A comparison of the American Board of Anesthesiology's in-person and virtual objective structured clinical examinations

•The virtual Objective Structured Clinical Examination functioned reasonably well.•The virtual scenarios were moderately more difficult than the in-person scenarios.•Virtual & in-person examinees performed similarly in large-scale, high-stakes setting.•Examiner grading severity was comparable between the in-person and virtual exams.•A deliberate de novo design may be required for long-term virtual performance exam.