r/GRE

Hello everyone,

I took the GRE last week and scored a 322 (Q168, V154). While I'm really happy with my Quant performance, my Verbal score definitely needs some work to help me hit my overall target of 327-330.

First off, a huge thank you to Greg and Vince! The resources are fantastic and got me a long way.

Here is a breakdown of my practice scores leading up to the test:

• Actual GRE: 322 (Q168 / V154)
• PPP#3: 324 (Q169 / V155)
• GregMat Mock 1: 321 (Q164 / V157)
• GregMat Mock 2: 316 (Q165 / V151)

What I've done so far: I completed the GregMat 1-Month Plan and have fully exhausted both the ETS Big Book and the Official Guide (OG).

Where I'm stuck: Since I've already gone through all the standard materials, I’m currently looking for an affordable 1-on-1 Verbal tutor or a targeted coaching service based in India to help me get across that 327+ finish line. I need someone who can help me diagnose my weaknesses across the board and push my Verbal score up those last few crucial points.

Any solid recommendations for tutors who are good but won't break the bank? Thanks in advance!

I took my first GRE attempt on August 14 and scored 160V / 165Q. I’m happy with my verbal score, but I’m aiming for a 170Q on my next attempt, which I’m planning to take on September 4.

For context, my current study plan is:

• Quant: Each day I review one specific topic/foundation area, then do untimed practice followed by timed practice. I’m mainly using GregMat, the ETS Quantitative Reasoning Practice Questions, the Official Guide, and Manhattan 5 lb.
• Verbal: I’ve already memorized around 700 words from the Magoosh 1000-word list, so I’m adding some GregMat vocab to fill in gaps and doing roughly 1–2 verbal sections per day to maintain my score.

What I’m struggling with is figuring out where my energy is best spent to get from 165Q to 170Q.

I feel like my foundations are pretty strong, so I’m not sure whether I should continue heavily reinforcing foundations or shift more of my attention toward hard questions, traps, and time pressure. How should a typical study session look at this point in your opinons?

Also, in terms of materials, a lot of the Manhattan problems feel easy and repetitive, so I'm currently using the "hard Quant" section, and unfortunately I have used most of the ETS material I have (mistake on my part). Gregmat is great but I have also been burning through most of their question bank because I've been studying for a few months now. I'm try to do the tactic of solving 20 questions and starting from scratch incase you get one wrong so I am worried I'm running out of material as well.

I also haven’t received my diagnostic breakdown yet, so I don’t know exactly what types of questions I missed. Interestingly, I remembered a few of the harder questions I was unsure about during the test and checked them afterward, and I had actually gotten those correct. That makes it even harder to tell where the lost points came from.

For anyone who has gone from around 164–166Q to 169–170Q, what made the biggest difference?

I studied pretty intensely for my first attempt and burned myself out, so this time I want to be much more deliberate about how I use the next couple of weeks rather than just throwing more hours at the GRE. I’d especially appreciate advice on what to prioritize once your foundations are already solid.

I just took my GRE with 14 days of medium prep. I got 160 in quant and 145 in verbal. I want to know how much weightage is given to GRE scores. Is it better for me to rewrite GRE or just not enter my GRE scores while applying? Please help. Maybe ask for where I’m applying to, reply in the comments

Hey everyone. Just wanted to share my journey from the last couple months for anyone that might be getting stuck.

I just took my official GRE today and scored 163Q 159V, pretty much exactly what I was aiming for. Would have liked 165Q, but I’m not too angry about the 2 point differential. If that is what changes my admissions outcome then something else in my profile or essay needed to be much clearer

My journey was as follows:

Early May - PP2: 152V 152Q
June - PPP1: 154V 157Q
July - PPP2: 163Q 161V
A week ago - PPP3: 161Q 153V
A few days ago - PP1: 334 (GregMat calculator, but was wayyyyy easier of an exam than any of the others. Not very representative)

Tools used:

TTP for quant understanding and drilling, as well as official materials.
- TTP was really really helpful and really had a lot to offer with a super comprehensive and easily followed plan. The downside is the price point and a bit of information overload. I was able to dedicate around 6 hours per day to studying along with a full time job, so I was able to complete the full course. It really does touch on everything you need, but official material is where you are going to learn what you really need to continue honing down.

