I had finished up the OG13 and was looking for fresh questions. I had taken Magoosh GRE and found it pretty good so decided to go for Magoosh Premium (99 for both quanty and verbal). I think I'm happy with the content. I got a 750 on my GMAT and I can definitely attribute some of this sucess to the Magoosh software.
Magoosh QUANT- The quality of quant questions are pretty good. At one point I found myself addicted to
them. One area where I think Magoosh has an edge is the online platform to practice questions. The video lessons were excellent, especially the ones on Probability and Counting (permutation/combination). There are plenty of DS questions so people having trouble with DS questions should definitely benifit with this section. I finished all practice questions in Math.

Magoosh Verbal- Also good. The SC questions are especially of good quality and their video explanations are good too. I wont score their RC sections too high. I found a good number of their answers as arbitary, OG answers made sense and related to the paragraphs. But it could be because I lacked an understanding of the passages. I finished about 60% of the questions. I liked the fact that the SC questions specifically tackle some of the oftern tested concepts and idioms on GMAT.

Read More

The Manhattan course I took from Joe Lucero and Tom Rose was incredible! My score went from a 550 diagnostic to a 760 on test day. The strategies taught by Manhattan are simply the best. In particular, I benefitted from the timing strategy, the critical reasoning diagramming, and the number properties guides. Moreover, they give tremendous personal attention to their students. Joe Lucero helped me create a study plan for my last two weeks that I think alone boosted my score 100 points. Definitely money well spent and I would whole heartedly recommend this course to anyone considering taking the GMAT! Thank you Joe and Tom!

Read More

After getting a 660 (Q50, V29) in Nov 2011 (It was all self-preparation, solving only the OG and taking the practice tests from MGMAT. I also bought the MGMAT SC book), I decided to make it 700+ and apply for Fall 2014 (Due to pressure in my job and some other issues, I had to skip my plan to apply for Fall 2012 and Fall 2013)
In Oct 2012, when I resumed my GMAT preparation, I started searching for a comprehensive course for Verbal, which could boost my score. I came across e-GMAT, and after going through the trial videos, I got impressed and decided to enroll for Verbal Online.
I started the course, and then realized that I should have enrolled a long time back. It gave me a very solid framework, based on which I can look for patterns in the GMAT verbal questions. All its rules and the method of teaching impressed me a lot. Especially the RC pack helped me the maximum.
Then I thought to upgrade my account to Verbal Live-Prep. To me the SC and RC sessions helped a lot. All credit goes to Shraddha! She is an excellent teacher. Somehow the CR sessions were not that impressive to me. I know Shraddha could have done a better job if she could have taken those as well.

Pros :
1. Great course for non-natives. It makes all the concepts needed for GMAT crystal clear. Worth Buying.
2. The audio- visuals are more effective than buying books such as MGMAT SC


Cons :

1. Offline support of the team is very weak. If you send an email to them for help, there is no guarantee that someone will respond. After you change the subject of emails, I used to get reply that my email had reached their junk folder, and hence I had to send reminders for reply
2. All the faculties (except Shraddha and Payal) are not that friendly,predictable and to some extent, may be professional. I remember that initially one of the faculties was very friendly and was really helping me a lot related to my doubts. But one fine day he JUST STOPPED responding to my emails (Please note that in those emails I was just asking for help. No fight. No abuse.) I sent repeated reminders but it seemed as if he simply started ignoring my emails. Am still to figure out what exactly went wrong. After all, I paid for the service. Also, this behavior looked a bit unprofessional and unpredictable to me.
3. I ended up getting a 690 (Q49, V34). I still believe that as per my preparation with e-GMAT, I could have easily cracked 720+. What I think pulled my scores down was my test taking strategies. e-GMAT still don’t have its own practice tests. May be they should add that. Grockit might not be that helpful to people.


