Physics › Past papers › Cambridge International 9702
Cambridge International 9702 past papers
There are five papers, and the AS Level is a qualification in its own right as well as part of the A Level. Papers 1, 2 and 3 are the AS papers and also count towards the A Level; Papers 4 and 5 are A Level only. Every paper is externally assessed. There is no coursework and no teacher-assessed component anywhere in 9702: Cambridge assesses practical skills in Papers 3 and 5.
Read off the Cambridge 9702 syllabuses for 2025 to 2027 and for 2028 to 2030, at printed pages 11, 12, 15, 40, 42, 43, 49 and 50. We compared the assessment pages of the two editions line by line: every paper name, duration, mark total, percentage weighting, question count and mark allocation is identical between them. One table serves both cohorts.
Cambridge gives each weighting twice, once as a share of the AS Level and once as a share of the A Level; the list below gives the A Level share. Three routes are allowed: the AS Level on its own, the A Level staged over two years with Papers 1 to 3 in the first year and Papers 4 and 5 in the second, or all five papers in one series. An AS route is graded a to e, an A Level route A* to E.
There are no optional topics. Medical physics, topic 24, and Astronomy and cosmology, topic 25, are compulsory Paper 4 content, where AQA offers them as options. Topics 1 to 11 are the AS content and are assumed knowledge for the A Level components; topics 12 to 25 are the additional A Level content.
Data and formulas are printed as page 2 in Papers 1 and 2, and as pages 2 and 3 in Paper 4. Papers 3 and 5 get no data or formulas page, so if you are sitting Paper 5 you have no printed constants. Neither edition states which calculator is permitted or prints a materials list, and we have not gone looking elsewhere for one.
The papers
- Paper 1: Multiple Choice9702/1 · 1 hour 15 minutes · 40 marks · 15.5% of the A-level
- Paper 2: AS Level Structured Questions9702/2 · 1 hour 15 minutes · 60 marks · 23.0% of the A-level
- Paper 3: Advanced Practical Skills9702/3 · 2 hours · 40 marks · 11.5% of the A-level
- Paper 4: A Level Structured Questions9702/4 · 2 hours · 100 marks · 38.5% of the A-level
- Paper 5: Planning, Analysis and Evaluation9702/5 · 1 hour 15 minutes · 30 marks · 11.5% of the A-level
Each paper has a page of its own naming what it assesses, how it is marked and which parts of this library it draws on. A candidate is marked out of 270.
Where to get them
Cambridge International publishes its own past papers and mark schemes on the Cambridge International AS and A Level Physics (9702) past papers page. Take a paper from Cambridge rather than from a revision site, so that you get the right version with its mark scheme.
The series the board publishes
Cambridge currently publishes one examined series, June 2024, and one specimen set no candidate sat. Cambridge publishes the most recent series openly and keeps the rest for registered centres in the School Support Hub. Each series below has its own page listing what is published for it.
Every link below goes to Cambridge’s own copy on its own servers. InkPhysics hosts no past paper and no mark scheme, and links no mirror of one. Checked against Cambridge’s own listing on 31 August 2026; papers are added and withdrawn without notice, so if a link has moved, use Cambridge’s own page instead.
Where the mapping is rough
Five of the library’s units carry AQA option names, and Cambridge has no options at all. Astrophysics and Medical physics are compulsory Paper 4 content for you, not a choice, and two Turning points lessons and one Engineering physics lesson are compulsory Paper 4 material under Cambridge’s own topic names. If a unit name looks like somebody else’s option, check the specification map before deciding it is not for you.
One Astrophysics lesson, the Doppler effect and Hubble’s law, is partly AS content, because Cambridge sets the Doppler effect for sound waves at 7.3. The unit as a whole is not AS content, so Astrophysics is not listed against Papers 1 and 2. One tag putting Electronics on Paper 4 has not been checked, so it is left out rather than shown, and one Measurements lesson reaches Paper 4 through the mole alone.
The point-by-point view is the CIE specification map.
Links to AQA, Pearson, OCR and Cambridge International are provided for convenience. InkPhysics is not affiliated with or endorsed by any of them, and none of them is responsible for the content of this site. AQA’s copyright policy does not permit its materials to be reproduced on third-party websites in any format, and we take the same line with the other three: every paper link on this site goes to the board’s own file.