Because the GRE is a timed test, we must become skilled enough at solving GRE quant questions to correctly answer them in the time allowed on the GRE. In fact, one common reason why people struggle to complete the quant section of the GRE on time is that they didn’t quite get themselves skilled enough to be able to answer quant questions in the allotted time.

I’ll lay out our top 5 GRE timing strategies that you can follow to reach your target score on the quant section of the GRE. I’ll also discuss some important features of the GRE exam to keep in mind when honing your timing strategies. 🏆


Given that each quantitative reasoning section of the GRE presents 20 questions to be answered in 35 minutes, you’ll have an average of 1 minute and 45 seconds for each quant question.

However, you should consider this average time a baseline — a reference point by which you can track your pace — not a fixed point to which you must adhere. Because of the varying levels of difficulty of questions on the test and your particular strengths and weaknesses, some questions may take you only 30 seconds to answer, while others may require three minutes.

In fact, you should expect some variation in time per problem and consider that as part of your test strategy. If, for example, you answer a relatively easy quant question in 30 seconds, you’ve just “banked” an extra 1 minute and 15 seconds for a more difficult question in that section, or an extra 45 seconds each for two medium-level questions.


An internal progress clock allows you to intuitively understand how far you’ve progressed in a GRE quant question. Are you close to getting a correct answer? Halfway? A third of the way? Knowing your approximate progress in solving a quant problem can help you determine whether you should keep working or make the best possible guess and move on to the next question.

Much of this comes down to being familiar enough with the various GRE quant question types to know, in general, the steps that it will take to solve a particular question. This is yet another reason why ample, methodical practice with realistic GRE questions is essential to your GRE prep.


Although you may not have the time or ability to solve every quant problem on the GRE, a solid GRE timing strategy is to answer every quant question as you encounter it.

Here’s why. If you leave several questions blank because you’re unsure of their answers, and then you run out of time before you revisit them, there’s no chance that you’ll get any of those questions correct.

Instead, if you guess an answer for each question you’re unsure of and then mark the question for review, even if you run out of time, there is still a chance you guessed correctly. Remember, on the GRE there is no penalty for an incorrect answer. Then, if you do have time remaining after you’ve gone through all the questions in a section, you can bring up the status screen and revisit the questions that you marked during the first run-through.

Another benefit to this strategy is that you will be familiar with all the questions you guessed on, and thus you’ll better be able to decide which ones are worth spending your remaining time trying to solve.


At the top left of your testing screen will be a countdown clock, and you should use that clock to help you keep pace both during your practice exams and your actual GRE.

Since you have 35 minutes to answer 20 questions in each section, you’ll want to complete half of those questions with about 18 minutes remaining on the clock. If you have more than 18 minutes remaining, that’s great! You’ll probably have plenty of time to finish the questions if you continue at your current pace. However, if the clock indicates that you have fewer than 18 minutes, realize that you’ll need to hustle a bit in order to answer every question.


In many cases, when you encounter a GRE quant question that you’re having a hard time solving, it makes sense to try using estimation to solve it. You can use estimation to quickly determine whether an answer is reasonable. For example, if you had to multiply 4.17 by 199, you could estimate 4.17 to be 4 and 199 to be 200, and so your estimated answer would be 4 x 200 = 800. This estimate would allow you to include or exclude some of the answer choices. For example, if the answer choices were 8.30, 83, 830, and 8,300, then estimation would actually provide all the information needed for correctly answering the question.

Good luck studying, and reach out to me if you have any questions or need any more specific advice.

Warm regards,
Scott