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Short answer: 2 to 4 months for most candidates.
Generally, candidates preparing for GMAT do so alongside full-time employment and preparing for a competitive exam while simultaneously handling responsibilities at work is not easy. Hence, no one span can be defined as the “ideal preparation time” for all GMAT test-takers around the world. The ideal GMAT preparation duration, rather, depends upon such critical factors as your target GMAT score, your understanding of concepts tested on GMAT, and your work schedule. Thus, while a month may be enough GMAT preparation time for some, four months may not be sufficient for others.
GMAT, or the Graduate Management Admission Test, is a computer-adaptive standardized test that helps the Admissions Committee of the B-schools determine the analytical, quantitative, and verbal skills of the incoming MBA class. While the GMAT’s importance is a stated fact, a significant question among GMAT aspirants is what should be the ideal GMAT preparation time?
The table provides a basic sketch of the important steps that must be followed in preparing for GMAT and the approximate time required to accomplish each step.
# | Step | Time Needed | Resource | Some Reliable Resources | Tip |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Take a full length test | 3 hours 30 minutes | Any reliable full length test | Experts’ Global, Manhattan Prep, Veritas | Avoid official mocks; save those for later |
2 | Develop concepts | 4-6 weeks | Any reliable GMAT course | Experts’ Global, Veritas, e-GMAT, Magoosh | Take free trials before finalizing a course |
3 | Practice regularly | 4 weeks | Any reliable GMAT course | Experts’ Global, Veritas, e-GMAT, Magoosh | Save official guides for final month of prep |
4 | One full length test every ~10 days | 3 hours 30 minutes/ test | Any reliable GMAT test series | Experts’ Global, Manhattan Prep, Veritas | Avoid too many private test series |
5 | Periodically revise the concepts | 1 day / 15 days | The GMAT course you opted for | The GMAT course you opted for | GMAT concepts take time; revision matters |
6 | Analyze the mistakes | 1 day / 15 days | The GMAT course you opted for | The GMAT course you opted for | Mistakes are your good friends |
7 | Solve all 3 official guides | 2-3 weeks | Latest Official Guide, Math Review, Verbal Review | If you need extra official questions, buy “Question Pack” | |
8 | Revise and consolidate your prep | 1 week | The GMAT course you opted for + Official guides | The GMAT course you opted for + Official guides | Re-attempt questions you got wrong earlier |
9 | Take the official mock tests | 3 hours 30 minutes/test | GMAT Prep from MBA.com | If you need extra official mocks, buy “Exam Pack- 1 and 2” | |
Give the GMAT with a calm mind! |
GMAT Prep Time: 30 Days
The following section suggests the ideal 30 days GMAT prep plan for both first time test-takers and test re-takers.
GMAT 30 Days Study Plan: For First-time Test Takers
Always begin your GMAT Prep process with a diagnostic test to understand your strength.
Week | Action |
---|---|
1 | Take a mock test, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, practice. |
2 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, attain accuracy. |
3 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, attain accuracy, time yourself. |
4 | Take 3 practice tests, refer to the Official Guides, work on accuracy and time. |
To make better use of the limited time and avail of robust assistance with your GMAT prep, get the free GMAT prep mobile app for Android/ iOS.
GMAT 30 Days Study Plan: For Test Re-takers
That you are re-taking your GMAT clearly indicates that you are not satisfied with the scores you have received. Hence, this time, start your GMAT prep process by introspecting on the possible areas of improvement. For the same, start by acquiring the GMAT Enhanced Score Report to analyze your performance.
Week | Action |
---|---|
1 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, attain accuracy. |
2 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, attain accuracy, time yourself. |
3 | Take 3 practice tests, reach perfect sync of accuracy and time, revise concepts. |
4 | Take 4 practice tests, refer to the Official Guides, maintain accuracy and time, revise concepts. |
GMAT Prep Time: 60 Days
The following section suggests the ideal 60 days GMAT prep plan for both first time test-takers and test re-takers.
