Navy SEAL trainees and other sailors hoping to join one of a handful of hard-charging Navy jobs have to pass many brutal fitness tests. But beginning this year, fully qualified SEALs and others in combat roles must now pass a specific, Navy-wide Combat Fitness Test every year to keep those jobs.
Sailors in the Navy’s four combat-focused career fields must now take an annual swim test and then wear a 20-pound weight vest for both a run and a set of traditional strength tests. The test will apply to SEALs, special warfare combat crewmen (SWCC), explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) techs, and fleet divers.
Starting this year, those sailors will now take the combat test, known as the CFT, instead of one traditional fitness test, which the Navy calls a Physical Readiness Test, or PRT. The Navy announced last week that all sailors would be required to take two PRTs each year, up from one.
The new test begins with a timed 800-meter swim in a pool (there is an option for open water), which sailors can complete with fins, goggles or facemasks — but no snorkels — and with any swimming stroke.
After a 10-minute rest, sailors must wear a 20-pound weighted vest or plate carrier for the three final events:
- Maximum push-ups in two minutes;
- Maximum pull-ups with no time limit (no kipping allowed);
- 1-mile run.
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Sailors can score up to 100 points in each event, with scoring weighted by age but not by gender. A guide from the Navy Physical Readiness Program and a Navy fact sheet outline the exact procedures and scoring for sailors in combat arms.
Scores slightly higher for Special Warfare sailors
Fitness has long been at the core of daily and operational life for sailors in SEAL, SWCC, EOD and Fleet Diver teams, with each field requiring recruits to pass notoriously difficult fitness tests just to begin initial training. But the new combat test will be the first Navy-mandated fitness test for sailors in combat arms roles, a spokesperson for the service told Task & Purpose. Previously, all sailors in those roles had to simply do the Physical Readiness Test.
While sailors in all four jobs will take the same test, SEALs and SWCC sailors will face a slightly tougher grading curve. SEALs and SWCC sailors operate under Naval Special Warfare Command, while EOD techs and divers are assigned across the Navy.
For example, for a 25-year-old SEAL to earn the maximum score of 100 in each event, they would have to swim 800 meters in 11:20, knock out 54 push-ups, 21 pull-ups and run the mile in 8 minutes. An EOD sailor or diver would need the same swim time and push-up count, but just 17 pull-ups and a 10-minute run to score 100. On the SEAL/SWCC test, those push-up and run marks would still fall in the “excellent” range but would get just 80 points.
Combat tests will be military-wide
The new test came out of a Sept. 30 memorandum from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on fitness standards. The memo outlined the requirement for a “combat field test” for combat arms roles, as one of two tests taken each year. The memo said that it must meet service-determined standards and must be “executable in any environment, at any time, with combat equipment.”
Some fake documents claiming to be the new test standards have made the rounds online, but many military branches are still working on finalizing what those combat arms fitness tests will include.
For sailors in those roles, the new test is simply another one to do each year. A spokesperson for Naval Special Warfare Command confirmed that the test is being added to the roster of fitness assessments sailors have to take, but is not superseding or replacing any other tests within each job. Navy special operations personnel already must complete the Navy’s Physical Screening Test to qualify for those roles. That includes a 500-meter swim, followed by timed push-ups and curl-ups, pull-ups to failure without a time limit, and a 1.5-mile run.
As part of the Navy’s overall revamp of its fitness standards, all past fitness test failures will reset to zero at the start of the year. The Physical Readiness Test, which all sailors must do as part of assessments, remains the same: a mix of forearm planks, push-ups and a 1.5-mile run.