GregMat for Verbal RC/TC and general vocab
- Did all groups of the vocab mountain, memorizing nearly all 1060 something words. Wasn’t super important for my actual exam, but knowing the 10 words that you need to know on the test kinda makes it worth the time investment of around a month doing 30 new words a day. For TC/SE the practice question they have are really really solid, highly suggest them. For RC, which I struggled with a lot, I just used only official materials. The preswift and strategy videos for verbal from Greg are also golden, it’s a must. Once you have completed around 16 of the word ground, I’d start glancing at the SE and TC strategy prep swift videos. Super affordable and great quality, huge shout out to Greg.

Biggest Takeaways:

Test anxiety is a solvable and practicable issue. I focused really really hard on mindfulness and meditation leading up to my exam, and have never felt so calm despite it meaning so much to me for the programs that I am basing a lot of my future on. Please please please, take the time to sit quietly and meditate or something, just get your mind right. Even if it makes you feel silly or stupid, WHO CARES ITS ALL FOR THE BIGGER GOAL!

Quant on the test felt debatably easier that some of the official mocks, much much easier than the GregMat mocks. Time management is the most difficult thing once you have a solid foundation and can consistently enter the hard second section. Being able to let go of questions that you don’t have a high chance of getting right is a MUST. That was really hard for me, but on the actual test I think that was one of the reasons that I was able to achieve my goal score of 320+ on my first attempt. Remember that each section is completely done once you click next, forget about it and don’t worry about it, it’s over. Just try your best and if it doesn’t work out then go back to the drawing board.

Hope everyone gets the score that they are aiming for, just remember that this whole experience is teaching you more than you know, beyond what loquacious and quixotic means and the probability that Bob and Jon will sit next to each other.

Best of luck!

I can’t be the only one who feels this way… gregmat seems to go over quite a bit of material that is not needed or covered on the GRE. It’s overcomplicating the process and adding extra grief to reviewing for the math section.

hi as the title says i gave the gre today for the first time and got this score. i would like to touch a 330 or atleast a 327 within the next 21 days with a higher quants score as i am planning to apply to masters in finance programmes and i think i haven’t reached my ceiling yet. as of now, I have given both the power prep tests and solved all the 600 questions on GregMat and two of their mocks. i found the difficult to extreme questions difficult (ha!) but I could solve more than 80% of the medium level and hard level questions. i think rc might be an issue in some places? i did 30 groups of vocab. i did the 2 month plan but thought it was too much after 4 weeks and instead switched to doing all the prep swift videos instead

i have not solved GM3 mock or any questions from manhattan prep 5lb. what could i do to improve my score? i think it was mostly based on practice and luck today so i am a bit confused on how i could push myself and if its even worth it with this score. any help would be appreciated

A little late to post but I gave my GRE on 31st July. This subreddit helped me a lot during my prep, so I am happy to give back to the community. Thanks Gregmat for this absolutely goated prep material at this price.

As the title says AMA regarding prep happy to help.

I’m honestly feeling really disheartened. I went from 303 on my first GRE attempt to 309 on my second. I know it’s technically an improvement, but after all the preparation, I expected a much bigger jump.

What hurts the most is that my Quant didn’t move at all. I got 159 both times. It’s making me question whether I’m actually capable of improving or whether I should just accept that I’m not good at this.

I’ve started feeling really stupid and wondering if I should just declare myself dumb and give up on the GRE altogether.

Should I attempt it a third time with a completely different strategy? For those who went from around 300–310 to 320+, what actually helped you break through?

I could really use some honest advice right now.

I scored a 321 on my second attempt today (159Q 162V). I’m quite surprised because I consistently performed better in quant in my mocks
PP3: 163Q 159V (1.5 weeks ago)
Gregmat 2: 164Q 162V (last week)

For reference I scored a 317 (160Q 157V) three months ago.

I was confident that my quant skills were better than what it was in my first attempt which makes this so surprising, and disappointing. One thing I’ve noticed is I struggled with time management during the test, something that wasn’t a problem in my mocks. Not sure if the questions were harder or more tedious. (I’ve been able to solve most medium and hard gregmat questions)

Still trying to decide if I should do this again. :/

Hey everyone! I’m struggling with time management on GRE Quant and would really appreciate some advice. My exam is in 15 days.