GMAT 60 Days Study Plan: For First-time Test Takers
Always begin your GMAT Prep process with a diagnostic test to understand your strength. Further, you may also consider enrolling for a GMAT classroom prep program.
Week | Action |
---|---|
1 | Take a mock test, analyze mistakes, develop concepts. |
2 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, attain accuracy. |
3 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, attain accuracy. |
4 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, develop your speed. |
5 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, focus on accuracy, attain speed. |
6 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, attain speed and accuracy. |
7 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, refer to the Official Guides, maintain speed and accuracy. |
8 | Take a practice test, refer to Official Guides, analyze mistakes, and relax! |
To make better use of the limited time and avail of robust assistance with your GMAT prep, you can also partake of an online GMAT preparation program.
GMAT 60 Days Study Plan: For Test Re-takers
That you are re-taking your GMAT clearly indicates that you are not satisfied with the scores you have received. Hence, this time, start your GMAT prep process by introspecting on the possible areas of improvement. For the same, start by acquiring the GMAT Enhanced Score Report to analyze your performance. You may also consider enrolling for a GMAT classroom prep program.
Week | Action |
---|---|
1 | Take a mock test, analyze mistakes, develop concepts. |
2 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, focus on gaining accuracy. |
3 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes,revise concepts, attain accuracy. |
4 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, develop your speed. |
5 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, focus on accuracy, attain speed. |
6 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, attain speed and accuracy. |
7 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, refer to the Official Guides, maintain speed and accuracy. |
8 | Take a practice test, refer to Official Guides, analyze mistakes, and relax! |
To make better use of the limited time and avail of robust assisstance with your GMAT prep, avail of a GMAT guidance program and improve upon your weak areas.
GMAT Prep Time: 90 Days
The following section suggests the ideal 90 days GMAT prep plan for both first time test-takers and test re-takers.
GMAT 90 Days Study Plan: For First-time Test Takers
A period of 90 days for GMAT preparation is the perfect GMAT prep time. 90 days gives the students enough time to prepare the concepts, revise, practice, work upon their weak areas, and attain the sync of accuracy and time. At the same time, 90 days is the perfect duration to keep the GMAT aspirant from becoming impatient and to prevent them from getting bogged down by the pressure of performance.
Always begin your GMAT Prep process with a diagnostic test to understand your strength. Further, you may also consider enrolling for a GMAT classroom prep program.
Week | Action |
---|---|
1 | Take a mock test, analyze mistakes, develop concepts. |
2 to 4 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, attain accuracy. |
5 to 7 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, develop speed, attain accuracy. |
8 to 10 | Take 4 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, attain speed and accuracy. |
11 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, maintain speed and accuracy. |
12 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, refer to the Official Guides, maintain speed and accuracy, and relax! |
GMAT 90 Days Study Plan: For Test Re-takers
Do not wait for as long as 90 days to re-take your GMAT unless you desire intensive practice and revision of concepts. If only either of the following circumstance hampered your GMAT performance, should you consider a study plan of 90 days prior to re-taking the test:
In either case, your GMAT prep plan will start with the acquisition of the GMAT Enhanced Score Report to analyze your performance and enroll for a GMAT classroom prep program.
Week | Action |
---|---|
1 | Take a mock test, analyze mistakes, develop concepts. |
2 to 4 | Take 2 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, attain accuracy. |
5 to 7 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, develop speed, attain accuracy. |
8 to 10 | Take 4 practice tests, analyze mistakes, develop concepts, revise concepts, attain speed and accuracy. |
11 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, maintain speed and accuracy. |
12 | Take 3 practice tests, analyze mistakes, revise concepts, refer to the Official Guides, maintain speed and accuracy, and relax! |
The ideal GMAT prep duration varies from student to student. To garner a positive understanding of this difference in time required for GMAT prep and thereby arrive at a definite answer to the question, GMAC conducts a survey each year. The data collated and spread, as per geography, suggests that irrespective of the external conditions, on an average every GMAT test taker has taken up to 9 weeks to prepare for GMAT.
