Can someone explain this?

[ethan42781]

I took 2 practice tests last weekend, one on Saturday and one on Sunday. On Saturday I took the 2004 PR CAT4 and scored 640 (40Q, 39V). On Sunday I took the GMAT Prep2 and scored 720 (47Q, 42V). My knowledge of the subject matter did not change between tests, yet my scores were so much different. Specifically for the math section, I got 81% of the questions correct on the 40 score and only 62% correct on the 47 score. I guess that makes sense if Im seeing harder questions, but why didnt answering so many correctly on the 40 score bump me up? Thanks.

[beatthegmat]

I took 2 practice tests last weekend, one on Saturday and one on Sunday. On Saturday I took the 2004 PR CAT4 and scored 640 (40Q, 39V). On Sunday I took the GMAT Prep2 and scored 720 (47Q, 42V). My knowledge of the subject matter did not change between tests, yet my scores were so much different. Specifically for the math section, I got 81% of the questions correct on the 40 score and only 62% correct on the 47 score. I guess that makes sense if Im seeing harder questions, but why didnt answering so many correctly on the 40 score bump me up? Thanks.

Unfortunately, it's not really possible to compare scores between two test prep companies (or in your case, PR vs GMATPrep) because the scoring algorithms work very differently.

A 100 point improvement in such a short period of time is certainly surprising. As you had correctly identified, hit rates don't mean much in the GMAT world rather than the number of difficult questions you can answer correctly.

I don't have a good answer for you as to what might have happened, but the good news is that I think that your GMATPrep score is likely more representative of your actual GMAT test taking abilities than any other test source.

Good luck!

[beatthegmat]

When you take GMATPrep 2, please let us know how that goes!

Good luck with your prep!