I’m able to solve hard quant questions when I’m untimed, and often after reviewing a solution I realize I actually knew how to approach the question. But under timed conditions, I panic, especially when I see a wordy question or one with a lot of numbers/information. I end up spending too much time trying to figure out how to approach it.

I’ve been following GregMat and doing his quant timed sets diligently, but I’m almost always losing 3 to 4 questions due to time constraints, particularly in Section 2.

My current plan is to:

• Continue doing timed quant sets regularly.
• Practice skipping questions when I don’t see a clear approach quickly instead of getting stuck.
• For long or wordy questions, practice breaking them down and identifying exactly what is being asked before solving.
• Review my timed sets afterward and categorize mistakes as either a knowledge gap, approach issue or time management issue.
• Do more full timed sections so I can get used to the pressure and pacing.

I’m aiming for a 168+ score, so I really want to work on this since I don’t think my foundation is the issue anymore.

For those who have improved their Quant timing, does this seem like a good approach? Is there anything you would change or add, particularly for dealing with panic on long/wordy questions and avoiding losing multiple questions to time in Section 2?

Any practical advice would be greatly appreciated!

Hi, as soon as I try to open any GRE practice test from the ETS "my tests" section, it shows me this. Is this happening with everyone? Or has this happened before and if yes in how much time will it get solved?

https://preview.redd.it/lrwc086whojh1.png?width=2940&format=png&auto=webp&s=33b9c8d2910bef3620cd73abd9345a4d49dc54c8

I recently retook the GRE and scored a 162V, 169Q. I'm retaking in early November because I am applying to top 10 CS, Statistics, Applied Math, and ORFE programs, which are extremely selective, and I need all the advantages I can get, especially because I lack publications. Here's what I did before the July test:

• I used Manhattan for verbal practice, as well as the Kaplan verbal workbook and prep book practice tests
• For extra reading practice, I did Big Book and Magoosh passages
• I completed most of the ETS verbal practice in the Official Guide and Verbal workbook
• To track my mistakes, I made an error log, but I don't think I took it seriously enough to learn from my mistakes
• I did 15+ practice tests from ETS, Kaplan, and PR

However, this only yielded a 1 pt gain from my 162V,168Q result in 2024 which I used for MS applications. Here’s my current plan. This time, I am "studying smarter, not harder." I plan to limit my 3rd party practice tests to 1 and will instead focus my plan on the 3 PowerPrep Tests which I did not purchase last go around. I am concurrently prepping for the GRE Math Subject Test in late October, so for now I am doing 3 hours a day. The schedule runs 10AM-2PM with a lunch hour:

Day	Section	Time	Blocks
Monday	Verbal	10:00AM-11:00AM	Big Book long passages
		11:00AM–12:00PM	GregMat One-Month Study Plan (Version 2.0)
		1:00PM-2:00PM	Vocabulary: vocab mountain, magoosh, quizlet
Tuesday	Verbal	10:00AM-11:00AM	2, 3-blank TC: gregmat bank, Kaplan, Magoosh, Manhattan
		11:00AM–12:00PM	SE, GregMat 1 mo V
		1:00PM-2:00PM	Vocab, 2-3 blank TC
Wednesday	Verbal	10:00AM-11:00AM	ETS RC: redoing a set of used questions
		11:00AM–12:00PM	ETS RC: looking at last week’s set and taking thorough notes on misses
		1:00PM-2:00PM	Vocab, SE or TC depending on weakness
Thursday	Verbal	10:00AM-11:00AM	Timed section + review
		11:00AM–12:00PM	GregMat 1mo V
		1:00PM-2:00PM	Vocab test, error log
Friday	Quant	10:00AM-11:00AM	Timed section + review the sec
		11:00AM–12:00PM	Review
		1:00PM-2:00PM	Drills based on section
Sunday	Quant	2 hrs anytime	Drills
			Drills + retrospective

This is based on me missing 4 RC (mostly long passage), 2 multi blank TC and 1 SE

1 week before the PowerPrep test, I plan to do an extra hour per day with an extra verbal set and review time. Let me know any suggestions or tips!

TL:DR Just buy a GreGMAT subscription, overwhelmed plan is amazing.

Hey, just finished the GRE, got a 166V:161Q. Super happy about this - when I started studying, I was looking for at least a 310. Not sure what I got on the writing, but felt pretty confident about it.

