Verbal scores dropped in the real test, what should I do? UPD: 730!

Congratulations on crossing the 700 threshold, and on your great Quant score! I'm sorry to hear that your Verbal dropped on test day, but if you scored V41-V42 on three unfamiliar official tests, that's your Verbal level. It's very hard to improve on high Verbal scores (there aren't any prep products that help at that level), so if you were able to improve from V38 to that level on your own, you've done very well. Because your Verbal scores were so consistent on your practice tests, it's likely you performed a bit differently on test day. If there are times of day when you're sharper, you should account for that if you retake (I'm the same way -- I'd probably get a 320 if I took the test too early in the morning). The test is a lot about clear thinking, so these kinds of things can be important. It seems also that you got down to 50-50 on several questions, which happens a lot on harder questions, and when it does, since you end up guessing, your score will be subject to a lot of variance. It's very possible you were just unlucky with a lot of those guesses, and with different luck your score might have been much higher. But it sounds like the biggest issue may have been pacing, and if you paced yourself differently on this test than on others, that might account for the score drop. It sounds like you probably needed to make some guesses or rushed answers at the end, and in that case it can be hard to get an elite Verbal score. Verbal pacing is not an easy thing to improve at, and if it's something you need to work on, it might be a good idea to ask Verbal teachers on this forum if they have any advice. But I'd bet, from your diagnostics, that if you could retake the test tomorrow, your Verbal score would be a few points higher, assuming you perform as you normally do, and if you'd like to raise your Verbal score, I think retaking would be a good idea.

Commiserations on the score drop GraceSCKao

Have you ordered the ESR? With 710 you probably do not need to retake, but the ESR sometimes provides clarity on what caused the drop. That may set your mind at ease a little.

Also, please don't think that "all your efforts are to no avail". As others have explained, nerves and small changes on test day can reduce the score dramatically. The consistent 40+ in practice tests shows that your knowledge and skills have certainly improved.

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Hi GraceSCKao,

To add to the excellent points made by AndrewN and IanStewart, I'd ask you to get the ESR for this attempt, as suggested by vv65. I don't expect it to be too useful, but it'll answer at least some questions you may otherwise spend a lot of time thinking about. For example, were your mistakes concentrated in the last quarter (seven minutes for the final seven questions), or were they more evenly distributed? And although I can't say why your verbal score dropped, the issues you identified (taking the test at a different time, spending more time than you normally would on some questions, and problems managing time) are important (and common) causes of score drops.

It's clear from your posts that you think deeply about and try your best to understand the concepts tested on the GMAT. That's a great quality to have regardless of whether you decide to retake.

Thank you experts for your warm responses and suggestions!

I ordered the ESR report today, and contrary to my expectation, CR is actually my strongest verbal sector (with 84th ranking, the same ranking I gained in my test in December). But my RC and SC rankings declined. Both fundamental skills of RC retreated, a result that might partially be attributed to the fact that I kind of rushed in the final passage. The fundamental skill "communication" in SC improved, but another skill "grammar" fell, a very surprising result because I sincerely thought that I have made progress in SC.

In the four stages, my accuracy rate is 100 percent in the first stage, and the inaccuracy rate fluctuated in the following stages--43%, 29% and 62%. The average difficulty of questions that I answered incorrectly was the highest in the second stage, lowered a bit in the third stage and rose a bit in the final stage from the third stage. Overall, the difficulty of questions I answered incorrectly was higher than the question I answered correctly--so I guess I did not make careless mistakes.

But time pacing is a big problem. The average time per response totaled 2:10, 2:15, 1:52 in the first three stages respectively, but plunged to 0:22 in the final stage! Does it mean that I actually only got about three minutes for the last nine questions? (Strangely, I remembered that I had more time.)

I am not sure whether my worse performance in RC and SC sectors has something to do with the fact that the last set of nine questions comprises mainly of RC and SC questions (I rushed in the final stage.)

But I am sure that time pacing is a big problem.... In fact I had this pacing problem in all of my previous attempts, but I did not seriously research time pacing skills because I thought that the most effective way is to boost my skills so that I could handle questions more efficiently, as it does not require any pacing skills to handle easy algebra in 62 minutes. I only used one time pacing principle--no question deserves more than three minutes. But now I see that since this test is adaptive testing, there are always questions beyond my reach. So, if I am to retake the test, I would research more into this field.

