Top 5 GMAT Tips to Improve Your Performance on Test Day

Tip #1: Do Not Try to Determine How Well You’re Doing

You will never know how well you are doing until the test is over. Despite your best intuition, you have absolutely no way of determining whether a question is easy or hard for the purposes of your score. You have no way of knowing how other students did or are doing on that problem. What seems easy to you may be hard for the majority, and what seems hard to you may be easy for the majority. Furthermore, you’ll be blindly exposed to experimental questions. That is, you won’t know they’re experimental. Perhaps that question that’s worrying you so much won’t even be counted. So why waste your limited energy thinking about things you can’t control? Just focus on doing the absolute best you can.

Tip #2: Don’t Worry If You Struggle With the First Question or Two

Often, students who perform below their goals on the GMAT say that they had a hard time with the first few questions and, as a result, lost their focus on the following questions. Of course, it would be desirable to recognize and easily solve the first few questions you encounter, but if you can’t or if the first few questions seem unusually abstract or difficult, don’t worry. Just keep your focus. Put your energy into the questions to come; don’t ever think back. Stay engaged.

Tip #3: Don’t Take Practice Tests in the Few Days Prior to Your Test

Practice tests serve as a valuable tool in your GMAT prep. However, taking full-length practice tests right before your official test is not a wise move. If you’ve studied properly and strategically, these last few days will provide you little value in learning new information. Instead of trying to cram new knowledge in the days before your exam, do some light studying and review, reinforcing what you already know. Give your brain and body a break; you’ll need them well-rested come test day.

Tip #4: Don’t Worry About Running Out of Room on Your Notepad

You can always ask for a new one. Similarly, when you get your pens, inspect them, making sure they have good tips and write smoothly. If you don’t like the pens you’re given, immediately ask your proctor for new ones.

Tip #5: Don't Forget to Warm Up Your Brain

Before the test starts, it’s a good idea to do a light warm up. For example, sit in your car and solve 5 quant and 5 verbal problems. This way your brain will be focused and ready to work analytically when the test begins.

Warmest regards,
Scott