The Time Management for the GRE Exam - Introduction
The Time Management for the GRE Exam - Quantitative Reasoning
The Time Management for the GRE Exam - Verbal Reasoning
The Time Management for the GRE Exam - AWA Section





Making a survey among all the students who take the GRE exam perhaps, probably, you would receive back the most disparate answers, ranging from it is easier than the GMAT (half-true) passing through the fact the quant part drives the students insane (half-true as well, who knows deeply the GRE is perfectly aware that it is a verbal test and NOT a quant test among other reasonable assumptions), ending with the assertion that the more I take mock tests, the more I will improve my score on a ten-points scale per time.

Almost nobody will tell you that one of the few things the two exams share and that is one of the key elements to score well during the exam is a simple clock upon the questions itself: the time-management.

Time is the fourth dimension: it governs over your entire life from the moment you open your eyes in the very early morning to the moment when you die. Who never imagined to be Martin McFly and take a "back to the future" journey.

Back to the GRE, still today, the students do NOT get the following key points, of which time-management is the amalgam or common denominator:

• One of the primary objectives of the GRE is to decide if you can break down a circumstance before you and decide the data expected to understand the question. Thusly, the GRE is trying similar aptitudes needed to settle a business case. The numbers before you are not significant, but rather your technique for comprehending the inquiry is. Doing the math and estimating hypotenuses are not valuable abilities in business; you'll have the calculator to do that. Seeing how to approach and take care of issues is the genuine expertise being tried.
  
  
• Many students are far too eager to rely on shortcuts, gimmicks, and memorization. Understanding what is being asked is the key to getting the right answer much more frequently than hastily getting to some solution. Obviously, getting the opportunity to work rapidly and thoughtlessly crunching all the numbers as fast as conceivable will in some cases work, yet it additionally misses the whole purpose of the test. The real purpose of this test is to see how your brain works, what is your strategy, the understanding of the balance point or decision making, if you do have an alternative plan or another efficient approach in different scenarios or when something is not going straight and you are able to improvise, finding an alternative solution.
  
  
• That being said, the GRE is additionally keen on speed, which is the reason there is a period cutoff to each part. All the students would have the best score - 340 - if we had unlimited time to solve a problem, maybe. Several students complain about the time pressure and the fact that they took too much time to answer the question BUT, somehow weirdly, they are partially balmed by the fact they nailed it correctly. Now, if you pick a question wrong the question is obviously WRONG; if you take the question correct but in five minutes, the question is basically wrong, why ?? because the mounting of the time pressure is exponentially and will reverse on the next questions of the test and, well, there is a high probability you will pick them incorrectly. As it turns out, the question you had right is like being wrong, from a practical standing point.
  
  
• The previous point speaks to the inherent time management skill required to succeed on the GRE. Almost any question you will face on test day can be solved with a brute force approach. However, approaching the problem in a logical and methodical way should be your goal for both quant and verbal questions. I pointed out before no tricks, no shortcuts and I confirm this but on the other hand, I have to explain what I meant a bit: tricks and shortcuts are PERFECTLY fine unless they are a derivation of your supreme power: your LOGIC. If I try to beat the test, to solve every single question thanks to a shortcut then my test will be a complete failure. All over the fronts.
  
  Logic is MY primary tool. And because my tool is so powerful I am able to solve a question not only in a straight manner, but also with alternative approaches, shortcuts, or even blindfolded.

All the information above constitutes the frame to introduce us to what is the time-management and what is the real problem with it, and how to solve and fix it.
In my humble experience over the years, I did notice that the TM is threatening like it was a separate entity a-se-stante or per se from what I study to score well during the exam: dealing with algebra rather than geometry.

As a result, many people think across the spectrum that the TM is a thing that I fix on its own: Monday >>> Friday I study my material, solve questions; Saturday I work on TM, and perhaps Sunday (if I am not tired) take a mock exam. See here more on "How many mock exams should I take" and ALL the relative GRE FREE tests we do have at our disposable FREE GRE Practice Tests [Collection] - New Edition (2021)



A Season in the Abyss

I still remember a brilliant article in which I read clearly and simple: time-management problems are an effect, not a cause.

We certainly are nice persons, here to help students as much as we can able to do. However, we are not sugar-coating because this does not work or help the students to get rid of their time problems. More directly: their skills are wretched, atrocious. They navigate in a pessimum situation.