Thank you experts for your all responses once again!

I have not decided whether to retake GMAT--I really want to try again but I cannot do so in the near term because of the rules regarding limited attempts. Meanwhile, I have not taken the TOEFL test, so I need to take the test first for my applications. Anyway, GMAT is challenging but also enlightens me in so many ways...I will stay at this forum and keep upgrading my verbal skills. I think I might continue seeking your help for some official questions.


Thank you AndrewN for your warm responses!

Since I do not need to use many math skills in my work--I sometimes need to calculate percentage rates but do not use most quant concepts such as prime numbers, factor, divisibility, geometry, algebra and possibilities--I knew that I should work on quant everyday to keep myself exposed to math, and I did so. Over the past six months, I practiced quant for about 1.5 to two hours everyday. In the real test, I was nervous because generally questions are harder than those in the practice exams, but at least I knew what the questions were testing and I had a direction.

I actually spent about the same amount of time on verbal everyday during this period, but mainly on expanding my vocabulary and improving my SC skills. Overall, to be honest, I did not spend as much time on CR or RC as on SC.

In retrospect, I think that I made several incorrect choices between the final two options in those puzzling CR questions. The options I picked might not be the "safer" one or the one that are more in line with the logic, as you said. But even now, I cannot articulate why they are inferior though I've reviewed them a few times in my mind. These selections might reflect a big weak area in my critical thinking.


Thank you for your warm response and encouragement IanStewart !

I hoped to find a time slot in the afternoon (I am a night owl), but there was no such slot but only those beginning in the morning. I hope that there will be more choices if I am to retake the test.

In the four practice exams, I also had the pacing problem, but it was not as severe as in the real test. I will work on time pacing.


Thank you vv65 for your kind response!

I am frustrated with the outcome but you are right that it is not good to think that all my efforts are pointless. (Though, I still wish that the efforts could be reflected in the real test.) I need to use written English in my work and preparing for GMAT helps me better carry out the tasks in work--I could see the mistakes in writing I could not see in the past, or the logic bugs that I took for granted in the past. That is the beauty of this test I guess.



Thank you AjiteshArun for your advice and commendation!
I always learn a lot from your posts and explanations. It is your posts and other experts' that help me try to think deeply about the concepts. Thank you.

A very informative debrief and the ensuing discussions.

Your prep for GMAT will help you pass TOEFL with great scores. After that, if you do elect to take GMAT again, you can relax a bit but also speed up a bit in verbal section. Typically, we tend to spend too much time on questions we still get wrong any way. It is a pity to guess any questions simply because we are running out of time.

(Especially for SC questions, we might feel that we did pretty well, only to be proven wrong by the ESR.)

Good luck!

Thank you for your response and encouragement zhanbo !

I just read your debrief and felt amazed at the fact that you got seven minutes for the last question. I only got seven minutes, or even fewer time according to my ESR report, for the final nine questions. I wonder whether you could share some strategies about pacing and answering questions as fast as necessary (does it come as a result of practice as well as greater and deeper understanding of the tested concepts? ) I will move to your thread to file my questions.

Sorry that I'm so late to the party on this, GraceSCKao! I know that it wasn't quite what you're looking for, but congrats on hitting the 710 mark!

Plenty of lovely people have already weighed in, so I'll try to keep this relatively short. But a few things caught my eye in your posts.

For starters, IanStewart is spot-on about the effects of a not-quite-ideal testing time. In particular, you'll read with a little bit less precision if you're not at your sharpest -- imagine skipping over a little modifier here or there on CR, or not fully grasping the consequences of small tweak in language. That's enough to land you in purgatory on a bunch of questions, struggling to decide between the last two answer choices.

Put another way: if you can't decide between the last two answer choices, odds are good that you're misreading or misinterpreting something. And you're much more likely to do that if you're not completely at your best physically.

Here's the other big thing that caught my eye:

These two things are almost certainly related!

It's really, really easy to discount the effects of repeated questions on your practice tests. But even if you don't remember the questions consciously, the repeats can have an absolutely huge impact on the testing experience. Whenever you read something that you've read before -- again, even if you have no conscious memory of it -- you'll read and comprehend it MUCH faster the second time.