Background: Avid reader, hobbyist writer (though the things I write have nothing to do with the GRE essays), Microbiology major. It had been years since I did math topics concerning the GRE and I also haven't taken any math classes in college (though general chemistry had lots of conversions)

Practice tests:

Kaplan - Slightly north of 310

PP2: 162/159

GregMat 1: 155/160 (note: this was before the overwhelmed plan but after studying ETS stuff)

Post Studying:

GregMat 2: 162/161

PP1 - 326 (using GregMATS PP1 grader)

What I did: My studying methods were pretty haphazard because my goals were relatively modest (that is, I could've gotten a 300 on the GRE and that would've been enough to not retake). I did the ETS math review and looked at some of the Quant and Verbal guides (which you can find the older versions of for free on the internet as PDFS), but honestly most of my learning came from GregMATS "I'm Overwhelmed" plan. It also helps that Greg is pretty funny and it reflects in the videos + descriptions.

I also did not review the mountains every day, but instead used Anki versions of the Quant and Verbal mountain (which you can find online), because it worked better for me. I also did some of the practice questions on GreGMAT, but I was pretty haphazard with that as well. I did not review Quant strategy before the test, which probably would've helped.

My favorite strategies:

AWA: I would just follow GreGMAT's advice (5 paragraph essay where you either mostly agree/mostly disagree with a concession), felt like it saved a lot of time. Definitely don't forget that you can use negative examples - that is, when you're having trouble providing an example that supports your opinion, you can alternatively provide an example attacking the opposite viewpoint.

Ex: Suppose that the prompt is that mint chocolate chip ice cream is better than vanilla (which is, in fact, true), and you mostly agree with this. Further suppose that one of your reasons for why mint chip is better is because the mintiness provides freshness - instead of providing examples of how other minty foods are refreshing, a negative example could be to attack a food that isn't minty.

"Peppermints are also minty foods that are renowned for their freshness. In contrast, tootsie rolls, a food that completely lacks mintiness, have been proven by scientists to be one of the least refreshing foods in the known universe."

A bit of a rough example, but you get the point.

Quant: There were a lot of questions where I had no immediate ideas on how to solve the problem, so I skipped them. Probability, combinatorics, and series are pretty rare. I would say that doing good here relies on a good foundation and being able to come up with some sort of plan to tackle the question (could be seeking a pattern, testing numbers, etc.) Speaking of testing numbers, for the Quantity A vs. Quantity B questions, I like to sub in numbers like 1 and zero, along with decimals and super large numbers, because they tend to reveal potential edge cases that make the answer D.

Verbal: In general, try to come up with an answer before looking at the answer choices. I also really liked contrast strategy - for example, in the phrase "People might think Pizza is ____, but reality would state that it is really __" tells you that the two blanks are probably opposites. In general, looking for relationships between the blanks is a good move. Looking for synonyms on pair questions is also a good idea (because if you have a pair question and one of the words has no matching synonyms, it cannot be the answer). I also really liked the "Word of Zeus" strategy where if the question asks you what the passage is saying, that you only choose an answer that is 100% said in the passage. So if you look at an answer and think "Well, maybe," or "I mean, that's plausibly true," I probably would not choose it.

Hope this helps!

I have been preparing for GRE for the past 2.5 months. I plan on giving it before this month ends. I went through I'm overwhelmed, did each and every quiz for quant and verbal, did week 3 and 4 of 1 month plan ass well.
I've been scoring 8 on the foundation quiz, took it twice. My verbal has been great. I was earlier having issues with timing. I still do but i've been getting better. My baseline was 313 on PP2. 153Q and 160V. Since then, i've been able to get through the Quant on GRE with ease. After all the studying, I scored a 320 on PP1, with timing. Today, I took Gregmat Test 1 and I scored 151 Q and 160 V and I was devastated. Then did the K*F mock and scored worse. 155V and 156Q. I need to get 325 at the very least.

I hope this doesn't portend my score to come. This is especially taking a toll on me because I got laid off last month, and given how the job market is, this looks like my only shot at getting any employment.

[supprimé]

Hey everyone,

I took my first GRE attempt two days ago and got an unofficial 293, which honestly crushed me because I had been consistently scoring around 315–320 on my mocks.

I think the biggest issues were exam anxiety, losing focus, and poor time management. I know I’m capable of doing better based on my practice scores, but I clearly couldn’t replicate that performance on test day.