The following tables depict the median time taken by students to prepare for GMAT:
GMAT Preparation | Region of Residence (% of test takers) | ||||||
East &SE Asia | Canada | Central & South Africa | Europe | Latin America | Middle East/Africa | USA | |
Less than 1 week | 7% | 6% | 7% | 8% | 6% | 12% | 10% |
1 to 3 weeks | 29% | 26% | 21% | 26% | 19% | 28% | 22% |
4 to 6 weeks | 32% | 33% | 29% | 30% | 23% | 23% | 28% |
7 to 9 weeks | 14% | 1% | 26% | 19% | 21% | 13% | 17% |
More than 10 weeks | 13% | 12% | 18% | 13% | 25% | 15% | 16% |
Median GMAT Prep Hours | 100 hours | 75 hours | 90 hours | 80 hours | 100 hours | 60 hours | 50 hours |
Source: GMAC 2017, mba.com, Prospective Students Survey, 2015 – 16
However, the question still remains – What is the ideal preparation time for GMAT? Answers such as “as long as you can study for it”, or “till you master the concepts”, or “till you get your target score” are vague and frustrating to be heard by someone seriously considering taking up the test. To help you, we have outlined a few crucial points, elaborating on the ‘factors’ already discussed, that you can keep in mind while planning your study time:
Attention span and study plan can never be the same for each person. Hence, if a GMAT prep time of 2 months works for few students, it will not work for the other group of students. The ideal step, in this regard, would be to begin with identifying your particular strengths and weaknesses and the number of hours that you can sincerely dedicate to preparation. For professionals, again, the issue of work-life balance becomes a pertinent issue. Thus, the beginning plan should be:
Your preparation schedule should be compartmentalized to ensure that you are regularly practicing all four sections and spending reasonable time on each. Key points to be kept in mind, in this regard:
Shortlist your schools, set your target GMAT scores, take the GMAT mock test to determine your learning needs, and select the study plan that best meets your learning need.
To sum up, consider the following in planning your GMAT prep time:
The first step to acing the 3 hours and 30 minutes long GMAT test is to understand the test thoroughly. Before you can start with your preparation or even chalk out a GMAT prep routine for yourself, understand the pattern, the syllabus, and the scoring pattern of the GMAT test.
Sections | Number of Questions | Time per Section | Types of Questions | Scoring | Mean Score |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Analytical Writing Assessment | 1 | 30 minutes | Analysis of an Argument | 0 to 6 (in 0.5 increments) | 4.48 |
Integrated Reasoning | 12 | 30 minutes | Graphic Interpretation, Table Analysis, Multi-source Reasoning, Two-part Analysis | 1 to 8(in 1 increment) | 4.29 |
Quantitative Reasoning | 31 | 62 minutes | Data Sufficiency, Problem Solving | 6 to 51 (in 1 increment) | 39.93 |
Verbal Reasoning | 36 | 65 minutes | Reading Comprehension, Critical Reasoning, Sentence Correction | 6 to 51 (in 1 increment) | 27.04 |
GMAT: Sections and Type of Questions
Divided into 4 distinct sections, Analytical Writing Assessment, Integrated Reasoning, Verbal Reasoning, and Quantitative Reasoning, GMAT aims to understand a candidate’s ability to read and analyze multi-source data, interpret graphics, and evaluate and represent information in a coherent form.
