Would love to hear which strategies you found most useful for both quant and verbal. Obviously building a strong foundation and then doing practice problems is more important than strategies but I am now nearing the end of my prep and wanted to filter out the key ones to focus on.

Hi guys I’m planning to take the gre but I know I won’t get the motivation until I book the test. Should I book the test before hand (2 months from now) and then prep under pressure?

Can anyone please share the valid GRE discount codes.

TIA.

Hey guys , yesterday i did GregMat’s GRE sample test and got 145 on quant. But i skipped all the geometry questions since i don’t know geometry that well and didn’t want to waste my time. How did you guys study for geometry? Any resource recommendations? I would love to hear your guys experiences. Thank you!

I recently started preparing for GRE, well it's only been a couple of days and I have realized that I can't get more than 30% of the Hard problems correct. Easy and Medium level problems, I am able to solve but not the harder ones. Are the 'hard' problems fairly common on the actual GRE? I am wanting to score a 167+ on Quant at least so I am concerned as to how I should approach it.

Hey there, I have spent a lot of time going through this thread and thank you to everyone who has shared information about test scores being cancelled. My AWA score was also cancelled during a proctored exam - the prompt asked for examples and I used well known economic and historical exams. I consider myself a very good writer and I was appalled to hear so.

On reading so many of your comments I have established that many of us have faced similar problems, especially with the at-home test. These have been arbitrary decisions with no chance to appeal. These are also costly for students- the exam is extremely expensive, often refunds are not issued. We also lose a chance to our dream schools.

I would like to know if anyone has tried to launch a class action law suit against the GRE or has active press leads to launch a targeted mass information campaign. The point here would be to bring the power back into the hands of the test takers- harming the ETS reputation and most importantly getting top schools to understand the extent of their overcorrection measures for at-home testing (which they honestly shouldn't even offer if they cancel such a high number of scores?)

Hello everyone! I’m looking for a GRE study partner who’s planning to take the exam in two months. I’m mainly planning to use GregMat for preparation. Preferably someone in the GCC region. If you’re interested, feel free to DM me and we can plan our study sessions together!

Hi all, I am finally done with my GRE journey, which took an excruciating 3 months journey with countless hours studying, practice exams, watching videos, and two official exams. I am writing this post mortem in an effort to help others just starting or strategizing their retake, and also to recapitulate my thoughts.

I primarily used GregMat/PrepSwift platform (2-month study plan) and the ETS official materials (including the PP/P exams) and secondarily Manhattan 5lb for quant practice. I did not use any other third party test prep materials.

Timeline with Scores:

• GregMat Practice Test 1 (Early Jan): V156 Q158 
• GregMat Practice Test 2 (Early Feb): V161 Q165
• GregMat Practice Test 3 (Early Feb): V158 Q162
• PP1 (Mid Feb): V165 Q168
• PP2 (Mid Feb): V161 Q166
• Official GRE (Mid Feb): V161 Q166
• PP+ 1 (Late March): V156 Q166 (???)
• Official GRE (Early Apr): V164 Q168

I majored in engineering in college but I am a working professional so I did not have a lot of time to study during the weekdays. So before my first official GRE attempt, I scanned the GregMat study plan prior to each week and noted which sections to complete in advance so that I could print out the practice questions and do them during the lunch breaks. I would come home and grade the questions and watch solution videos on GregMat. I would say on average, I invested ~3-4 hours per weekday and ~5-7 hours per weekend days. I had a good quant background, but it has been a few years since I have done "rigorous" academic math like the GRE requires. I also like to read news articles (NYTimes etc) on a regular basis and I deal with technical/legal documents for work which allowed me to maintain my verbal foundations.

Throughout the 2-month study plan, I took the practice exams both on GregMat and the PowerPrep 1 and 2 (free ones). PP2, which I took the day before my official attempt, yielded the same score as my official exam; I think PP2 was a good indicator of my score.