People have timing problems because they don’t get good rephrasing. People have timing problems because they don’t understand RC passage before attacking the questions, going back and forth between the passage itself and the questions, back-to-back. People have timing problems because they don’t have the discipline to guess, and this is one of the most crucial points to understand which students often are refractory.

Timing issues are either the product of a weak base or a negative action.


Even worse this scenario is when students take a CAT or the real exam: they start panicking with the clock at the top ticking like a time-bomb. The brain enters a blackout phase, random numbers appear before your eyes and without any consciousness, you are in unchartered territory. Boom. Lost. A disaster and I have to retake the GRE.
People usually equate the base with math work, but there is also a verbal work of this nature. Most testers take reading English for granted but the verbal demand the same rigor as the math. The Foundation's work involves seeking conclusions, primary concepts, and paragraph subjects effectively.

Other timing concerns include the behavioral approach. Have you learned the techniques in the guides above the base work? Do you almost immediately knowing the styles and effective methods, or are you reinventing the wheel? When you see an issue with the pace, do you set up an RTD chart automatically? Do you know, literally, multiplication tables like you do not need even to think about ?? Everything has to be on auto-pilot. Your brain must work only to deliver the right result NOT to HOW to go through the process.




GRE Time Management General Strategy

1) An influential aspect is the students do not know how the test works in its intimacy and its conclusive score: the timer, if you can skip a question and back later on, and how the score is calculated. More on this in my post How is the GRE Score Calculated -The Definitive Guide (2021)

2) If you are making many careless mistakes, try this trick: Pause after reading a question. esp. on the quant section, after reading a question and before starting to solve it - stop for 5 seconds and instead of throwing yourself at it, take a casual look at it and think if an easier solution exists. Don't just rely on your reflexes, use your brain too. While it sounds counter-productive, this trick will help you save time and also avoid some silly mistakes you may make by rushing to read the question.

3) If possible, avoid guessing 2 questions in a row. If pressed for time - solve every other question instead of guessing at a random.

4) Most Important Tip: Never ever spend more than 3 minutes on a single question. After 3 minutes, if you still can't see a solution, figure out an alternative approach, or start a guessing strategy. Be done by 3:10 OR it will hurt for the rest of the test. Plan and know your limits and promise yourself you will do it. This again sounds counter-productive but it will help you. It will hardly make a difference if you guess one.

5) You need to be prepared that the timing will not go as you wish or plan. Battleplan rarely survives contact with the test: you may get a hard start or a few questions in a row that will get you down, but you need to be flexible and adjust to the test, just as the test tries to adjust to you. Plan to be stuck. Plan to be freaked out. Plan to panic. I don't mean to plan to have a mental breakdown and practice rolling on the floor - I mean plan for all of these situations/scenarios and how you will respond in each. Know when it is time to move on. Prepare to face the expected.

5) If you have problems with timing - experiment during practice tests! For example, you can take a test on which if you don't answer a question within 2 minutes, you simply move on. I took one like that, and what I did was guess when I was overtime on hard questions. My results that day, perhaps, were the lowest of all, but it allowed me to finish early and measure the time I had left as "extra" time for hard questions. Another test you can take is "untimed" (some software simulators allow it) and take the time I needed on every question - this showed how much time I comfortably needed.



How much time should I budget per question?

The answer differs depending on how difficult the question is.

There are easy questions, medium questions, and difficult questions. Easy questions should take between 45 seconds and 1 minute. Medium questions should take between 1:00 -2:00. And difficult questions should not take longer than 3 minutes. The ratio of easy, medium, and difficult questions varies per section but in general, you can expect to see a smattering of each. In the easy section, the ratio will skew towards easy; in the difficult section, that ratio will skew towards difficult.

However, always keep in mind your pacing




We have 35 minutes to answer the 20 questions in each quant section and 30 minutes to answer the 20 questions in each verbal section. If we're going to complete the segment on time, so we're going to have to meet the average pacing. Keep a time log that reflects the time spent on your practice problems, always, keeping track of your progress such as the following chart:

Question #	Pacing Time
\(5^{th}\) question	\(8^{th}\) minute
\(10^{th}\) question	\(16^{th}\) minute
\(15^{th}\) question	\(24^{th}\) minute
\(20^{th}\) question	\(32^{th}\) minute