A 6 min read

Keeping up with its annual feature, the GMAC has recently released the latest Official Guide – GMAT OG 2019. In this article, we will review and answer the following questions pertaining to the GMAT Official Guide 2019. Read our latest review on recently released GMAT OG 2020.

• What is added in GMAT Official Guide 2019?
• GMAT Official Guide 2019 vs GMAT Official Guide 2018 Review
• Should you upgrade to GMAT OG 2019?
• Is the online tool that comes with OG 2019 worth it?
• Overall Takeaways

We will continue to provide more details in the subsequent articles in this series. Our next article will cover the details of questions added in the Verbal section of GMAT Official Guide 2019.

What is added in GMAT Official Guide 2019?

• No change in the number of questions in OG 2019

The total number of questions in each section – SC, CR, RC, PS, and DS – remains the same as in GMAT OG 2018.  So, there is no increase in the number of questions in the book.
The table below shows the distribution of questions in the GMAT Official Guide 2019.

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• No change in the type of questions asked on the GMAT

Per our analysis of all the newly added questions in OG 2019, there is no noteworthy change in the kind of questions GMAT tests.

Strong foundation skills – Understanding the meaning in Sentence Correction, identifying the argument structure in Critical Reasoning, applying reading strategies in Reading Comprehension, and having strong quantitative foundation for Quantitative sections – are very critical to solving each type of question on the GMAT.

Once you have strong foundation skills, following a structured step by step process is the key to getting that 750+ score on the test.

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GMAT Official Guide 2019 vs GMAT Official Guide 2018 Review

As mentioned in the above section, there is no major change in OG 2019 with respect to the number or type of questions. In this section, we have provided a comparative review of OG 2019 with GMAT Official Guide 2018.

• No noteworthy change in the distribution of easy, medium, and difficult questions in GMAT Verbal

Each official guide 2019 provides questions of three difficulty levels. There is not much change in this distribution in the GMAT OG 2019 in the verbal section.

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The table below shows the distribution of easy, medium, and difficult questions across different question types in GMAT verbal section.

Question Type	Easy	Medium	Difficult	Comparison with GMAT Official Guide 2018
Sentence Correction	31	42	67	No Change
Critical Reasoning	33	43	48	Same number of difficult questions    3 additional medium questions in OG 2019. Hence, 3 fewer easy questions in GMAT OG 2019.
Reading Comprehension	33	46	60	Same number of difficult questions    1 additional medium question in OG 2019. Hence, 1 fewer easy question in GMAT OG 2019.
Quantitative	157	82	165	Same number of difficult questions    19 additional easy questions in OG 2019. Hence, 19 fewer medium difficulty level questions in GMAT OG 2019

• Greater number of easy questions than medium difficulty level questions in GMAT Quant

As in GMAT Verbal, questions in GMAT Quantitative section are also classified into three difficulty levels – easy, medium, and difficult. In GMAT Official Guide 2019, the number of difficult questions is the same as the number of difficult questions in GMAT Official Guide 2018.  But there are 19 more easy questions than medium difficulty level questions in GMAT quantitative section.

Here is the data for the distribution:

• Easy – 157 questions in OG 2019 (vs. 138 in OG 2018)
• Medium – 82 questions (vs. 101 in OG 2018)
• Difficult – 165 questions (same number in GMAT OG 2018)

So, what does this mean for you as a test taker – Nothing much. This distribution has no bearing whatsoever on the difficulty level of the test since the test is adaptive in nature. This data simply shows that this group of questions has easier questions than the medium difficulty level questions.

Purchasing GMAT OG is a cost associated with your GMAT preparation. Read about how much does it actually cost to take the GMAT

To purchase GMAT Official Guide 2019 or not?

Before we give our recommendation about your purchase decision, it is important that we present some noteworthy facts to you.

1. GMAT Official Guide 2019 does not just mean the book. It also includes the online platform.
2. The GMAT Official Guide online portal once activated has a validity of 1 year.
3. The OG portal can be extended but pricing options are not readily available.
4. GMAT Official Guide 2019 is priced at $35 on amazon.com and Official Guide 2018 is priced at $25 on the same.
5. On wiley.com, it is priced even higher at $48.

Now comes our recommendation:

• If you are just starting your preparation and do not have any official guide, then we recommend you purchase OG 2019.
• Frankly, if you are up for saving money, you may purchase GMAT Official Guide 2018 as well since it is $10 cheaper than its latest counterpart.
• This is because from a subject matter standpoint there is not much of noteworthy addition in OG 2019.
• If you already have previous editions of OG, then we do not recommend investing in GMAT OG 2019.
• As mentioned earlier, from the standpoint of subject matter, there is no noteworthy addition.

Now we understand that you must be wondering about the online part of the book.  For this very purpose, we have added it as a separate section below.

Is the Online Tool worth Purchasing Official Guide 2019?

If you have GMAT OG 2017 or OG 2018 official guides, then it is likely that your access to the online tool has already expired.  In this case, you have the book but not the access to the online tool.

Now you may wonder, “should I invest in OG 2019. ” And our straightforward answer is “NO”.  We do not believe that it’s worth spending $37 on OG 2019 if you already have previous editions of GMAT Official Guides just to get access to the online tool.

In order to compensate for the lack of this online tool, we recommend you utilize the OG quizzes on e-GMAT platform in conjunction with your OG book.

On e-GMAT platform, each OG question is curated according to concepts and process that it tests.  Each question comes with brilliantly created solutions using the e-GMAT process so that you understand the optimum process of solving each OG question.  Lastly, each OG question has its own dedicated forum so that you can ask any doubt that may come across while solving or reviewing each OG question.

Buying the GMAT OG 2019 online tool might not be worth it, but buying the GMAT ESR is worth your money if you are planning to retake the GMAT.

Our Review of the GMAT Official Guide 2019

Here is a quick summary analysis of Official Guide 2019.

1. What is new in OG 2019?
   • There is no appreciable change in content in this edition of OG.
2. Should you upgrade to GMAT OG 2019?
   • If you already have previous editions of OG – OG 2018 or OG 2017, you do not need to upgrade to OG 2019.
   • If you do not have OG yet, then it makes sense to invest in OG 2019.
3. Is the online tool that comes with GMAT Official Guide 2019 worth it?
   • Not really.  Do not shell out $37 only to get access to the online tool.
   • Instead, utilize e-GMAT OG quizzes to get benefit from carefully curated questions with detailed process-based solutions.

If you are planning to take the GMAT, we can give you access to quality online content to prepare. We are the most reviewed GMAT prep company on gmatclub with more than 1820 reviews (as on Mar 30, 2019). Why don’t you take a free trial and judge it for yourself? Write to us at acethegmat@e-gmat.com in case of any query.