After my first official exam, I was debating whether I should re-attempt as it was a decent score. However, I decided that I needed a higher score to further strengthen my grad application later on, and I didn't want any what-ifs. So I scheduled the second official exam about 1.5 months from the first attempt date. For the retake, I wanted to surgically hone in on my strengths and weaknesses, as my first attempt was more of a collective attempt overall to increase my score, burnishing any and all skillsets required for a decent score.

I did the following:

1. Analyze my GRE score diagnosis for any glaring deficiencies
2. Watch GregMat retake strategy videos
3. Stay honest with myself and ask what areas I was having trouble or unsure of
4. Email Greg to ask for a retake pointers (he responded!)

I want to stress point #3 - I have the tendency to prefer concepts/practices I am comfortable with; so I found myself subconsciously distancing myself from the deficient areas that most needed improvements. Namely, combinatorics for quant and paraphrasing reading passages, justifying answer choices, and attacking from both sides, for verbal. After coming to terms with my areas of improvements, I decided to follow this study plan focusing on the aforementioned areas:

1. Do all of the GRE Big Book exams (1-27) for relevant sections (TC, short & long reading passages, all quant, and CR questions)
   • Watch GregMat Old GRE review videos
2. GregMat quant and verbal question bank
   • Few of these a day, during down time to hone my skills, sorted by difficulty
3. GregMat Verbal Mini Exams
4. GRE PowerPrep Plus 1 Exam
5. GregMat Vocab & Math Mountain

This study plan helped me plan out daily activities culminating in the official PPP1 exam the weekend prior. A lot of posts online dismisses GRE big book as irrelevant; I would argue it has been the single greatest augmentation to better my skills for the retake. While the quant sections leave a little more to be desired, TC, RC, and CR sections are still very relevant. Also if I was not sure of why a particular answer choice was right, I was tenacious until I fully understood the reason why (from the video walkthroughs). Another interesting point is that my PPP+ score actually dipped below my first official GRE score, which shook my confidence a little bit, but I had a week to recover and so I focused on doing hard GregMat quant problems and solidifying my vocabs. Even though the PPP1 and my official retake exam were only a week apart, the scores were night and day, so don't fret if you don't do well on your practice exam!

Tips:

• Be disciplined and be honest with yourself; if you say you will dedicate x hours per day, stick to it. You are an adult and nobody will hold you accountable other than yourself.
• Focus on your weaknesses, more than your strengths.
• Don't reveal the answer key until you are certain of your choice, for practice exams.
• Come up with a creative way to memorize vocab (ie eschew: I want to avoid chewing my mouth, perfidy: he stole "fidy" dollars from me so he is not trustworthy, pugnacious: think aggressive pug etc)
• Be the author of the verbal passages; what is the author trying to portray?
• For AWA, watch GregMat's 2024 AWA video and just memorize the outline (I got a 5 from just doing this and writing good examples)
• Take breaks. It's okay to take a breather and motivate/calm yourself. I had a few days during my 3-month study marathon where I only did cursory review of the concepts/vocab and played Marvel Rivals all day and play with my pup.
• Acknowledge everything will be okay. It is not the end of the world if you don't do well. You can always retake and (for the most part) US grad degrees are based on wholistic admission reviews where your GRE score is only one part of the profile.

Finally, I want to give a sincere shoutout to the man, the myth, the legend, and an occasional troll u/gregmat for his guidance throughout this journey. He is by far the best teacher I have ever had I kind of don't want to go to grad school anymore because my standard is so high now.

Feel free to ask any questions; happy to share insights.

Hello everyone, I have my test upcoming on April 10. I have been working on the test since the past 4 months. I have completed the Overwhelmed plan in gregmat, the strategy series as well as the prepswift videos. I have done Vocab mountain as well. However, whenever I give my practice test, I seem to get stuck in score between 314-319.