But in conclusion, despite whatever experience I had, I would still recommend the non-natives to buy at least the Verbal Online course. It simply is too good to make up your foundation for GMAT verbal.

Read More

Prior to signing up for Magoosh, I had taken the GMAT twice before and done respectably, 710 and 690. However, with a quantitative background and seeking admission to top 10 programs, I recognized that my quant sub-score needed help (only a 44 both times) to achieve the "80%" threshold. This is where Magoosh came in. I was struggling to understand the shortcuts and precise methodologies required for these quirky GMAT problems and the breadth of video solutions was something I didnt find in any other programs and is what truly put me over the edge. While I didn't improve my overall score too drastically, I did improve my quant sub-score to a 49 and the critical 81%. Thanks for the help, Magoosh!

Read More

Magoosh offers a great product at an affordable price. I knew virtually nothing about the GMAT or the GMAT material, and Magoosh's helpful videos showed me everything. Here is what I really liked about Magoosh:

Visual Dashboard:
This dashboard helped me really keep track of my progress, and allowed me to see all tools at once. Even though the dashboard is a small part of the Magoosh product, to me it was vitally important.

Video Tutorials:
Because I have not been in school for awhile, I really struggled with a lot of the GMAT material. However, Magoosh has extremely helpful videos that walk you through the test, testing strategies, sections, concepts, and practice questions. The tutorials were very short (allowing me to focus on what I needed and also feel like I was "progressing" quickly by watching six 5-minute videos, as opposed to one 30-minute video), and also very comfortable to listen to.

Question Bank:
Magoosh has A LOT of questions (over a 1,000) and they all have a written explanation and video explanation. This was critical in my learning HOW to solve questions. They also offer many different ways to practice, even simulating the "adaptive" nature of the GMAT (as you get questions correct, harder questions get asked).

Customer Service:
This was what made this company. I got great customer service, before and after my test. They offer a lot of great deals, and even send a friendly email right before the exam to encourage/help you.

Overall, I truly believe I couldn't achieve my 710 without Magoosh!

Read More

I Started the preparations in mid May 2013 and completed OG in 2 weeks. I was mighty impressed with CR as the questions were not only good but also interesting, with every question giving a beautiful insight on its own. Quant was easy and verbal was selectively good (around 80% of the time). I bought an e-GMAT verbal live prep course in the last week of May.

While I was scanning for more information about GMAT on GMATClub forums in the months of April, I came across e-GMAT. I subscribed to one of their posts and this led me to accept the invitation for one of their free sessions. Since I couldn’t join the session I was pleasantly surprised to get a recording of their session the very next day. I went through the recording at my own ease and thought of joining e-GMAT. The reason why I ultimately chose e-GMAT over other courses was their relatively lower price and their innovative promotion as being the best course for non-natives.

The content is good and neatly organized. They are truly the messiahs for SC. The sessions with Shradha and Payal are just too good. And the best part - shoot a doubt and you get responded in less than 24 hours. The ‘Meaning’ approach in SC is as good as it can get. The approach helps you save a lot of precious time and energy.

The CR and RC sections are equally good but just that they are more helpful to improve accuracy than time. However, the exam demands saving precious time and that is something that the candidate needs to improve on his/her own. Practice can be a better tool here.

The ready summary with pdf for each chapter is a great tool to revise quickly. I used to read those pdfs when I was at work and thus kept in touch with the SC concepts which I was likely to forget otherwise. I took my GMAT and scored a sweet 720 (Q51V36).

An added advantage with e-GMAT course is that you get 800score and Grockit access free of cost. 800score tests are easy but they expect higher accuracy of you. The quant is of the same level as GMAT but Verbal is easy. The Grockit tests are nearest to the real GMAT. Initially, I hated them but by the end of my preperation I had changed my opinion of them. The Quant is a notch higher than the real thing and the verbal is a notch lower but still they are as close as you can get. Though their scoring is wrong and even a few of their questions are marked wrongly - which can be frustrating at times, they are a good practice because they give you the same feel of urgency that the GMAT delivers. Their user interface is very poor and they should change it immediately. The way the test answers are displayed without any time analysis doesn’t help a candidate’s cause.

