GRE Quantitative Tips and Strategies

Many people have asked me about GRE Quantitative Tips and Strategies by saying: ‘How to do well on GRE Quantitative section?’ To address this question, I will tell you strategies that help you in GRE quantitative section.

How to get perfect score in GRE Quantitative Reasoning Section?

Do you know all concepts of quantitative section of GRE and did enough practice to answer correctly within time? Perhaps your answer is in yes; yet you need to know some strategies to do well in your exam. There are strategies that are highly recommended in GRE quantitative section. These GRE quantitative tips & strategies help us to improve accuracy while selecting the correct answer. Additionally, the timing (even in seconds) plays significant role to attempt GRE quantitative section, if managed effectively. After completion of GRE 30-days Preparation Plan, almost every student can answer all questions correctly if no time limit is given. In this article, you’ll learn all those strategies to get perfect score in GRE quantitative section and will learn how to save maximum time from each quantitative question type. An answer selected based on guess hardly help to get perfect score in GRE quantitative section. So knowledge is a must in order to get desired score in GRE quantitative section. But the question is: ‘how to use that comprehensive knowledge smartly?’ Let’s discuss this in detail here.

How to tackle different question types?

In GRE revised General Test, there are four different types of questions:

      – Problem Solving
      – Quantitative Comparison
      – Numeric Entry
      – Data Interpretation

Each question type requires different strategy to answer speedily and accurately. Let’s discuss these question types one by one.

Problem Solving:

This question type consists of multiple answer choices. For easy to medium difficulty level questions, practice during GRE 30-days Preparation Plan makes your mind much sharp and provides enough pace that the first two lines (in word-problems type question) give you clear idea about the topic from where the question come from. Each topic has unique method to solve every questions, so use that method; and do calculation so speedily but much carefully i.e., save maximum seconds from each question. This will provide you extra time in minutes on a whole. One technique that top scorer use here for very hard difficulty level questions, is “Process Of Elimination”. Remember that ETS never make such questions with options that are not able to distinguish clearly. In other words the options always have 2 to 3 choices out of 5 that can be easily eliminated without wasting time for answering question. This strategy is only applied where the question difficulty level is very hard. These questions require an average time of 1 min per question. At beginning many questions from arithmetic can be solved in 30 seconds while problem solving questions require approximately 1 minute and 30 seconds on average.

Quantitative Comparison:

This question type tests your level of broadness of your knowledge and rules which apply in GRE Math section. It tells your level of strength that in how many aspects you can compare the two quantities. If you are able to compare the two quantities from all aspects, it will give you the evidence whether the two quantities are comparable or not. It it is comparable than which quantity is greater? or whether the two are equal? This question type in New GRE revised General Test has broken the rule “Nothing is Impossible”, because some times the two quantities are impossible to compare; hence sometimes it is impossible to answer whether the two quantities are equal or which quantity is greater? Most of the time, this question type contains variable (e.g., a, b, c or x, y and z) and constant. Here one strategy that top scorers use is supposing the two quantities as equal. Then simultaneously solving it to find evidence whether the two are equal or not. If it’s not, then find evidence which quantity is greater in all aspects. All aspects may include 1) positive values, 2) negative values and 3) zero; the combination of these three creates different aspects. If you get evidences that in some aspect first quantity is greater, and on other aspect second quantity is greater, that shows you cannot compare two quantities from given information. These questions require an average time of 1 minute per question.

Numeric Entry:

This types of questions are usually medium to hard difficulty level, because the chances of correctly guessing the exact answer is too low if no calculation is done to find exact answer. Here you need to put exact answer in the box. This type of question always tests your accuracy while dealing with calculations. It tests your arithmetic ability as well as the knowledge of math. As Numerical Reasoning question type does not contain any option for answer choice, there is not short-cut to solve. Only strategy that work here is to work on your calculation very accurately and carefully. One strategy that top scorer use here is to use formulae that saves time while solving questions that come from different topics. These questions require an average time of 1 minute and 15 seconds per question.

Data Interpretation:

This question type usually tests your level of analysis and interpretation of data given in form of table, graph or pie-charts etc. But here you should be very careful while interpreting the graph or table. The more the time you will give to these type of questions, the more the chances you have to make right answer selection. These questions require an average time of 2 minutes per question. As this section requires maximum time , so do these questions at the end. It’s important to note that these questions are very easy if you correctly interpret information available in form of graph, pie-chart or table etc. You would save the seconds from each question to get few more minutes for Data Interpretation type of questions. So when you left 7 min after attempting all questions, you can work on these questions very comfortably and accurately because you have enough time to interpret the graph or table etc. You’ll always see from 6 to 7 Data Interpretation questions in GRE quantitative reasoning section. Here the most ideal time is 2 minutes per question on average.

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By the way, I’ve prepared for you GRE 60-days study plan, that will help you in GRE preparation with easy concepts and best practice materials. This study plan will gradually improve your skill to attempt GRE General test comfortably and will help you to get your desired score in GRE. Ideally more than 320 score is expected from you after completion of this GRE online course.