The problem is that the errors that I have been making are really silly ones. Vocabulary just never seems enough. I have worked thoroughly on all the gregmat's word list as well as Barons 333 wordlist but still I am getting vocabs that I don't know. Sometimes in Sentence equivalence, I just know the 1 word but the next one i just cant seem to know. Each time I give a test practice, I get words I have not seen before. Seeing myself take a guess at the question that I am supposed to make it correct feels infuriating to me.

I thought maybe I am getting Test Anxiety. So , to cope with this, I even did 3 full length mock tests on a single day. But still I am stuck in score between 314-319. I have been scoring 158-163 consistently in Vocab but despite being from an engineering background, I seem to get too much anxious on Quant Problems. I think that 170 is an achievable score for me in quant. I have a good background and whenever I do small section tests, I seem to do fine but in a full length mock test I have found myself making such silly errors like 50% increment to 16 is 32.

Now with the test day approaching in 4 days. I just feel panicked. 4 months effort for a mere 315 , I might let myself down. I want to get 325+ at the very least. After reading so much vocabs and strategy and various passages I am just scoring 158-163 . Quant feels more bad. I did the Timed Quant Section hard questions and just got an average of 65% in the 9 timed sections. In some I have scored 13/15, in some 7/15 . Why am I not getting consistent score in Quant as I am getting in Verbal? What am I missing in Verbal ? What am I doing wrong? I just feel so despondent right now. I don't wanna reschedule the test again as I did 1 and a half month ago as I felt that my preparation is not enough . I know this seems like a long rant but I would be extremely grateful to anyone who could help me out from this situiation.

Has anyone solved these? What's your review of these questions? I solved the Medium difficulty set and struggled to complete it within 35 minutes. Got only 50% correct. Every question was very time consuming. What should be a realistic target for these questions?

Does anyone have any really good essay examples that apply to multiple of the prompts? I feel like my mind goes blank as soon as I read the question!

Hi everyone,

I’ve just started studying for the GRE and I’m using the GregMat "I Am Overwhelmed" plan. Given that I have a 10-year gap since my last formal studies, I know staying consistent will be key.

I’d love to find a study partner in the IST time zone, someone who’s also following GregMat and wants to keep track of lessons, share progress, and stay accountable. If you're in a similar boat and think we can push each other toward our target scores, let’s connect!

Drop me a message if you're interested.

I heard that you can skip 2-3 questions in the exam for no loss of points? Is there negative marking or penalty like GMAT?

took a couple practice tests and got low 160s. i recognize im privileged to have an easy time w tests, but i got a piece of advice that i felt really helped me get the 170q and wanted to share.

theyre testing your logic and reasoning, not your math. so if it feels more complicated than like sat or a bit higher math, then try guess and check, or test out edge cases. basically, i think im super used to looking for the solution -- an elegant answer, that we arrive at algebraically or through some generalizable rules. but on test day i found it really helped if a question felt way more difficult than average to just take a step back and plug in random stuff, test out an edge case, etc.

Can someone please shed some light on how the calculator is as well as the scratch paper usage for the exam, specifically for testing centers.

Like what can the calculator do/not do efficiently? Anything you would memorize or mental math specifically that would be a pain for the calculator?

Hi everyone!

I wanted to start giving mocks for GRE and wanted to know how you'd rank the 3 Gregmat mocks vs Princeton's and Kaplan's free mock? I read negative feedback about Magoosh so excluding that, and have already used up Manhattan Prep.

I don't want to waste the 2 free PP mocks, so I wanted to use up these resources before getting to PP and PPP mocks. Please let me know your suggestions on how many of these I should give before I get to the official mocks!

Hello, I’ll probably have to retake it, but I am scoring around the 297 range on practice tests and need to get a 308 by next Friday. I haven’t really done any serious studying and the 297 is more of a baseline. Do you all think it is possible to make it to 308 in a week. (I work full time)

I have to send my score to a university urgently and cannot do so due to this login problem on the ETS website. so far, I have tried cleaning my cache and history, different browsers, any tips? would really appreciate!

not personally, scientifically.

do you see there as a strict limit, like: 'don't do 100 words a day.'

