LMFT Licensure in Alabama: Requirements, Hours and Exams

Alabama issues three rungs plus separate supervision designations.

MFT Intern is a Board designation, not a license, for a person enrolled in a qualifying program who has yet to graduate, or who has yet to complete one, practicing under an approved supervisor; it lasts at most four (4) years, renews on a two-year cycle, and requires continuous supervision at one hour per five hours of face-to-face therapy.

The Licensed Marriage and Family Therapy Associate (LAMFTA) is a license, adopted in 2023, for graduates completing the two-year postgraduate supervision requirement; it lasts at most five (5) years at a 1:10 supervision ratio.

The LMFT is the independent license, and the board credentials supervisors separately as Supervisor Candidates, Approved Supervisors and Supervisor Mentors.

The degree is a master's in marriage and family therapy of at least 48 graduate semester hours or 72 graduate quarter hours at a regionally accredited college or university.

It must come from a COAMFTE-accredited program, a CACREP Marriage, Couple, and Family Counseling (MCFC) accredited program, or be the content equivalent of either.

Content equivalent means graduate coursework in six designated areas — marriage and family studies, marriage and family therapy (three courses minimum), human development, professional ethics, research, and mental health diagnosis — plus other clinical treatment areas, equaling 48 semester hours.

One course counts as three semester credits, four quarter credits, or 42 didactic contact hours.

The associate rules separately accept a master's or doctoral degree in an allied field with graduate-level MFT coursework meeting the same Board course requirements.

Graduates of programs that were COAMFTE MCFC accredited or candidate programs at the time of graduation are deemed to have met the Board course requirements.

First, an internship, during or after the qualifying degree: at least 12 months, 100 supervision hours concurrent at one hour per five direct client contact hours with at least 50 individual, and at least 500 direct client contact hours, 250 of them with couples or families physically present in the therapy room.

Second, the post-degree stage as a licensed MFT Associate: a minimum of two years, 1,000 post-degree direct client hours concurrent at one supervision hour per ten client contact hours, 250 relational hours with couples or families physically present, and 200 supervision hours including 100 individual.

Up to 100 of the 200 supervision hours can come from the graduate program at the 1:5 ratio; the remaining 100 post-degree hours must include at least 50 individual.

Group therapy counts toward direct hours but is not "relational" unless the members live within the same household.

Allied-field applicants or candidates without a graduate internship must complete the full supervision requirement post-degree; hours beyond the internship's 500 need a written letter from the Approved Supervisor or Program Director.

The rule's examination requirement is brief: an applicant must have passed the marriage and family therapy examination approved by the Board.

The rule text does not name the test; the AMFTRB 2025 survey identifies it as the AMFTRB Examination in Marital and Family Therapy, which is an aggregate survey rather than the rule itself.

To sit for the exam, you must either have met all requirements for becoming an MFT Associate, or have a program director's letter verifying that you are in good standing and within six months of graduating from a COAMFTE or CACREP MCFC accredited program.

No separate Alabama law or jurisprudence exam appears in the rules read, so confirm the current exam and registration steps with the board before scheduling.

Alabama expects face-to-face supervision from a named list: AAMFT and ABEMFT Approved Supervisors and Supervisor Candidates.

Individual supervision is one supervisor and up to two supervisees face-to-face; group supervision may include no more than six supervisees.

A signed contract for supervision must be submitted with the associate or LMFT application, and no supervisee may have more than two supervisors without Board approval.

Peer supervision, supervision by a family member, administrative supervision and primarily didactic teaching do not count.

Face-to-face hours may be conducted via electronic communications only when simultaneously interactive visually and orally; the broader "telesupervision" definition at r.

536-X-1-.01(14) does not say how those hours count, so confirm with the board.

Becoming an ABEMFT Approved Supervisor runs through Supervisor Candidate status: the candidate must provide at least "nine (90)" hours of clinical supervision over not less than 12 months (words and digits disagree), supervise at least two supervisees for at least six months, and complete 18 hours of mentoring with an LMFT Supervisor Mentor.

Approved supervisors then need 5 supervision-CE hours every two years.

The chapter defines the practice broadly and then fences it.

Marriage and family therapy is diagnosing, assessing and treating emotional, mental and behavioral disorders within a marriage and family therapy treatment context, using principles that treat individual problems as interrelated with family systems.

An LMFT may diagnose and develop treatment plans, but only within that frame and never beyond their training.

The rule then lists what the license does not authorize: administering and interpreting psychological tests and related instruments, admitting persons to hospitals, treating persons in hospitals without medical supervision, prescribing medicinal drugs, authorizing clinical laboratory or radiological procedures, and electroconvulsive therapy.

A licensee also may not describe any test, report or procedure as "psychological" or as a "psychological evaluation," and nothing in the chapter authorizes the practice of medicine.

Endorsement has two doors.

The general rule requires an applicant licensed or registered as an MFT in another state whose requirements are equivalent to or exceed the Board's, with certification from that board of licensure dates, discipline record and exam history.

The second door is the one that matters to most movers: licensees from any other US state are automatically eligible for an Alabama license by endorsement once the Board verifies moral character, evidence of licensure, no disciplinary actions, and a three-credit-semester or four-credit-quarter course in mental health diagnosis — a course a graduate's transcript may not include, so check it before moving.

The rule was amended effective October 15, 2023.

Separately, a nonresident MFT licensed elsewhere needs no Alabama license to provide services in this state for no more than three days in any month and no more than ten days in any calendar year.

There is no MFT compact; this is a board-to-board endorsement.

Every license runs on a 24-month cycle, and each rung has its own continuing education total.

An LMFT needs at least 40 contact hours, of which at least 10 must be clinical MFT workshops, 6 in diagnosis and treatment, and 6 in professional issues and ethics; LMFT supervisors add at least 5 hours in supervision.

An MFT Associate needs 20 hours (5 clinical MFT, 3 diagnosis and treatment, 3 ethics), and an Intern designation renews with 10 hours (3, 3, and 3).

Acceptable units include graduate courses, NBCC-approved courses, supervision under a board-approved contract up to 10 hours, and independent study capped at 10 hours.

Distance learning must be synchronous.

The board audits licensees at random, and documentation must be kept for two years.

Three dated rule changes define the current Alabama system.

On October 15, 2023, the board adopted the LAMFTA rule 536-X-2-.04 and amended the endorsement rule 536-X-2-.03, turning the associate tier into a licensed one with its own five-year cap; a guide published before that date will not show a licensed associate at all.

The associate internship rule 536-X-2-.05 is a new rule the saved notes date only to their June 20, 2023 filing, with no effective date printed.

The LMFT requirements rule (536-X-2-.02) was amended effective February 14, 2025, and the designations rule (536-X-3-.01) effective March 17, 2025; the sources read do not isolate what those amendments changed, so quote the current rule text rather than a pre-2025 summary of it.

The two-year, 1,000-hour post-degree requirement sits in 536-X-2-.02, and the 500-hour internship it builds on is set in 536-X-2-.05(4).

An LMFT can move a license to inactive status by notifying the board, which excuses renewal fees — but an inactive licensee who uses the LMFT title in Alabama is treated as practicing without a license.

Restoring within five years takes fees and proof of continuing education for the prior two years; beyond five years, the board requires a new application plus either sworn evidence of active practice in another jurisdiction or 50 hours of board-approved supervision within the past two years.

Complete applications must reach the board two weeks before its next meeting.

Spouses of active-duty military members have their own route under the Military Family Jobs Opportunity Act: a license issued pending approval when the original state's requirements are substantially equivalent, an initial licensing fee waiver, and a temporary license to begin practice while finishing Alabama's requirements.