So what does that mean? Well, you might sail through the (repeated) practice tests without much of a time crunch, but then you're likely to move more slowly on the actual exam, when all of the questions are completely new to you. Sure, the fogginess from the not-ideal time of day probably contributed to your timing issues, but odds are good that the repeated practice tests obscured your actual problems with speed and efficiency on verbal (and possibly quant, to some degree).

What should you do about it? Especially if you've used all of the official practice tests, I'm a big fan of using LSAT sections to monitor of your efficiency and consistency. You've probably heard me say this in a few videos, but if you're able to CONSISTENTLY complete LSAT CR and RC sections (~25 questions each) in under an hour, you're likely to be OK timing-wise on the GMAT verbal.

The key word here is "consistently": if your times swing significantly from section to section, that's a sign that you're doing very different things from day to day, and need to work on employing the same approach, every single time you sit down to do a set.

For what it's worth, you're not in a terrible spot. Quant was fantastic. You let your guard down a bit on CR and RC, and odds are good that you can recover from it. And you had a bit of a bad day because you didn't take the test at the best time for you -- that's easy enough to fix. So there's clearly some upside here, and you're already sitting on a pretty great score. So there's plenty to like about your situation, even if it doesn't feel that way after all of the work you've put in.

I hope that helps a bit, Grace! Keep us posted, please.

Thank you GMATNinja so much for your response!

I think you make a great point--some repeated questions in my mock tests have helped me move faster and more confidently than I do in the real tests, even though I did not remember those repeated questions' content or answers. In fact, when I ran into a repeated question in the mock test, I intentionally asked myself to answer no sooner than 2 minutes, because I knew that there would be no such thing as repeated questions in the real test. But, although I eliminated the time difference, I ignored the difference in the state of mind---I felt calmer and more in charge with these repeated questions, even just subconsciously.

I suppose that this difference in the state of mind has a huge impact on pacing. Besides the fogginess from the not-ideal test time, the fact that when sitting at the test center on the test day, I knew it was a real deal also made me want to answer more carefully and eventually caused my horrible pacing. I think that I can only continue to boost my vocabulary, reasoning skills and pacing skills, in order to improve the verbal score next time.

To be frank, when I saw the score of V35 on the screen, my first reaction was "there must be some mistakes." But nearly one month after my last attempt, I, in consulting experts on some official questions or interacting with other members at this forum, know that I still have much to work on in the verbal section. So thank you for your encouragement and I will continue this journey.


Yes Charles I saw you recommend LSAT several times in your videos, but to be honest, before today, I never considered using the test's questions for practice, because I felt that the requirement of the preciseness of language for lawyers is much, much greater than that for business people and regular people. I thought that I would face more challenges in LSAT questions.

But I've almost used up the official mock tests and I do really hope to strengthen my mental stamina (in my last attempt, I felt that my brain burned out in the final stage, the IR section), so I will try to practice some LSAT questions. Meanwhile, I am practicing the TOEFL reading passages for my upcoming TOEFL test. (By the way, we TOEFL test takers can use 20 minutes for each set of questions in the reading section (a passage and its 10 questions)--that is really nice compared with the rule of GMAT!)

Thank you for your encouragement and suggestion once again!

Hi GraceSCKao.

It's been fun seeing you around and working with you, and I'd really to see you achieve your score goal.

Since verbal timing seems to be a major issue for you, you may get some key insights from the following posts.

GMAT Verbal Timing Strategy

How to Get Faster at GMAT Verbal

Hi all GMAT club members and experts,

I would like to update you on my latest GMAT attempt--I retook the test today and got 730--Q50, V39, and IR 8. I almost burst into tears at the test center as I did not expect the score coming. I felt good about my quant, but felt that I did a bad job in verbal. After my second break, I was in a bad mood but still tried to complete the IR and AWA. Though reluctant to face the result, I had no choice but to click the "NEXT" button to see my score. Surprisingly, it is 730.

For amazing test takers, 730 might not be excellent, but I am really happy with it, because it would help me enhance my application package this year. More importantly, I finally got what I had hoped for--a higher verbal score. V39 might not be particularly high, but it is my best verbal score ever. I made so many efforts for verbal, so last time when my verbal score fell to 35, I was not really okay with the result. To get a better verbal score was a major reason why I decided to retake the test.