I have 20 days until my second attempt, and I really need to get to at least 315 for the master’s programs I’m targeting.

So far, I’ve completed:

• ETS Official Guide
• Official Guide for Verbal Reasoning & Quantitative Reasoning
• Manhattan Prep 5 lb.
• Kaplan
• PowerPrep 1 & 2

Vocab is not really an issue for me. At this point, I think I need to focus heavily on timing, test-taking strategy, and performing under pressure.

My current plan for these 20 days is to focus primarily on timed practice, review my previous mistakes, take regular full-length mocks, and work specifically on maintaining timing and focus under test conditions. I don’t want to simply do more untimed questions, I want to replicate the pressure of the actual exam as much as possible.

My main questions are:

1. How would you recommend I structure these next 20 days?
2. Where can I find good timed question sets that are reasonably similar to the actual GRE?
3. Are there any full-length mocks you would recommend apart from the ETS PowerPrep tests?
4. How do you deal with the huge difference between your mock performance and your actual test-day performance?

I’m trying not to spend a lot of money on another prep course, so I’d really like to make the most of the resources I already have.

Would really appreciate any advice, especially from people who have managed to make a similar jump between attempts. 🙏

https://preview.redd.it/3uqdh901lxih1.jpg?width=1162&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d9e5262b811f1376a041aebed7695a4318be226b

First, let me provide some background.

In June this year, I took the LSAT at home, but my score has been held and hasn't been released yet. Sad. Later, I realized that waiting idly was not a solution, and I was also considering applying for some non-legal programs, so I decided to take advantage of this break to prepare for the GRE, giving myself a month to study.

I actually signed up for a class at the beginning. I won’t mention the name of the institution, but the teacher was quite nice. When the class started, there were about 5 people in total. Two dropped out in the first week, and after a few weeks, one transferred to another class. So most of the time, it was more like one-on-two. In the last few sessions, because the other student couldn’t make it due to some issues, it even turned into one-on-one. The service experience was indeed very good, but to be honest, I didn't end up using many of the methods taught in the class. The main reason wasn't the teacher's fault, but rather that my attention was entirely focused on the TOEFL at the time. I scored a terrible 99 on my first TOEFL, and I spent the entire day thinking about how to raise it to 100, so I barely paid attention in the GRE class.

During the course, I took the GRE without any preparation and scored 319. At that moment, it really felt like my world had fallen: TOEFL 99, GRE 319, both exams just one point short of reaching the next level. After the TOEFL scores came out, the GRE course was also nearing its end. The reading teacher recommended an online practice platform to me, and I found it very suitable for me. In the end, I mainly relied on this platform + Gemini to go from 319 to 335. The most significant improvement was in Verbal, which increased from 152 to 167, nearly reaching the full score.

Let me clarify upfront: what follows is just my own learning approach, which may not necessarily suit everyone. I tend to be on the more extreme side—I don’t particularly enjoy summarizing techniques, but rather prefer to thoroughly grasp concepts through extensive input, practice, and review. So if you prefer systematic courses, skill summaries, and a step-by-step approach to problem-solving, this method may not be suitable for you.

1. My core approach is actually quite simple: practice, a lot.

During class, the teacher taught many techniques, including logic and problem-solving methods. In the end, I hardly used it at all. My method, to put it simply, is: Understand the question, then solve it.

There are no particularly magical techniques; it's all about extensive practice to develop a strong sense of language, problem-solving intuition, and reading ability. When I was preparing for the exam, I just worked through the practice questions on the platform. One nice side effect was that by test day, I was already so familiar with the test interface that the actual GRE almost felt like just another practice session at home. Over the course of a month, I completed more than 1,000 Verbal questions, including fill-in-the-blank and reading comprehension.

Here, I would like to emphasize one point in particular: Do not translate the questions. (I am not a native English speaker.)

If your goal is a Verbal score of 160+, I personally believe that relying on translation is essentially meaningless. The GRE test time is very tight. During the actual exam, you simply don't have time to first translate the English into another language, then analyze it, and finally choose the answer.