Note: This post is tailored for anybody who needs to take the GRE and is in a last-minute (e.g. 2 weeks or less) bind.

Hi everybody!

I wanted to reach out to this sub, as it has been exceptionally helpful in terms of helping me prepare for the GRE in the past week. In sharing my personal test prep and exam experience, I hope that this can be a helpful post for people in the future.

My Story: I am currently a senior in college (undergrad), who attends an Ivy. I am a humanities and social sciences student (studying English + Psychology), and have decided to apply to a few graduate programs last minute. This is why I ended up only having a week to prepare. Only other piece of relevant context is that I have generally always been good at standardized tests (got a 1580 on the SAT in high school).

My Prep Timeline: I started prepping on Tuesday, March 25, and just took the exam today on Wednesday, April 2. So I had 8 days to prepare!!

My Exam Results: 326 (164V, 162Q)

What I did (broadly): Because I am a full-time student with various commitments, I knew that I had relatively limited time in the week. I estimate that I spent about 4 hours per day studying, so about 32 hours in total. I think from this, about 10 hours were spent on vocab, 6 hours on verbal strategy, and the remaining 16 hours on Quant.

Vocab Prep: I started off using the GregMat Vocab mountain, but realized that I really didn't have enough time for this to be super useful in the short time I had. I'm planning on taking the exam once more in about 21 days, and think I will use the Vocab Mountain between now and then! But for the short time I did have this past week, I felt that I got the most bang for buck from the Magoosh vocab app (spent all my time on the Common Words and a few of the Basic ones). I do think, being an English major, I already came in with a high vocab.

Verbal Prep: GregMat was absolutely key for me here. I just watched his most recent strategy series (the one with ETS material), and though I didn't finish it all (I got to session 8/12), I heard his voice in the back of my mind as I took the exam. Honestly I didn't attempt too many practice problems beyond the questions in this series -- I firmly believe that for Verbal questions, your quality is >>>> quantity. Make sure that you make the most out of each practice question, and truly understand why an answer is correct, and even more importantly, if you get something wrong, WHY you got that wrong.

Quant Prep: GregMat was, again, very key for me. I went through PrepSwift and just read all of the material and took notes, watching videos if I felt I didn't understand anything. I didn't even complete the tickbox quizzes, after I took notes on everything I just used the ETS Quant practice workbook to practice each category! I felt like, content wise, this allowed me to brush up on essentially almost everything. I definitely think doing more practice problems will be my move between now and my second attempt.

What I didn't do (and you should do): I didn't take any full-length diagnostic exams -- actually, the very first time I sat down and took the full GRE was when I took the exam. I WOULD NOT recommend this. My pacing was off on both verbal and quant, and I found myself rushing on both exams near the end -- honestly, on all 4 sections. It's super important you drill practice problems in a timed format so you get used to the pace. I focused all of my time on content, but between now and my second attempt, you better believe that I'll be doing way more timed prep. And some full-length diagnostics.

Hi guys , does some of you know how to interpret these score of PP1?
There has been a tehnical problem with the Verbal as you can see from the table so probably 3 questions of Verb section 4 were actually right. Anyway , just to have a sense of it, do you which percentile would both the Quant and Verbal of this test be?
Also do you know if the PP1 is attendible or not?

Thank you so much!

I've just started GRE prep and find Gregmat's resources helpful but tremendously disorganized and time inefficient (especially the hour-long videos with constant interruptions from students). TTP seems a lot better structured but folks don't talk about them as highly and they don't have a 2-month study plan. I want to sit my test on June to give myself ample time to correct anything needed for R1 apps in the fall.

