A 16 min read

Your GMAT score is more than just a number—it’s a key factor in your business school application, influencing admissions decisions, scholarship opportunities, and even job prospects post-MBA. Therefore, understanding your GMAT score and percentile ranking is more important than ever. Whether you’re preparing for your first attempt or considering a retake, having a clear understanding of how GMAT scores are calculated can help you set realistic targets and refine your preparation strategy. A strong GMAT score not only enhances your application but also increases your chances of securing scholarships and admission to top-tier MBA programs.

In this article, we’ll break down the GMAT scoring system and percentile rankings for 2025, helping you interpret what your score means in relation to other test-takers. We’ll also introduce a 2025 GMAT Score Calculator and a detailed GMAT Score Chart, allowing you to quickly assess your performance and determine where you stand.From understanding scaled scores to evaluating how each section contributes to your overall score, this guide will equip you with the knowledge and tools needed to approach the GMAT with confidence. Let’s dive in and explore how you can use your score strategically to strengthen your business school application.

You can calculate your total GMAT score now:

The best way to understand the new GMAT scoring system is by trying the test out for yourself, and get a detailed GMAT score analysis report.

Understanding GMAT Scores

A strong understanding of how the GMAT is scored is crucial for setting your study goals and interpreting your performance. In this section, we’ll break down the score ranges, explain what scaled scores are, and detail how your performance on individual sections contributes to your overall GMAT score.

GMAT Score Range and Sections

The GMAT Exam is divided into three main sections, each contributing to the total score. Each section is scored on a scaled score ranging from 60 to 90, and these section scores are combined to produce the overall GMAT score, which ranges from 205 to 805.

Section	Scaled Score Range	Number of Questions	Time (Minutes)
Quantitative Reasoning	60–90	21	45
Verbal Reasoning	60–90	23	45
Data Insights	60–90	20	45
Total GMAT Score	205–805	64	2 hours 15 minutes

Note: The GMAT Exam now refers to the current format, incorporating these three sections.

What Is a Scaled Score on the GMAT?

A scaled score is a transformation of your raw score (the number of questions you answer correctly) into a standardized range that accounts for differences in difficulty between test forms. Here’s how it works:

• Raw Score vs. Scaled Score:
  • The raw score is simply the total number of questions you answered correctly.
  • However, because different test editions may have varying levels of difficulty, raw scores are converted into a scaled score. This ensures fairness and consistency across all test-takers.
• Why Use Scaled Scores?
  • They provide a consistent measure of performance regardless of which test version you take.
  • They allow business schools to compare scores on a common scale, knowing that a 75 in any section reflects the same level of proficiency.
• Translation to Total GMAT Score:
  • The scaled scores from the Quantitative, Verbal, and Data Insights sections are combined and then transformed using a proprietary algorithm to produce your total GMAT score.
  • This total score is designed to reflect your overall aptitude and readiness for business school, with higher scores indicating stronger performance.

How the GMAT Exam is Scored: The Adaptive Testing Algorithm

The GMAT Exam is computer-adaptive, meaning the difficulty of the test adapts to your performance in real time. Here’s a simplified look at how it works:

1. Starting Point:
   • The exam begins with a question of medium difficulty.
2. Adapting to Performance:
   • If you answer correctly, the next question will be slightly harder, testing your upper limits.
   • If you answer incorrectly, the next question will be easier, allowing the test to pinpoint your skill level.
3. Impact on Scaled Scores:
   • Your ability to answer more challenging questions correctly contributes to a higher scaled score.
   • The adaptive nature of the exam means that it’s not just the number of correct answers that matters, but the difficulty level of the questions you tackle.