The following table highlights the broad concepts tested in the GMAT Verbal and Quant Reasoning sections:
GMAT Quantitative Reasoning | GMAT Verbal Reasoning |
---|---|
Arithmetic | Subject – Verb Agreement |
Permutations and Combinations | Pronouns |
Ratio and Proportion | Modifiers |
Linear Equations | Parallelism |
Roots and Exponents | Idioms |
Algebra | Reading Comprehension |
Geometry | Redundancy |
Scoring on GMAT
GMAC follows a particular scoring algorithm for GMAT, a piece of information that is not publicly available. However, there are definite factors that the scoring on GMAT depends upon – the number of questions answered, the number of questions correctly answered, and the difficulty level of the questions answered are crucial components that determine the final scores received on each section. Besides, only the scores obtained in the Quantitative and the Verbal Reasoning section on GMAT add to form the total GMAT score; the scores obtained in the Integrated Reasoning and the Analytical Writing Assessment sections are not added to the total GMAT score and are separately provided.
What Is A Good GMAT Score?
GMAT score forms an important criterion of admission to B-schools. Any GMAT aspirant must conduct thorough research on the average GMAT score requirement of their shortlisted B-schools and accordingly proceed to prepare for GMAT. However, what may be a “good GMAT score” for one school may not be good enough for another school. For instance, among the top-25 globally ranked business schools, the average GMAT score requirement for IMD is 670, for Berkeley: Haas is 726, and for Harvard is 730.
Average GMAT Score: Top-25 B-Schools
School | Average GMAT Score |
---|---|
Stanford | 708 |
Harvard | 730 |
INSEAD | 700 |
Wharton | 732 |
CEIBS | 685 |
LBS | 707 |
Chicago Booth | 738 |
MIT: Sloan | 730 |
Columbia Business School | 732 |
Berkeley: Haas | 726 |
Yale | 724 |
IESE | 690 |
Oxford: Said | 690 |
Northwestern University | 732 |
Dartmouth | 722 |
Cambridge: Judge | 696 |
NUS | 662 |
HKUST | 680 |
HEC Paris | 690 |
Duke: Fuqua | 704 |
Esade | 660 |
IMD | 670 |
Darden | 718 |
ISB 7 | 09 |
NYU: Stern | 716 |
While the MBA admission essays help to represent a holistic narrative of your profile, the GMAT score represents your quantitative and verbal proficiency. The GMAT score, therefore, testifies your deftness to analyze situations, reason, and solve critical problems, skills integral to pursuing your career in a senior leadership role, post-MBA. Thus, to understand which GMAT score is good for you, evaluate the student profiles of your target B-schools and accordingly, set your target GMAT score.
As we rush to fulfill our responsibilities and to achieve our targets, we often ignore the stressors that play a crucial role in determining our performance. Beyond the negative effects that the stressors are prone to have on our health, stressors also affect our task performances. According to psychologists, stress does not necessarily degrade but improves our performance, the stress and performance relationship, thus, taking the form of an inverted-U graph – a model developed by Robert Yerkes and John Dodson in 1908. Specifically, in the initial stages, the stress acts as an energizer, boosting our ability to perform. However, with the persisted exercise of the same stressors, stress becomes distracting, and our performance gradually drops.
The original Yerkes-Dodson Law. Image Source: Wikipedia
You are bound to experience high levels of test anxiety and performance anxiety throughout your GMAT preparation time. The trick to succeeding here is to actively recognize the stressors and disregard their existence. Hence, the importance of breaks! Your initial excitement and vigor to perform may also positively influence your test scores in your initial mocks. However, your final test results may reflect otherwise, you may not be even able to reach your target scores. Such discrepancies should be accounted for not only in terms of lack of preparation, but also failure to recognize the actual factors. Consider the situation: a 680 in your mock may make you confident of scoring a 700 in your final. You are confident of your preparation and you eagerly await the final test-taking day. When the results are declared, you find that you have scored only a 660! A very frequent complaint from students, this discrepancy is the result of text anxiety, and one poor performance is liable to further aggravating the text anxiety.
Combating the Stressors:
To sum up, therefore, the GMAT preparation time that you ultimately decide upon should take into account the following:
Apply with efficient MBA consultants and GMAT prep mentors to avail of proper guidance as regards to managing preparation time for GMAT and getting the desired GMAT score.
All the best!