So my entire training process involves reading English directly, understanding it directly, and doing it directly. Of course, it will be very painful at first, and you might even feel like you're guessing on many questions in a row. But when I had done about 500 questions, I began to notice that many things started to feel familiar. It's only after persisting through about 1000 questions that one truly gets into the groove. So for me, the later stages of the GRE Verbal section are not about "how many more techniques I know," but rather whether my mind can immediately react when I see a sentence, a logical relationship, or an option.

2. For every question I don't understand, I will keep going until I truly understand it.

This is one of the most important points.

Every time I encounter a problem I don't understand, I directly hand it over to Gemini and let it explain it to me step by step.

But here's the key point: Don't just ask "Why is the answer A?" What you really need to address is: Why didn't I understand this question?

Based on my own experience, when I couldn't solve problems in the early stages, it was mostly not because GRE logic was too abstract, but due to two very basic issues: I don't recognize the word. I didn't understand the sentence.

For the first 500 questions, the main issues I encountered were vocabulary and grammar. If after doing 500 questions, you still often can't understand the questions at all because you don't know the words, I think you should still focus on improving your vocabulary first.

Moving forward, the issue will gradually become: "I know every word, but I don't understand what this passage is saying." At such times, what is often lacking is not vocabulary or grammar, but background knowledge.

3. My major takeaway: To study for the GRE, you actually need to learn a lot of background knowledge.

This is the point I would like to share most from my entire method.

The GRE reading section covers a wide range of topics: astronomy, geography, history, geology, biology, literary criticism, literary history, feminism, labor movements, African American history, indigenous issues, and more.

As I went on, I increasingly felt that: If you have no idea what an article is talking about, reading it can be really painful. So later on, whenever I worked on a problem and realized I didn't understand the background behind it, I would continue to ask Gemini.

For example, if an article mentions a certain literary school, I won't just ask: "Why did you choose B for this question?" I will continue to ask: "What exactly is this literary school?" "Why did it appear?" "What is the difference between it and another school of thought?" "What is the historical background of this?" Sometimes they even ask philosophical questions all the way through. Feminism, labor movements, Black history, and Indigenous issues are particularly common in GRE reading passages. I even jokingly refer to them as the "GRE Reading BIG FOUR."

At first, I would feel: "Why should I learn all these things just for a GRE?" But the actual effect is very significant. When you already know what a topic is generally about, you don't start decoding it from scratch when you encounter similar articles; instead, you understand it within the framework of your existing knowledge. The article suddenly becomes very easy to read. I managed to achieve a level of satisfaction with this task within a month.

If you learn more slowly, I think two months would be more than enough. Moreover, I tend to forget some background knowledge as I progress, so when I encounter similar questions, I ask the AI to explain them again. After repeating it several times, you will naturally remember it.

4. Should I memorize vocabulary, study grammar, learn background knowledge, or do more practice questions?

My answer to this question is: it depends on which stage you're stuck at now. If your basic vocabulary is still insufficient, you should certainly start by memorizing words.

When I started this method, my vocabulary was probably at least around 8,000 words. If your vocabulary is significantly below this level, directly tackling GRE reading passages in this way would be extremely painful. If you encounter a word you don't know, I think you can look it up anytime. The same goes for grammar. If a sentence is already so complex that you can't break it down at all, then of course you need to improve your grammar.

However, if your grammar foundation is roughly at the TOEFL 90+ level, I personally don't think it's necessary to spend a lot of time systematically studying grammar. For me, after mastering basic vocabulary and grammar, the marginal benefit of background knowledge is very high.

When you lack background knowledge, you're not just "getting the question wrong"; you don't even know what the question is about. Forcing a hard reset in this state can easily lead to increasing frustration. On the contrary, once you truly understand what the article is about, you can gradually increase the number of practice questions, and solving them will become smoother and smoother.

So I'm not saying "don't do practice problems." After all, I ended up doing a lot of practice problems. My theory is: First, resolve the reasons why you don't understand the material, and then practice a large number of problems. This approach is far more effective than simply mindlessly increasing the volume of practice.

5. My study intensity is very high, and this must be mentioned.

I have basically been preparing for the exam full-time this month.

Every day, besides eating, I sleep about 10 hours and exercise for 2 hours. The rest of the time is mostly spent on GRE preparation. The actual effective time for practicing questions is about 8 hours a day. Every 55 minutes or so, I go out for a 5-minute walk and then come back to continue.

So don't assume that "from 152 to 167 in a month" is an easy path. No. I really spent a lot of time on it.

