Ayush Verma

How to Prepare for the GMAT: Study and Preparation Tips

Students smiling and studying together representing how to prepare for GMAT using good GMAT advice - image by Magoosh

Wondering how to prepare for GMAT? I’m here to offer you some tried and true GMAT preparation advice to help you reach your target score. Read to the end for bonus advice on how to prepare for a 700+ and even a 750+ GMAT score!

Best Ways to Prepare for the GMAT

1. Give Yourself Time to Fail

While you can read hundreds of blogs and articles on ‘How to Prepare for GMAT’ or talk to dozens of GMAT experts to understand what worked for them, the most important thing that will make or break your GMAT preparation journey is the amount of time you give yourself to experiment with those recommendations and find out the perfect combination for you. So in a way, my #1 GMAT preparation tip is about how to use all the remaining tips in this post – By allowing yourself time to try a few different things out, fail, and then figure out what works best for you.

In general, people set aside about three months before their deadlines to get some solid studying in with minimal distractions. Get a personalized recommendation on how long to study for the GMAT with a quiz to get a better idea, but then give yourself one month extra on top of that. The extra month will give you time to experiment with your studying pattern and figure out what works for you. It will also allow you to study without pressure knowing you have some margin to fail early on but still have enough time to reach your target GMAT score.

2. Know Thy Enemy

It is so often that students come to me after having spent dozens of hours preparing for the GMAT but are still unaware of the adaptive nature of the exam or what the options in a Data Sufficiency question are. It is vital to get familiar with the GMAT format and structure before starting your journey. The directions on the GMAT won’t change on the day of the test, so you will save a lot of time on the exam day if you come in already knowing the format and the directions. Pay close attention to the directions for the data sufficiency section. Because the GMAT is an adaptive test, it’s a good idea to get familiar with the adaptive format in particular!

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3. Focus on Accuracy First, Timing Later

The GMAT is a timed test, and students try to incorporate that into their GMAT preparations from Day 1. While this might sound like an efficient use of time, it, unfortunately, sets students up for failure. You need to remember that GMAT is about finding the correct balance between speed and accuracy. The best way to find that balance and, therefore, the best study for GMAT is to separate these two aspects and tackle them one at a time. Whenever you study a topic from the GMAT Verbal or GMAT Quant Section, always focus on accuracy first. Ensure that you can get 80-90% accuracy on the practice questions or topic tests you take. Don’t worry whether it takes you 30 seconds to solve each question or 3 minutes. Once you have consistently started to hit the 80% – 90% accuracy mark, you should bring timing into the fray and begin to notice the time it takes you to solve those questions.

4. Learn the Most Frequently Tested GMAT Concepts

It might not feel like it, but there is a finite amount of information that is tested on the GMAT. While it would be ideal to be an expert in every single possible topic to be tested, it would be disappointing to hyperfocus on function notation and find that it only has the slightest chance of showing up on the quant section. Begin by focusing your study on topics that are most frequently tested in the verbal and the quant section. Find the most common GMAT topics here.

5. Work on Your GMAT Timing

The time limit on the GMAT puts a lot of structure around how long you can spend on each question, especially because the test is computer-adaptive, and you will only see one question at a time.

Be familiar with how much time you have to answer the questions for each section (total section time/number of questions per section). Once you are confident about your accuracy, time yourself while doing the practice problem to train your body to get a feel for how long 2 minutes really are.

In addition to getting into a rhythm for timing, work on your stamina for prolonged focus. Since the GMAT is almost 4 hours, it will require focus that may not come naturally to you. Check out this in-depth article for more time management tips.

6. Take Every Mock Test Like the Real Exam

So often, great students who have worked hard and are well prepared fail on the exam day due to pressure and anxiety issues. One of the best ways to overcome exam day anxiety is to simulate the test-day experience whenever possible and take every practice test in a test-like setting. I usually advise all my students that if you take every mock like the real exam, the real exam will feel like just another mock.

During your GMAT preparation, you’ve been building accuracy. It is also essential to build endurance for the duration of the test! Find a quiet place with a computer and pull up the free GMATPrep software or one of Magoosh’s practice tests (included with a Premium plan).

GMAT Preparation for a High Score (700+)

While most of the above tips will help you get a good score on the GMAT exam, here are a few tips for those who want to go that extra mile and target a 700+ score on GMAT.

7. Be Aware of Your Strength and Weaknesses

As you study along with your GMAT materials, you are bound to make mistakes. Make a habit of learning from these errors by keeping a GMAT error log. Take time to revisit your error log and analyze the areas where you make frequent mistakes. This exercise might be difficult at first but will pay off in the long run since it will highlight the types of questions and content you need to focus on improving. It will put your weaknesses front and center and force you to work on them and better understand the concepts! Remember, if you’re a Magoosh GMAT premium user, our excellent Student Help team is available to answer all of your academic questions.

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8. Practice, Practice, Practice

Expert GMAT advice is united on this point: The best way to apply your studying is to do tons and tons of practice questions. You’ll become familiar with the different ways the same topic can be tested, and you’ll uncover weaknesses that will help you hone in on areas for improvement.

Don’t be discouraged by getting practice questions wrong. Being able to understand why you got certain questions wrong will help you avoid making the same mistakes in the future. Better to get questions wrong in practice than on test day! Remember that GMAT error log you created, and don’t give up!

Bonus: GMAT Preparation for an Elite Score (750+)

If you are one of those outliers who like to be perfect in everything they do, or you feel you have other areas in your profile that might put you at a disadvantage in your application, and you want to completely nail the GMAT exam by getting a Top 1% score, here are my two cents for you.

9. Identify Your Strengths and Become the Best in Them

Apart from everything mentioned above, you need to take things one step further. While most will use the error log to identify their weak areas and fix them, you need to attack not only your weaknesses but also those strengths. If you are good at RC, double the time you spent on RC and make sure you don’t make even a single mistake on any RC question.

During my own GMAT preparation journey, I did not settle for a V40 score when I identified that I was naturally good at the Verbal Section. Not only did I solve every single question on the Official Guide and Verbal Review, but I also practiced LSAT study material, since it a considered a level harder than GMAT Verbal and I wanted to prepare myself for the extremely hard verbal questions. I challenged myself to solve the verbal section in 50 minutes. All this is what helped me score a V46 on the Verbal Section and a 760 on the GMAT in my first attempt. Remember, you can’t leave any stone unturned if you are going for that elite 750+ score. Good luck!

Authors

  • Ayush Verma

    Ayush is a Test Prep Expert and Application Coach actively involved in the Test Prep and Application Consulting space for several years now. He is a GMAT 99 Percentiler and has extensive experience in delivering private tutoring sessions for GMAT, GRE, and SAT exams. Ayush has a Bachelor’s in Computer Science and an MBA in Strategy from the Indian School of Business. He is an ardent ManUnited fan and when he is not helping students understand that tricky GMAT question or write that dreaded Why MBA answer, he would be likely cheering for his team at Old Trafford (GGMU). To connect with him, feel free to reach out to him via LinkedIn or his website Test Prep Buddy.

  • Jen Nguyen

    Jen is here to do everything in her power to help you ace the GMAT. She is a graduate from the University of Virginia, with a major in Economics and a minor in UVA Men’s Basketball. She is a certified yoga teacher, the world’s laziest runner, and likes to experiment with vegan cooking (it’s really not as gross as it sounds).

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