Overall, I have recommended e-GMAT to a lot of my friends who are preparing for GMAT. The stepping stone is the free strategy session, after that its e-GMAT all the way.

Read More

I will take my GMAT next month. Still I would like to put write about the e-GMAT course.
SC:
Based on posts in the various forums, I started preparing for SC with Manhattan SC book. While this book provided a good understanding of various error types tested in SC qs, it’s very dense. Moreover, my accuracy was not improving beyond 70% and even was decreasing below in time pressure. After strategy session “Master GMAT SC”, I enrolled in the verbal online course.
My take on this course
1. As per my opinion, the 3-step process of solving SC is the best process I have ever come across. Using this process, my accuracy has improved up to 90% in OG 12 qs. Honestly speaking, this process increased my confidence so much that I am actually addicted to the process
2. Emphasizing on meaning rather than too much theoretical grammar jargon is a real deal breaker. Example – e-GMAT uses simple terms like verb-ing modifier, verb-ed modifier in stead or gerund, participle.
3. Each concept is taught in a very logical way. Because of this, one can approach SC question in a same way as one does quant problem.
4. Audio-visual combination in e-learning really makes the learning enjoyable.

While each SC question OG VR2 was solved using a 3-step process, it also requests that you do the same for OG13. ( I am so addicted to this 3-step process!)
CR:
1. Argument structure and ‘pre-thinking’ assumption are a real deal breaker for any types of CR questions.
2. The course emphasizes the pre-thinking for most type of CR question.
RC:
1. Key reading strategy really helped me read the passage actively, improving my accuracy for RC questions
In summary, the best part of this course is that it makes the verbal preparation very logical rather than improving literary skill of English, making the verbal preparation very enjoyable and interesting. After one month of preparation, when my confidence was at rock bottom, it boosted my confidence. Now I think that like many other successful students, I can nail the verbal too. I am sure that my result on the real GMAT test will show soon.
If anyone is struggling with verbal, I would strongly recommend this course.

Read More

I think Manhattan does a really nice job. The course material is essentially exhaustive, I don't think there was anything I would have expected to cover that we didn't at least touch on in live class and wasn't fully covered in the curriculum. The course can slow down a bit at times (partially as a result of adverse selection from the type of people who takes GMAT classes) but the teachers in general did a great job coaching everything through the topics.

One thing in particular I liked was the results-oriented approach. I personally tend to prefer the algebraic approach to problems, but they consistently pushed us to recognize when back-end tactics would be faster. I never fully mastered that skill set but it definitely helped with my timing.

Read More

I signed up for e-GMAT SC online course after trying MGMAT SC and GMATPill. After spending US$350 on GMATPill 6 pill combo and getting frustrated with Zeke's approach to SC questions, I thought, "Why not try e-GMAT?" This was the best decision I made during my prep.

When I started e-GMAT SC, my SC accuracy was roughly around 50%. After finishing the module in 2 weeks, my accuracy rose to around 70%. This was enough to get my verbal from 33 on GMATPrep mocks to 36 on the real GMAT!

I'll not give 5 stars just due to the UGE (user generated exercise). Come on, reading several sentences about the cricket stuff (bats, etc) might be interesting for some cultures, but not for every non-native.

Read More

Overall I'm satisfied, but I think trusting in Magoosh as your only source for prep is going to take you as far as the mid 600s.

The quant part was good, so was SC. Mike McGarry videos were awesome.

The videos are dynamic and engaging, but there could be some notes to make easier to review concepts later.
They really need to work on CR and RC videos and questions.

There is a new feature, the score predictor that works fine - although it needs some work to perfect it.
The question bank is good, though small. If you're serious, you'll finish all the questions fast.

Read More