Tips for GMAT

Hey there,

 I scored 770 on the gmat (top 1%), so can give some advice:

For quantitative section, I recommend this book to both learn the concepts and practice some "hard style" problems before moving onto official GMAT questions: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Total-GMAT-Math-Jeff-Sackmann/dp/1453772316

For Sentence correction, I recommend the Manhattan Prep book, very good to learn the actual principles of grammar/sentence structure etc. I never used the other two verbal books (reading comp. and critical reasoning) but I heard they are also excellent.

To improve your essay (AWA), this online service where it gets graded with detailed feedback is great: https://www.awaprofessor.com/. Howe

Overall though, my biggest piece of advice is really just do as much real GMAT questions as possible – get the official guide + the verbal/quant add ons, and also download the real GMAT simulator. First 2 ones are free, then you can buy additional tests to do. Find that a lot of 3rd party sources online are not representative of real GMAT questions – especially for verbal reasoning, where I wouldn't trust most of the 3rd party material.

Finally, Gmat club is an amazing forum to get study tips, learn new approaches (e.g. how to approach the essay) and to also see explanations for questions you don’t understand.

Good luck!

Hi, I strongly recommend the official test simulation to practice the exercises with the officila time pressure. Here the link https://www.mba.com/exam-prep

Best

Antonello

Three things:

• (Desktop) magoosh.com: one of my favorite sites. The subscription, while not as extensive as The Economist's, provides ample material for your money. Learning and practicing (the two being intertwined but actually different) is all Magoosh is about.
• (Mobile) Ready4GMAT: really good app for on-the-go prep. It gives you problems closest to the real deal far as I've experienced. It also keeps track of your schools of choice and how far off the average you are. It has good a harsh score estimation algorithm, too.
• (Mobile) Elevate: really good app for cognitive training. It helps you with reading, listening, math, reasoning, even speaking (has lessons on how to enunciate clearly).

Other than that, just hothouse yourself for a few weeks till you pick up momentum, then step back and incorporate it gently into your convenient routine.

Best of luck!

Some great feedback here already. Just make sure to realize the GMAT is only a small part of your application - at some point, the score is good enough and your time & energy would be better spent improving your essays for example.

One of my analysts has been preparing the test for months already, and hasn't started his essays in spite of me pestering him to refocus. I think that's a definite mistake, and am afraid he'll pay for that later.

Hello!

To add on top of what has been said, the best is to practice, practice, practice!

In concrete, with tests, so you can also time yourself, get used to the format, etc. 

There are free exams in the internet that you can use for practice (the one of LBS MBA page, Verits prep, as well as some free trials for courses such as the one of The Economist (https://gmat.economist.com/)

The key to success here is not only get practice, but learn techniques.

Hope it helps!

Cheers,

Clara

Dear A!

During your preparation for GMAT I would recommend the following approach: 

1) Keeping your math trained with GMAT exercises is always a good idea. The free resources can be found online, for example:

• http://www.mba.com/global/the-gmat-exam/prepare-for-the-gmat-exam/test-prep-materials/free-gmat-prep-software.aspx
• https://www.mba.com/exams/gmat
• https://www.mba.com/-/media/files/mba2/assessments/2018/gmat/gmat-handbook-2020-07-10.pdf?la=en&hash=9DCAD3E9A43EEE7B520C84327FBEC6F399A72D82

2) Also, tests that usually are for investment banks (with graphs analysis) are useful. Free resources can be also found online:

• https://www.tptests.com/Candidate/practice/Instructions

If you have any further questions, just drop me a line!

Best,
André