I don't know whether I would take GMAT again--I've taken this test for six times, could you believe that? It is said that Asian test takers take GMAT for 2.28 times on average. Whether I am to retake it, I think I've at least found some closure with GMAT. I could not call GMAT an "honorable opponent," as I am never one. GMAT is more like a magnificent mountain and all I can do is to elevate myself to climb up.

I would like to give a shout-out to these experts:
avigutman AndrewN AjiteshArun IanStewart MartyTargetTestPrep KarishmaB GMATNinja zhanbo

Thank you for your responses and answers to my questions at this forum all the time. Your insights and demonstration of thinking and reasoning are of great help to me.

I would also like to thank Charles GMATNinja particularly. Last month when I just returned to GMAT world after my TOEFL journey, I almost forgot what to pay attention to in the SC section (after reading so many terrible sentences in the real world), but your new SC videos at Youtube are awesome and help me pick up all the things quickly. And I always appreciate the sense of humor of you and your team members--it is nice to have happy time while learning GMAT!

In case other test takers want to know how I prepare for this attempt to raise the score by 20 points, I would point out two things: enough sleep and timing strategy.

This time, I did not have to take the test in the morning so I had enough sleep. Meanwhile, timing had always been my weak spot, and this time I made a time table. The method from this youtube video works the best for me. The same strategy might not work for everyone, but if you, like me, tend to think too much and are indecisive, you may want to check this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWrUiBT83PQ

For quant, magically, I still remember all the concepts despite four months of break. Yet, I did calculations not fast enough. So I did six official mock tests to "get the feelings back," and tried to find efficient solutions for hard questions at this forum or in prep books. I concentrated on my weaker areas, and practicing quant everyday is a must.

For verbal, SC and RC are my weaker areas so I focused on them more. Magically, when I just returned to GMAT world, I felt that I had already got better reading skills although I had not practiced GMAT for four months. I guessed TOEEL helped me out there. Questions of TOEFL reading section are generally simpler than those of GMAT, but TOEFL articles are generally much longer. So, I guess that I boosted my reading ability while preparing for the TOEFL test--I became less fearful of long passages. For SC, I made an Excel sheet to collect the questions that I did incorrectly or that are good.

I still had timing issue in the verbal section today, but overall, the problem was less severe than last time. Some CR questions are long and complex, and some SC questions use many words I don't know and they don't have definite errors. I lagged behind my timetable about almost eight minutes in the middle way, but I pushed myself to speed up and narrowed the gap to about five minutes for the final ten questions. Timing...is indeed an interesting and important topic.

Finally, experts do you think I should retake the test later this month? I can still take GMAT for twice and I don't think I need to save the two opportunities for the future . I would like to hear your insights and opinions. Thank you.

Gratz on the 730.


If you are motivated to retake and have the flexibility to do so, the question may be: why not?

I'm stoked to hear this from you! I was kind of wondering how things have been going for you, and this increase is so fun.

Regarding whether you should take the test again, I'd like to see you score even higher, and I know you can. At the same time, you have to make the call regarding whether it's worthwhile to prepare more.

If you decide to take the test again, you may get some key tips for improving your verbal score from this video.

Congratulations, Grace! I'm thrilled to see that you did so well on the test, and a V39 is an outstanding score (as is a Q50 of course). If a higher score would be meaningful to you, and if you're thinking about retaking in the next couple of weeks, I'd take your diagnostic test scores into account. If you have good reason to think your Verbal level is higher than V39, then you'll likely get a better score if you retake, but if you were scoring in the high V30s on your recent diagnostics, then you'd probably need to spend a bit more time on Verbal to have a good chance at a higher score on test day. That said, with a 730, and especially with a Q50, a higher score isn't likely to make any difference, but I'm not an admissions expert, so if you need advice about whether a better score would be useful, you should talk to someone who knows about the expectations at the programs that interest you. Good luck!

edit: I only read your most recent post when I replied, then I saw your earlier post where you mention that you had several V41+ scores on diagnostics, so I think your chances of improving your V score are very good -- whether it's worth going to the effort is a different question though!

Congratulations GraceSCKao.

Your journey is very inspiring. Kudos to you! Your commitment to acing the test has paid off. The right mindset and commitment are the main ingredients for success.

Regarding a retake, I don’t see a reason why you should not go for a retake and aim for a 750. You already have the right core skills and improving from a 730 to a 750 could mean getting into a dream school and/or winning a scholarship.