If I can only study for one or two hours each day, I think it would be much more reasonable to extend the cycle to two months or even longer.

There's also a very boring but useful little trick for me: If the goal for the day is 200 questions, I sometimes intentionally stop at 199 and then start a new section. This will result in a: "They're already open, let's make a few more dishes." Finally, it might reach 210 or 220 in a day. It's childish, but it works for me.

Additionally, I will always have a Word document or Apple Notes open. For every question I tackle, if any word causes even the slightest confusion—whether it's unfamiliar, its meaning is uncertain, or I've misunderstood it in context—I immediately copy it down. Only copy the words, no translations, no definitions, and no fancy notes. Everyday if I still have energy, I quickly review these words. The key is not to re-learn the vocabulary. Instead, when you see this word, try to recall: "Where did I see it just now in which question?" If you can recall the exact words, the article, or even the context at that time, I think it would be much more effective than memorizing a definition.

6. My studying rhythm is 6+1.

That is: 6 days for new questions, 1 day for specifically reviewing mistakes.

The platform has a dedicated feature for incorrect questions, so I will compile the wrong answers into a section and redo them.

I usually start by selecting the last 50 incorrect questions. The reason is simple: the more recent the mistakes are, the farther back they are, and the less firmly they are remembered. Moreover, the number of incorrect answers is dynamically changing. For example, if you make the same mistake again when redoing a problem, that problem will be added back to your collection of mistakes. So to avoid getting confused, I will remember which problems I solved in each round. If it feels too troublesome, you can also create a separate "mistake log" to record the last few questions each time. Next time you review, continue from there and move forward.

I was quite lucky, and my accuracy rate eventually allowed me to form a comfortable 7-day cycle: The mistakes made in the first 6 days can basically be redone in full on the 7th day. If you have a lot of mistakes, you can definitely take an extra half day or even a full day to review, without strictly adhering to this schedule.

7. After completing the first round of practice, I went through all the incorrect questions again.

This stage left a deep impression on me. When I first did these problems, my overall accuracy was only about 65%. It's quite low. However, after I finish a round of practice problems and then go back to redo my mistakes, more than 95% of the incorrect answers can be corrected.

This indicates, at least for me: After one round of extensive practice and another round of reviewing mistakes, most of the questions are actually truly mastered. When I went back to redo the second round, it was almost completely correct.

At this stage, I can even remember the answers to many of the questions. But I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing. If you see a question and not only remember that "the answer is C," but also recall the logic of the passage, the context, and why the other options are incorrect, then you are actually already memorizing the question. The GRE itself contains a large number of repetitive language structures and thought patterns.

8. Why don't I recommend starting by memorizing GRE vocabulary words frantically?

Because for me: The pain of not being able to memorize a single word the first time is far greater than encountering it in a question and then remembering it.

Moreover, after you have completed over 1,000 Verbal questions, according to the GRE word frequency distribution, you have a high probability of having encountered a large number of common words in the exam. At this point, if you specifically focus on memorizing those low-frequency words, the marginal benefit will significantly decrease.

Of course, this does not mean that "you don't need to memorize vocabulary for the GRE." I believe vocabulary is a prerequisite for this method.

For me, in the later stages, it was more effective to encounter words repeatedly in real test questions rather than continuing to memorize isolated word lists.

9. Before the exam, I basically only review the questions I got wrong.

At this stage, most of the vocabulary, question types, and logic have already been encountered many times. So I didn't go crazy adding new things. It's just about reviewing the mistakes and looking at the words I recorded before. You can also take a quick look at the issue question. I actually prepared very little for my own issue. If there are uncertainties before the issue question, I will continue to ask Gemini.

10. Regarding mock exams: I only do them in the final week.

I started doing a mock exam every morning about one week before the official test.

My mock test Verbal score averages around 160. The final official exam actually felt easier than some of the mock exams I had taken. Of course, this is very subjective, as everyone draws different questions and has varying test conditions, so don't rely too much on mock exam scores to predict your final results.

For me, the most important role of mock exams is not to predict scores, but to get used to the exam rhythm.

Finally, let's summarize.

My major takeaway is actually not about "what magical techniques there are for the GRE." Instead: Understanding English thoroughly is far more important than memorizing a bunch of test-taking tricks.

