A convenience, not a compliance service, and not legal advice. Confirm fees with your board.