Here are a couple of examples for some inspiration. Dipinty improved from a 730 to a 760 in 1 month. This enabled her to secure a $50k scholarship from Dartmouth Tuck. Ayush, on the other hand, was waitlisted with a 710. He improved to a 750 and secured admits and scholarships from Ross and Columbia.

If you are aiming for the top 5 B-schools then improving your score to a 750+ can be worth the effort as it increases your return on investment.

I believe you have already addressed your important areas of improvement. You only need to fine tune them further. You can aim for a V42, and that can get you to a 750!

I hope this helps.
-Sundeep

Thank you so much IanStewart
I appreciate all your posts and answers to my questions at this forum--I've learned a lot with you, and your explanations always help me clear my confusions about the questions.

You are absolutely right that I should take into account my mock test results to determine whether to have the next try. My verbal scores range from 41 to 46 in the six official mock tests I'd completed before taking GMAT last Friday. They are higher than 39 I got from the real test, but I am not sure whether they are indicative of a good chance that I will score at least 41 next attempt, since none of the six mock tests had a brand new set of verbal questions. Even for the practice exam 5 and 6, I think I'd met at least one SC or CR question in my study.

Thank you for your encouragement--I think I would try again if I get a time slot in the afternoon (I'm a big night owl because of my job), the more so because I want to see whether I've reached my verbal skill limit.

Could you give me some suggestion about how to improve verbal score in 15 days? I will do better in time management next time. I lost eight seconds in the verbal section last Friday and was kind of affected. It was not wise since they were just eight seconds, and I spent more than eight seconds agonizing over the fact. I will also stick to my timetable since I've realized that for some verbal questions, thinking for five minutes might be exactly the same as thinking for 1.5 minutes in terms of answer correctness.

Besides the time management issue, I feel that I actually need to do more to enhance my verbal skills. In the real test last Friday, some CR and SC questions are very long and use many words I don't know, and I felt that just reading and understanding the stem would take me 1.5 minutes. I had to pass some of them for the sake of time control.

Could I really boost my verbal skills solidly in 15 days? According to my ESR, SC is my weakest area--my SC performance ranking 71st, while CR is 88th and RC is 93rd. So...maybe I should concentrate on SC first? Thank you in advance for your insights.



Thank you MartyTargetTestPrep for your encouragement and response!
I always learn a lot with your posts and responses at this forum. As a side note, sometimes I found some SC questions and their answers unexpected and even bizarre, and then I felt much relieved when I found you say in your posts that these questions makers are "pushing the boundary" of acceptable ways of English writing.

I am a loyal fan of your Youtube video. As for the difficulty level curve that you mentioned in your last video, I would like to share with you that I actually had a "nike-shaped" curve in my verbal section, unlike the curve of V31 or V44 represented in your video. Could you please have a look at my ESR screenshot photo? The difficulty level dropped in the last section, and I guess it dropped because I kind of rushed in the last section given time issue. If my guess is right, I should work better on time management to have a higher score next time--do you agree?

Thank you so much for your help!

Congratulations GraceSCKao !! That's a fabulous, well balanced score. All your sincere effort has paid off!
If you would like to apply this year, I would suggest you to focus on the application aspect of admissions now. The essays will take a lot of time and energy too. A 20 point increase in GMAT will not make much difference but the same time and energy invested in your essays could take your app to a whole different level.
But if you have time and are in no rush to apply, no harm in taking another shot at the test if you feel there is still some mojo left in you.

Hi GraceSCKao - congrats on the 730. Its a brilliant score.

If you are aiming for scholarship -- I say, give it another shot for a 750, but only if you need scholarship.

Just some quick questions based on what you mentioned


You mention RC is your weak area. It is for me as well.

How did you IMPROVE on RC ? You mention TOEFL but did you do ALSO following as well perhaps ?

• Did you perhaps practice 1 RC passage a day (700 level RC passages perhaps only) ? Very complex passages perhaps or just 600 -700 level passages ?
• Did you practice doing them -- untimed or timed ?
• In the world of RC - did you practice more Detailed Oreinted questions or Inference type questions ?
• Based on my ESR - i am weaker in "Detail Oriented" questions
• Given I dont need to take the TOEFL - Any suggestions on RC improvment would be great.