Group vs. Individual Supervision: The BACB 50% Rule
By the Ripley Fieldwork Tracker team · Published September 7, 2026 · Reviewed September 2, 2026 · 5 min read
At least 50% of your supervision must be individual, one-on-one time with your supervisor. Group supervision can cover the other half, and the BACB defines a group as 2 to 10 trainees who share similar experiences, with a cap of 10 people regardless of how many supervisors are in the room. Go over the group limit in a month, and you don't lose the month outright: you reduce the group hours until they no longer exceed your individual hours.
That last part is the piece almost nobody knows, and it's the difference between salvaging a month and writing it off.
What counts as individual supervision?
One-on-one meeting time between you and your supervisor. Nothing else.
Individual supervision is a one-to-one meeting, and at least 50% of your supervision meeting time each supervisory period has to be in that format. The clock that matters is meeting time, not calendar time. Two hours of group seminar plus 30 minutes of one-on-one is not a compliant month, because group time exceeded individual time. Two hours of group plus two hours of individual is fine.
What are the rules for group supervision?
Two to 10 trainees, capped at 10, and usually with your own supervisor.
The BACB's definition is specific, and three details in it trip people up.
| Rule | Detail |
|---|---|
| Group size | 2 to 10 trainees who share similar experiences |
| Hard ceiling | The number of trainees may not exceed 10 at any time, regardless of how many supervisors are present |
| Who leads it | Unless you're at an organization with multiple supervisors, group supervision must be provided by the same supervisor who gives your individual supervision |
| Non-trainees | If non-trainees attend, their participation must be limited and must not inhibit discussion or interfere with trainee participation |
| Share of total | Group hours may not exceed half of your total supervised hours in the supervisory period. |
The "same supervisor" rule is the one that catches people. A popular regional group-supervision seminar run by someone who isn't your supervisor does not count toward your hours unless you're in a multiple-supervisor organizational arrangement. Confirm who is leading the group before you assume the time counts.
What happens if group supervision exceeds individual?
You reduce the group hours until they no longer exceed the individual hours.
This is the BACB's own adjustment mechanism, and it's more forgiving than most trainees expect. Per the Handbook's table for months when requirements aren't met, if group supervision exceeds individual supervision, reduce the group supervision hours until they equal or fall below the individual hours. The month still counts; it just counts for less.
Two caveats on that. Adjusted hours are what go on your monthly verification form, but your own documentation system still has to show all the hours you actually accrued, unadjusted. And concentrated supervised fieldwork hours cannot be prorated or adjusted at all, so a concentrated month that breaks the individual-versus-group rule doesn't get salvaged this way.
Does an observation count as supervision?
It depends entirely on whether real-time feedback happened.
This is the most useful nuance in the whole system, and it's worth getting right because it affects three separate requirements at once. Your supervisor must observe you with a client each supervisory period. In-person observation is preferred, but recorded video or a live video conference is allowed.
The distinction: if your supervisor watches an hour of recorded video without giving you immediate, real-time feedback, that hour counts toward the observation requirement but not toward supervision contact or your total supervised hours. If the two of you watch it together, pausing to discuss the feedback, the same hour can count toward all of them: same footage, different value, decided by whether you were in the room.
How should I log the individual-versus-group split?
Record the supervision type on every contact, as it happens.
For each supervision contact, the BACB expects your documentation to capture the date, start and end times, fieldwork type, whether the supervision was individual or group, the activity category, and a summary of what happened. Rebuilding that from memory at month's end is where the split gets guessed, and a guessed split is what unravels during an audit.
Tracking it live is the whole point. The Ripley Fieldwork Tracker tags each supervision entry as individual or group and shows the running balance for the month, so you can see a group-heavy month forming while there's still time to book a one-on-one rather than prorating your hours.
FAQ
How much group supervision can I count? Up to half your total supervised hours in the period. Beyond that, the excess group hours get reduced.
How many trainees can be in a group? Between 2 and 10, and never more than 10 at a time regardless of how many supervisors are present.
Can someone else's supervisor run my group supervision? Only if you're receiving supervision at an organization with multiple supervisors. Otherwise, the group must come from the supervisor who provides your individual supervision.
Does a recorded-video observation count as supervision time? It counts toward the observation requirement. It only counts toward supervision contact and supervised hours if feedback happened in real time.
Can I fix a month when the group exceeded the individual? For supervised fieldwork, yes, by reducing group hours until they no longer exceed individual hours. Concentrated fieldwork cannot be adjusted.
Ripley is independent and is not affiliated with the BACB. Always verify requirements against current BACB documents.
Sources
- BACB: BCBA Handbook, Supervised Fieldwork Requirements
- BACB: FAQs About Supervised Fieldwork Requirements
- BACB: Documenting Fieldwork: Helpful Answers to Your FAQs
Ripley Fieldwork Tracker is a comprehensive, free online platform designed to simplify the process of tracking Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) fieldwork hours for aspiring Board Certified Behavior Analysts (BCBAs) and their supervisors. With features like real-time progress dashboards, BACB-compliant verification forms, and support for multiple supervisors, Ripley simplifies the certification process with secure, cloud-based tools.