![\"GRE](\"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/19\/2020\/01\/mprep-blogimages-wave1-30-1-e1579904159621.png\")
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When we say that the GRE is an adaptive test, we mean that the questions you are given on it vary depending on your performance. If you answer more questions correctly early on, you\u2019ll subsequently see harder questions. If you answer fewer correctly, you\u2019ll see easier questions. But how does this work exactly, and what does the GRE\u2019s adaptive format mean for you as you\u2019re developing your test-taking strategy?<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n First, unlike some other adaptive tests (<\/span>such as the GMAT<\/span><\/a>), the GRE is not adaptive at the level of the question but at the level of the section. Your <\/span>Quantitative<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>Verbal<\/span><\/a> scores, which each range from 130 to 170, are based on two sections each: two math sections and two verbal sections. Your first math section will be of moderate difficulty, as will your first verbal section. Depending on how you perform on this first section, you will either see a harder, medium, or easier second section. In other words, the <\/span>questions <\/span><\/i>within each section do not change depending on whether you\u2019re answering them correctly or not; only the second full set of 20 questions does.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Here\u2019s how you want to think about it: If you get a harder second section, that\u2019s a good thing! There is now a floor, so to speak, <\/span>below which you will not score<\/span><\/a>. You\u2019ve earned yourself a safety net, score-wise! Inversely, if you wind up with the easier second section, the opposite is true: You have now capped your score\u2014no matter how well you do on the second section, you will not score above a certain threshold at this point. (I cannot tell you what that threshold is\u2014sorry; it\u2019s not public knowledge.) For this reason, you <\/span>want <\/span><\/i>a harder second section.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Now that you know you want a harder second section, how do you earn one? One way and one way only: You need to answer more questions correctly. It\u2019s a numbers game. The more questions you get right, the better you do. This is true whether the questions are considered easy or hard. Hard questions are not given more weight than easier questions. Let me say that again\u2014the way you get a harder second section is the same way you get a higher score: You answer as many questions as possible correctly.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n So this raises the question of how you answer as many questions correctly as possible. Of course, this is where studying comes in. But apart from studying, there are some strategies that you can deploy in real-time during the test.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n First, know that the questions are not organized from easy to hard within the section. They\u2019re all mixed up. You could very well see a really easy question number 19 just as you could see a really difficult question number 3. Both of these questions \u201ccount\u201d the same amount. The last thing you want to do is spend so much time working on question 3 that you don\u2019t make it to question 19 and therefore miss out on nailing that easy point! To this end, here are a few rules of thumb:<\/span><\/p>\n Finally, a word of warning. One thing to look out for both as you\u2019re studying and as you\u2019re taking the exam is that, because of the adaptive nature of the exam, doing better can <\/span>feel <\/span><\/i>worse. As you improve, and thus earn yourself more challenging problems, you may have the (false) sense that you\u2019re actually regressing because the test feels harder. But you aren\u2019t! You\u2019re just seeing tougher programs as a reward for answering more earlier problems correctly. Keeping this in mind can help prevent you from feeling discouraged as your GRE skills improve.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n KEEP STUDYING<\/b>: <\/span>Which Questions Should I Skip on the GRE?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n Don\u2019t forget that you can attend the first session of any of our online or in-person GRE courses absolutely free. We\u2019re not kidding! <\/i><\/b>Check out our upcoming courses here<\/i><\/b><\/a>.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n Mary Richter is a Manhattan Prep instructor based in Nashville, Tennessee. <\/i><\/b>Mary is one of those weirdos who loves taking standardized tests, and she has been teaching them for 15 years. When she’s not teaching the LSAT or GRE for ManhattanPrep, she’s writing novels under the last name Adkins. You can find them wherever you buy books. <\/span><\/i>Check out Mary\u2019s upcoming GRE prep offerings here!<\/span><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When we say that the GRE is an adaptive test, we mean that the questions you are given on it vary depending on your performance. If you answer more questions correctly early on, you\u2019ll subsequently see harder questions. If you answer fewer correctly, you\u2019ll see easier questions. But how does this work exactly, and what […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":183,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1362503],"tags":[1364949,133],"yst_prominent_words":[1364933,1362788,1364942,1364944,1364941,1364934,1364937,1364946,1364935,1362627,1364936,1363421,1364945,1362751,1364943,1364803,1363272,1362898,1364947,1363032],"class_list":["post-12708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gre-101","tag-adaptive-testing","tag-gre"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/183"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12708"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12713,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12708\/revisions\/12713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12708"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=12708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}What \u201cadaptive\u201d means on the GRE<\/b><\/h3>\n
How do you get a harder second section?<\/b><\/h3>\n
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Something to look out for as you get better at the GRE<\/b><\/h3>\n
\n![\"Mary](\"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gre\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/19\/2020\/01\/mary-green-close-up-150x150.jpg\")
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