Best Practice Tests?

[beatthegmat]

I'm very interested in seeing the public opinion...

[greatman]

I have tried 3 Kaplan and 1 Princeton online....I think Kaplan r better, although questions r tough....

[beatthegmat]

Wow, so far Kaplan seems to be winning--not what I had expected...

[limits660]

Me neither

I thought Kaplan would have scored much lower. I evened it out with a vote for my favorite, Manhattan GMAT baby !

Just a quick question, shouldnt this poll be for people who have written the real GMAT exam already so they can make the best comparison between the practice ones and the real one? Just a thought because the results could be slightly skewed.

Im due to write in 2 weeks time (Feb 17). :roll:

[beatthegmat]

Me neither

I thought Kaplan would have scored much lower. I evened it out with a vote for my favorite, Manhattan GMAT baby !

Just a quick question, shouldnt this poll be for people who have written the real GMAT exam already so they can make the best comparison between the practice ones and the real one? Just a thought because the results could be slightly skewed.

Im due to write in 2 weeks time (Feb 17). :roll:

Yeah, this poll might have been better if we'd filtered for people who had already taken the test. But I'm still interested in people's initial perception, so I think that the poll could still elicit interesting results.

Good luck to you in your upcoming test! Homestretch!

[VirtualM]

I've tried Kaplan, Manhattan, and Princeton. I voted Manhattan GMAT because it provides high quality questions that are challenging and its logic best approximates the logic of actual GMAT questions. However I personally think that the MGMAT CAT is much, much harder than the actual GMAT. It's also easier to score high on MGMAT, probably because the questions it gives are so tough! Anyway, just wanted to note that the MGMAT test has good questions for refining one's skills and pacing, but it is probably not an accurate prediction of one's score and the overall difficulty of questions that will appear on the actual GMAT on test day. GMATPrep is always a more accurate predictor, based on my experience.

[limits660]

Great insight !

Thanks for the post VirtualM!

[maxim730]

Hmm.. Today is my last day and I really want to take a Manhattan GMAT CAT test over the GMAT prep exam, simply because Manhattan GMAT gives explanations for all the questions.

[greatman]

I am done with all six tests of Mahattan and all four of Kaplan....

I feel Manhattan is far better than Kaplan...

The way Manhattan explains answers, the level of question...I like that....Manhattan has really worked hard to make these tests...

I scored between 630 and 690 in Manhattan and between 520 and 550 in Kaplan....What about other people.....especialy in Manhattan....

[isisalaska]

Agree 100%
I love Manahttan and its explanation, plus its gives you an idea of the level of difficulty, and you can also do a lot of neat thinsg such us download your results in a Excel spreadsheet, etc. I got 660 on Manhattan test

[kevch25]

My scores on the Manhattan GMAT have been higher than normal. I've scored between 690 - 750 after taking 5 of the onlint practice CAT tests.

I score on my GMATPrep between 610-640, so I'm not sure how much stock to put into the Manhattan score. I agree with other posters in regards to the insightful question explanations, but I think their scoring strategy is a bit off. Where the GMATPrep beings to level out, I find the Manhattan CAT tends to keep adjusting.

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to think I'd be about to score a 750 on the GMAT, but I think there Manhattan GMAT CAT tends to score a bit higher. Has anyone else noticed this in their scores as well?

[Stacey Koprince]

We have done extensive testing of our algorithm (using our students' real scores on the official test) and our current standard deviation on our test is in the low 50s (compared to about 30 for the official test). This doesn't mean that the test is that accurate for everyone, of course, but overall, the algorithm output is fairly close to that of the official test.

[beatthegmat]

I started off with the official GMAt prep test and got 710 and then 690 for the second; After two weeks of studying, I did 580 on Kaplan. Needless to say I was shocked by my score. I did the second Kaplan test and got 610, still nothing to brag about. So I feel a bit better now that I've read the posts about Kaplan. Does anyone with GMAt test taking experience have any idea how the kaplan test scores translate to real GMAT scores? This would help me a great deal.

Thx!

Kaplan practice tests tend to skew down your score dramatically. I wouldn't pay much attention to those results.

[EDITOR'S UPDATE] I've since concluded that this is a myth. Stuart Kovinsky has provided really good data to indicate that Kaplan's scoring algorithm is not skewing results.

[beatthegmat]

I'm happy to hear that but it's very frustrating because I have no way of really effectively measuring my progress. I could be that my strategy is not good and that I should change my way of studying but I have no way of knowing this because Kaplan gives no real indicator of your real GMAT score.

Any suggestions on how to know if you're making any progress?

By the way, excellent forum, full of very usable stuff !!

One way to see your progress is to benchmark against the same practice tests. For example, if you start out with a certain score in your first Kaplan test and find improvement with each subsequent Kaplan practice test, then you are definitely improving.

[avak]

I just had a very dissapointing GMAT session getting a 680 on the actual test. That said, every Kaplan I took gave me ~580 and the GMATPrep tests gave me 710-740. I would say that the Kaplan test has fairly terrible verbal questions. The math seems more accurate although harder than the real thing. I would use Kaplan as practice but its not an accurate predictor of your score.