Should I use GRE score or GMAT score for b school applications?

Hi there,

Great question for those who have taken both GMAT and GRE. It depends on a few things which I'm listing below:

1) Your current professional background - if you're coming from a non-quant, non-business background (e.g. liberal arts, non-profit, military), adcom would be more understanding if you went with GRE because the quant for GMAT is more difficult.
2) Which school you're applying to - read some online forums and do some research on whether the schools you're applying to have a preference for GMAT. Schools either have a preference for the GMAT or indifferent between the two, but not really the case of preferring GRE over GMAT. Also, if you're applying to top 10 schools, they typically prefer the GMAT by a slight margin UNLESS you're coming from a non-traditional background (see point 1 above) because most traditional candidates (e.g. finance, consulting, corporate) typically opt for the GMAT.
3) The candidate pool you're competing against - In the same vein as point 2, if the candidate pool you're competing against (e.g. consultants) are all taking the GMAT, then it's probably better to also take that test or adcom may find it tricky to evaluate you against your peers. However, if you come from a non-traditional background, there will be more candidates opting for the GRE so you may have more leeway to choose between the GMAT and GRE.

While schools now accept scores from either one of these exams, the GMAT is original form which is more widely submitted form of scores for MBA, so there it is slightly looked more favorably upon if scores for both exams are similar. To the point of an earlier post, GMAT math is known to be more difficult so that's something adcom will likely take into consideration when evaluating two candidates with the same math score and same backgroiund, but one took GMAT and the other took GRE. Hope this helps with your decision and good luck!