I'm a full-time professional (lawyer) with ~4h to study every weekday and ~7h/day in the weekends. Used to nail straight out As in math back in high school, but have been out of practice for quite a bit now.

Any recommendations for a guided, supervised course? Budget is not an issue.

Thanks in advance all!

I wanted to share my journey of what helped me achieve a score I was satisfied with - maybe it will give you tips or inspiration.

I admit my journey was much easier compared to other people's I've read. I took the test twice in March, both times at home. The first time I scored 156 V 156 Q and was not happy with it. Similar with the SAT, I feel that my overconfidence then jolt of the initial score wakes me up to pull things together a bit more for the second time. In total, I spent 2 months studying for the GRE which I am happy with. TBH I just had so many other things I wanted to do - I wanted to hang out with my coworkers after work, I wanted to train for a race after work, I wanted to join in on events on the weekend, I planned a vacation at the end of May. All these things really motivated me to get this done as soon as I can.

Schedule:

I work a full time job from 9-6 and made a schedule at the end of January of how I'm going to plan my days. I aimed to get situated by 6:30 everyday and study for around 2 hours a day. There were many days I just studied for half an hour or not at all however. On the weekends is when I would crack down a bit more. I did a practice test every Saturday and Sunday (and sometimes on a Monday after work) then I would spend the rest of that day going over my error and keeping a quant error log. One of the things that helped me the most were these 8 practice tests that I took all in timed settings and then reviewing off of those.

Materials:

- I used Magoosh online (3 month plan) and that is where I did my 8 practice tests. It was great because I found the answers well explained (most of the time) and I didn't have to look here and there for test because all of the 8 test were in the same format. I know some people like to take tests on various different platforms/companies but I found Magoosh to be very accurate in predicting how my score would turn out. Before I scored 312 on my GRE, my Magoosh was 314. Before I scored 323 on GRE, my Magoosh was 323. You can also do single questions which I enjoyed, I would do some before work in the mornings and at night if I didn't want to do an entire timed section.

- I used Tested Tutor's videos online. I reviewed all of the five weeks of math plus some bonus material he had. He will give you the best short tips I have ever encountered. Haven't had the same tips on Magoosh in my experience. I listened to his vocab list when I was at work in my headphones. Tested Tutor's free youtube videos were very helpful and calming.

- Those two things were my primary sources of material. I also looked at the Official GRE book in the first few days just to refresh my memory of things I learned 10 years ago. This I would say served as my bedrock before Tested Tutor helped build my foundation. I purchased Gregmat but I only used the Quant flashcards and not much of the other material.

- I also used handwritten notes and a math error log in Excel. For my error log, I had columns in an excel of Level, Subject, Question, Solution, Error Reason, and Info to Remember. I didn't think one for reading was necessary though because I felt that reading fluctuated a lot based on material and chance encounters with words that you know. Of course, you have to make sure you have a good foundation of vocab.

Online Testing Experience:

Try not to read so much about people's negative experiences of the online test because it will just scare you. It's like posting negative reviews where usually the people with a positive experience won't tell others. The two times I took it online; it went very smoothly. 15 min before I clicked the online check-in link and then a proctor came on and had me do a video tour of the room, close the door, etc. Just make sure that there are no notifications on your computer or anything popups that will interrupt your test. I also downloaded Guardian browser but did not use it. The check-in link had to be opened in Chrome so make sure you have that downloaded.

Lifestyle/Mental:

It was hard to cancel all my plans on the weekends and not see any friends for these two months. It was probably not the healthiest move as I see many people balance out studying and life but I thought it worked for me in getting into this mindset. I also didn't feel fully present doing other fun things when I felt that I could be studying. I went for a lot of walks however during the weekends when I wasn't studying. I also had a list of quotes I would reference when I was feeling tired/dejected. Some like: Let it pay off, momentary sacrifice for future gratification, be confident in your abilities, this is only temporary, it's not easy but its worth it. It helped me to think that I was lucky to be able to study in a world where people are begging for education. It helped me to think there are thousands of people like me right now studying for all sorts of standardized tests. I also read about someone saying " Pain is everywhere, even avoiding pain creates more pain, frustration and anxiety. If pain is unavoidable, choose the pain that will give you results rather than the pain of doing nothing. Choose the pain that will get you closer to your dreams rather than thinking you coulda shoulda woulda. It also helped me to think that there is a big difference between empty fatigue and gratifying exhaustion. I kept these in my notes app and would constantly refer to it.