In the early stage, focus on building vocabulary and grammar. When you encounter an article that you don't understand, make sure to grasp the knowledge behind it. Then do a lot of practice problems. If you make a mistake, review it and try again. When you do enough, many things will gradually shift from "needing analysis" to "being obvious at a glance."

This is probably the entire process of how I improved from Verbal 152 to 167.

However, it is important to emphasize again: the intensity of my study over this month has been very high, and I already had a certain level of vocabulary and English foundation before I started preparing for the exam, so do not mechanically replicate the timeline of "one month." Finding a rhythm that suits you is more important.

I hope this post can be helpful to anyone currently preparing for the GRE.
And I hope everyone gets the score they’re aiming for.

Hi all, I have been struggling with Quant questions and looking for some advice.

I started GRE prep about a month and a half ago using Gregmat. I started with the I'm overwhelmed plan but had to switch to PrepSwift because it was taking too much time. In PrepSwift, I've gone through most of the videos across all Quant sections (couldn't finish everything due to time constraints with a full-time job). However, the major issue I'm facing is that I find some of the quant explanations on PrepSwift (both videos and quizzes) very hard. I don't know if it was intended this way to keep the video lengths short, but for some videos, it doesn't seem geared toward beginners. I end up having to use AI to get the necessary explanations for these lessons and quizzes, which leads to a lot of wasted time. I recently posted about this in the Gregmat forums, but didn't get any useful advice.

By contrast, I was able to access Magoosh's lessons this week through a friend's subscription, and their Quant lessons seemed much more understandable. Things like the concept of a "multiplier" in percent-increase/decrease problems (successive % changes) and many more are explained much better there. The presence of an in-built AI tutor and a full video + text-based explanation for every practice problem also helps a lot. This is where I was having trouble with Prepswift quiz explanations - some of them are barely 2 or 3 lines long and are not really understandable. But my concern is Magoosh's number of lessons; they don't seem to have as many videos on certain topics (like Geometry) as Gregmat, so I'm not sure whether it's a good/safe alternative for the test.

Has anyone been able to overcome issues in Quant using Magoosh? Is it a suitable alternative?

I understand this (struggling with Gregmat's Quant) might be an unpopular opinion around here, but not everyone has the same learning style, so I would appreciate any help/advice.

Before saying anything, there is no easier way. You've got to put in the raw work.

That aside, here are a few things I faced while preparing and how I overcame them.

1. GRE felt overwhelming when I started.
   There were so many things to cover that I felt lost and kept postponing my prep.

What helped:
GregMAT. Their study plan is very structured, and I followed it honestly. It helped me get into the flow. Every day I was making some progress, and that kept me motivated.

2. I set the bar too high.
   If I couldn't solve even one question, I'd get frustrated and start thinking I wouldn't be able to clear the GRE.

What helped:
This was especially true for Verbal. I'm a STEM student, so Quant came naturally, but Verbal was tough. I shortlisted the universities I wanted to apply to, checked what kind of Verbal scores they expected, and set a realistic target instead of chasing perfection.

3. I started taking mocks early and scored much lower than I expected.
   That honestly killed my motivation for a while.

What helped:
I realized I wasn't scoring low because I lacked knowledge, but because I lacked strategies. GregMAT teaches a lot of test-taking strategies, and they are genuinely important. I started applying those strategies while practicing and kept taking mocks. My scores gradually improved, and even my worst mocks started becoming decent.

4. After a while, my score got stuck.
   No matter how many mocks I took, it just wouldn't improve.

What helped:
I realized I was making a big mistake. Just giving more mocks doesn't improve your score. You have to change something after every mock. I had gotten into my comfort zone. I started analyzing each mock carefully, figuring out what went wrong, and making sure I fixed those mistakes in the next one. That's when my score started improving again.

Conclusion:

• ⁠The start will probably feel overwhelming.
• ⁠Get GregMAT (it's economical and genuinely very good).
• ⁠Stick to one plan. I personally didn't use anything else.
• ⁠Learn your fundamentals well, and don't ignore strategies—they're super important.
• ⁠Give lots of mocks and simulate the actual exam as much as possible. By the time the real exam comes, it should feel like just another mock.
• ⁠Most importantly, analyze your mocks. That's where the actual improvement happens.

That's pretty much all I did, and I ended up with 324 (Q167, V157).

Hope this helps someone who's just starting out :)