NFPA 101 Life Safety Code Practice Test

Fire exit hardware is the door hardware that combines two functions: it releases the latch when someone applies force in the direction of egress, and it provides the required fire protection when used as part of a fire door assembly. This definition emphasizes both the people-protecting function (egress) and the fire-resistance role of the hardware on a fire-rated door.

Panic hardware describes the same egress-initiating action, but it doesn’t specifically call out the fire-protection aspect as part of the hardware’s function on a fire door. Exit access hardware and horizontal exit hardware refer to different concepts in egress design—one relates to the hardware controlling access to an exit path, the other to doors that connect two sides of a fire barrier in a horizontal exit arrangement. The term that best captures the combination of egress operation plus fire-door protection is the one described above.