Stop Taking So Many CATs!
If you’ve ever taken more than one GMAT practice test (CAT) in a week, you’re taking CATs too frequently! Practice tests are one of your most valuable tools as you get ready for the official GMAT—but there’s definitely a wrong way to use your CATs. Here’s how to know when to take your next CAT. (This post has been updated for the new GMAT.)
When should I take a practice GMAT?
Practice CATs are very useful for three things:
- Figuring out your current scoring level*
- Practicing time management and stamina
- Analyzing your strengths and weaknesses
The first one has an asterisk because it contains a big assumption: Assuming that you took the practice CAT under official test conditions. It’s never a good idea to give yourself extra time, pause the test, take longer breaks than allowed, and so on. Always take practice tests under 100% official conditions.
And the third item on the list is actually the most important. You don’t get better while taking a practice test, in the same way that you don’t learn how to get better while you’re running a marathon; you’re literally just trying to survive. 😅
Rather, you learn how to improve in between practice tests while doing all kinds of training activities and analyzing your performance. So, the data you get on your strengths and weaknesses is the most important aspect of your practice test, because that’s what’s going to help you figure out what you need to work on between now and your next practice test.
Here’s your general practice test regimen:
- Take your first practice test early—within the first week or two of your studies. (I know you’re not ready yet. Take it anyway. Trust me.)
- Spend 4 to 6 weeks studying before you take another test. Keep on this cycle until you have gotten through all of your “primary” study materials (see below for details).
- After you have gotten through your primary study materials once, go into Review And Improve mode. Take tests approximately every 2 to 4 weeks in this phase.
- Don’t take tests more frequently than once a week.
Read on to find out more about each of the steps in this regimen.
Step 1: DO take a CAT at the beginning of your studies
Many people put off taking their first CAT, usually because they haven’t studied yet so they know they won’t do well. But who cares what the score is at this stage? You just started. Your goal now is simply to get good data on your strengths and weaknesses. If you know that right away, you can make much better decisions about how to prioritize your studies.
It’s important to have a basic* understanding of the question types before that first exam (particularly the questions in the Data Insights section), just so that you understand how each one works, but don’t worry about all of the formulas and rules. Some you already know; others, you don’t. Your first test performance will tell you what you do and don’t know—and you’ll use that information to set up your study plan. (*Basic = super basic, like you just know what each type looks like and how it generally works. You do not need to have mastered the question types in any way.)
One caution in particular here: A decent percentage of the people who put off their first CAT do so because they’re feeling significant anxiety about taking the test. But pushing off that first test will just make you feel more anxious (because you’ll be telling yourself that you’ve studied so now you should get a better score…and it will just spiral from there).
Do yourself a favor and take that first test right away. You can honestly tell yourself that your score doesn’t matter because you haven’t even really started studying yet.
Step 2: During your primary study phase, take 4 to 8 weeks between CATs
Now that you have a handle on your baseline strengths and weaknesses, dive into your study materials—your books or whatever you’re using that will teach you about all of the different question types and content areas tested on the GMAT. In our courses, we have everyone take their second practice test when they’re a little more than halfway through their primary study material.
When you take this second test, still try not to care too much about your score. (I know that’s hard!) There’s still a lot that you literally haven’t studied yet. The goal for this second test is two-fold:
- Get some practice with time management and with the strategies you have learned so far
- Update your data on your strengths and weaknesses
Use this new data to help prioritize the next segment of your studies—where can you predict that upcoming lessons will be easier or harder for you based on how things went on your second practice test? Also, note anything that you already studied before and your second practice test indicates you may need to review, then decide when you want to review it. For example, if you’re struggling with exponents, then it may be a good idea to review that topic before you begin studying quadratic equations, since quadratics also use exponents. Alternatively, if you’re struggling with decimals, which is a more isolated category, then it might be fine to wait until you’re done with your next segment of study before you loop back around to review this topic area.
Follow this regimen (ideally about every 4 to 6 weeks) until you’ve made it through all of your study materials once.
DON’T go months without taking a CAT
You may find yourself dreading taking your next practice test. The impetus is usually anxiety: You’re nervous that you won’t get the results that you want, so you avoid getting any results at all. Alternatively, maybe you think that you’ll study everything and then when you finally take a practice test, you’ll get the score that you want.
In either case, practicing without any semi-recent CAT data is going to cause you to build bad habits (such as spending too much time on a question) and fail to build good ones (such as learning how and when to cut yourself off and guess).
If your last CAT was so long ago that you’re no longer sure what your strengths and weaknesses are under testing conditions, it’s time for another CAT. And bonus: The more CATs you take, the more they will seem routine and the less you will dread taking them.
Step 3: During your Review and Improve phase, take CATs every 2 to 4 weeks
In our courses, this corresponds to the phase right after the course ends. You’ve studied everything once…now what?
