Certified Mechanical Inspector

Certified Mechanical Inspector, or CMI, is a certification issued by the American Society for Quality that covers a wide range of mechanical inspection techniques and general information on the use of inspection equipment, calibration, algebra, geometry, statistics, and quality assurance/control knowledge.

The CMI has recently been renamed "Certified Quality Inspector" by the ASQ.

The exam consists of 100 multiple choice questions given over four hours.

The failure rate for the exam is approximately 80%, primarily due to lack of preparation of the part of exam takers. While most exam takers are experienced inspectors, a common misconception is that the exam deals primarily with using common tools such as calipers, micrometers, surface plates, and gage blocks. In reality, the exam deals with a large body of knowledge including specialized testing methods, use of inspection standards & charts, calibration, statistics, quality history, and high school level mathematics in the form of word problems.