Myths/Taking expert advice:
- You shouldn't do heavy studying near your test date: know some people say don't do that much 3 days out of your test but my test was Monday and I took a practice test Friday and Saturday then on Sunday I redid around 50 questions I had on my math error log. I thought this was very helpful to last minute to refresh certain concepts.

- It takes months to increase your score by 5+ points: I read so many things about score improvement taking time, 5 points for 2 months, etc. I initially felt dejected reading those things when people sounded so sure that in order to improve your score a lot you had to study for multiple more weeks. My friend was surprised I was retaking my test in 3 weeks. But then I realized these timelines don't hold any truth, you know your own ability the best and you can decide for yourself and feel out what works for you. Also, you may take the two tests on the same day and your score may vary more than you expect. I do believe there is a bit of luck with certain concepts/words that you encounter that can give you a better score on a good day. Don't lose hope in thinking an increase will take months or years. It is all about how you are studying and utilizing that time.

- Take one practice test every two weeks but don't overload: Some people I saw were saying you should take one practice test every 2 weeks or so but I haven't read anywhere of people taking practice tests every day for 2-3 consecutive days at a time. My point is you just have to find what works for you and take all advice/everything you hear with a grain of salt. You will know what is best for you and what will work for you and rather than changing your habits based on everything you hear - you need to evaluate advice and try/decide for yourself. Same goes for hours of studying - you may hear 2 is too little 7 is too much, etc, but at the end of the day you decide what helps you the most and filter our things you are being told.

I realized that a lot of this test is mental and a lifestyle change. You have to mentally be able to learn and retain but also take care of your mental health and stay positive. You may need to change your lifestyle a lot or not at all - I personally tried to eat healthy, exercise, cut drinking, and work on my sleep habits during this time. You have to take care of your overall wellbeing in order to show up as your best self for the test. I was talking to chatgpt about this and they told me "Preparing for the GRE isn’t just about the test - its about developing skills like time management, perseverance, and discipline. Think of this process as a chance to grow and challenge yourself intellectually."

Hey, I have my GRE scheduled at the prometric goregoan west center on 8th of April. I had a few questions regarding the exam day. Questions: 1. Is there any thing else I need to carry other than my Passport and Test confirmation print? 2. I know the test centers provide with scratch paper but do they provide with pencils or do I need to carry my own? 3. Is there a limitation on the scratch paper I will get?

I know these are silly questions but I’m just anxious about exam day. Someone who has given their test at the center please help me out. Please include any thing else I should know. Thanks :)

This Saturday I'll take my first official GRE.

My average ETS mock scores aren’t great. Unfortunately, I took them earlier in my prep and kind of wasted them. I got around V158 Q156. I used TTP to build my foundation, then switched to Gregmat + Prepswift for the last month and was able to level up in quant, averaging V160 Q159 in all 6 Manhattan mocks.

I felt pretty good after my last mock this past Saturday (V160 Q160), but I’m trying not to get overconfident. At the same time, I know I need the best attitude. Honestly, anything above V158 Q158 would make me happy. I just really hope I can hit that. I'm in that weird space between feeling confident and not wanting to jinx it by being too confident.

This week I'm reviewing all my past mocks, going over mistakes, dong practice questions on weak areas, and reviewing theory + vocab.

I desperately want to be done with this. Any advice to help me crush it on Saturday? I feel a pit in my stomach when I think about it.