Take a test, analyze it, and use the results to set up a study plan that will carry you just until your next practice test in another 2 to 4 weeks. Prioritize your best opportunities for improvement based on the data from that test.
Careless mistakes? Definitely address. Didn’t know something but feel comfortable with that problem’s explanation? Learn how to do it for yourself in future. Totally lost when you review the explanation? Put that problem on your bail list; if you see something similar on your next practice test, guess immediately and move on. (After that next test, you can decide whether to study anything on your bail list. But not between now and the next practice test.)
Spend 80% of your time on the areas that you identify as the best opportunities for improvement. Reserve the other 20% of your time for overall review—do and review timed sets of randomly-chosen problems to keep your skills up across the whole test. (Our Dynamic Question Set Builder can help you with that.)
When you feel like you’ve made good progress on the best opportunities from your last practice test, take another practice test. Analyze the data and repeat the process.
When you get yourself into your goal scoring range on your practice tests (taken under 100% official conditions), it’s time to schedule your official test!
DON’T try to study everything before you take your next CAT
The goal is just to improve on your next test, not to get a perfect score; the GMAT is an adaptive test, so it can just keep getting harder. 🧐 Study enough that you think you’ve gotten better, then test to see whether you did.
If you do earn a better score, great—now, use the new data to figure out what to prioritize for the next few weeks. And if you don’t, better to know now so that you can take steps to figure out why your studies aren’t translating into a better score. (Maybe you’re messing up your time management or something else that isn’t related to the actual content you were just studying!)
Step 4: DON’T take a CAT more than once a week
Have you ever had this happen? You take a practice test and you get a score that you don’t like. Maybe you even really mess things up—run out of time or finish 20 minutes early—and your score plummets. So, a couple of days later, you take another CAT to prove to yourself that the bad test was just a fluke.
But whatever happened on the bad test could happen again in future, because something happened to cause that bad day—and if you don’t figure out what that was, then you’re at risk of repeating the experience on your official test. 
So, don’t take another practice test right now. There’s something important for you to learn from the practice test you already took—go figure out what that is.
In general, whether you like your score or not, don’t take another practice test until you’ve addressed whatever issues popped up during your analysis of that test. (Alternatively, if you really like your score, go schedule your official test!)
Most of the time, wait at least 2 weeks before taking another CAT
There are three broad modes of study:
- Your primary studies: Take CATs every 4 to 6 weeks
- The review-and-improve phase: Take CATs every 2 to 4 weeks
- The last-two-weeks phase: Take two CATs, one each week
Most of your study will fall in the first and second phases. During these phases, it is a complete waste of time to take another CAT in less than 2 weeks. The whole point of taking the practice CAT is to figure out what needs to get better. And then you need time to go get better! Until you’ve made substantial progress towards whatever issues were uncovered, taking another practice CAT is just going to tell you that you still have those same issues.
Once you do hit the final couple of weeks, your focus shifts. Now, you’re trying to solidify your Game Plan for test day. In this phase, do go ahead and take a CAT two weeks before your official test date and then again one week before. But take a look at the Game Plan article to understand how to use your data at this stage of the game.
DON’T take a practice CAT within 5 days of the real test
You wouldn’t run a practice marathon a few days before a real marathon, would you? You risk tiring yourself out or injuring yourself (by reducing your confidence) just before the real test.
If your score isn’t where you want it to be, postpone the test; you’re not going to change things substantially by taking a practice CAT at the last minute. But consider keeping your official test date and using it as an official “dry run” or practice run. It’s valuable to see what the official testing experience is like (whether in a testing center or at home); you may be less nervous when you take the test again because you’ll know what to expect.
And don’t worry about getting an official score that you don’t like. The GMAT allows you to report test sittings individually—so, if you do have a bad official test day, you just won’t report that set of scores to your desired schools.
Takeaways
In short, do take a CAT pretty early on in your study process. Then, analyze the results and use that analysis to inform your study plan. Early on, study everything that could be tested on the GMAT, taking periodic tests along the way to help continue to prioritize your studies.
After you’ve made it all the way through your study materials once, take another CAT, analyze, and figure out two to three weeks’ worth of priorities—the things that seem to you like the best opportunities for improvement. Then, take another CAT and repeat the process.
Once you’ve got your score where you want it to be, start your final review phase. During this phase (which typically lasts a couple of weeks), plan to take one CAT two weeks before and another CAT one week before your real test date. Read the Game Plan article (linked above) to learn what to do with this data.
Good luck and happy studying!
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Stacey Koprince is a Manhattan Prep instructor based in Montreal, Canada. Stacey has been teaching the GMAT for more than 15 years and is one of the most well-known instructors in the industry. Stacey loves to teach and is absolutely fascinated by standardized tests. Check out Stacey’s upcoming GMAT courses here.