Calculating the Total GMAT Score

The total GMAT score is derived from your scaled scores in the three sections. Although the exact algorithm is proprietary, here’s what you need to know:

• Equal Weight Across Sections:
  • Each section’s scaled score (60–90) plays an equal role in determining your total score.
• Balanced Performance:
  • A balanced performance across all sections generally leads to a higher overall score. For instance, scoring high in one section but low in another might not be as beneficial as maintaining consistently strong scores throughout.
• Example of Score Translation:
  • If you score 82 in Quantitative, 78 in Verbal, and 80 in Data Insights, these scaled scores are combined and processed to yield an overall score of 605
  • Conversely, if one section lags significantly, your total score might be lower, even if the other sections are strong.

Additional Considerations on the GMAT Score

• Skipping and Reviewing Answers:
  • The current GMAT Exam format allows for strategic review and editing of answers. You can mark questions and return to them later, with the option to change up to three answers per section.
  • This feature helps ensure that simple mistakes or second-guessing don’t overly penalize your scaled score.
• Test Adaptation and Strategy:
  • Because of the adaptive testing algorithm, it’s important to focus not just on accuracy but also on handling questions that progressively become more challenging.
  • A well-prepared candidate will be ready for the variability in question difficulty, which is factored into the scaled scores.

Key Takeaways on GMAT Scores

• Scaled Score Ranges:
  • Each section is scored on a scale from 60 to 90. These are not direct counts of correct answers but standardized scores that adjust for question difficulty.
• Total Score Conversion:
  • The total GMAT score (205–805) is computed from the three scaled section scores through a proprietary algorithm, ensuring a fair comparison across different test versions.
• Adaptive Nature:
  • The adaptive testing mechanism tailors the exam to your performance, meaning both accuracy and the ability to handle tougher questions are essential for a high scaled score.

Ready to tackle the GMAT Focus Edition? e-GMAT offers a Personalized Study Planner and top-notch Free GFE mock exam to help you prepare effectively. As the most reviewed GMAT prep company on GMAT Club with 2800+ reviews we’re here to support your GFE journey. Take advantage of our free trial with the best quality content. Start your path to success today!

GMAT Score Calculator & GMAT Score Chart: Estimate Your Score with Ease

Understanding how your GMAT score is calculated can be challenging, but with the right tools, you can estimate your performance and set clear goals. To make this process easier, we’ve created a GMAT Score Calculator that allows you to input your section-wise performance and get an estimated total GMAT score instantly. Additionally, our GMAT Score Chart provides a quick reference to see how different scaled scores translate into total scores and percentile rankings.

GMAT Score Calculator: Predict Your GMAT Score

Our GMAT Score Calculator is a user-friendly tool that helps you estimate your total GMAT score based on your Quantitative, Verbal, and Data Insights section scores. Since the GMAT scoring system uses a complex algorithm to determine the final score, this calculator gives you a close approximation of your expected score, helping you assess your readiness for the exam.

How to Use the GMAT Score Calculator:

1. Enter your scaled scores (between 60-90) for the Quantitative, Verbal, and Data Insights sections.
2. Click on “Calculate” to get an estimated GMAT total score (205-805).
3. Compare your result with percentile rankings to understand how your score stacks up against other test-takers.

Try out our GMAT Score Calculator below and see where you currently stand.

GMAT Score Chart: How Scaled Scores Translate into Total Scores

The GMAT uses scaled scores (60-90 per section), which are then converted into a total GMAT score (205-805). Our GMAT Score Chart provides a reference guide to help you understand how your section scores contribute to your overall score.

Ready to tackle the GMAT Focus Edition? e-GMAT offers a Personalized Study Planner and top-notch Free GFE mock exam to help you prepare effectively. As the most reviewed GMAT prep company on GMAT Club with 2800+ reviews we’re here to support your GFE journey. Take advantage of our free trial with the best quality content. Start your path to success today!

GMAT Percentiles: How to convert your score into percentile ranking?

Here’s what the GMAC says about GMAT Scores and GMAT percentiles: “GMAT Scores also include a Percentile Ranking. This number indicates the percentage of test-takers that you performed better than.” They further explain that while your score will not change, the Percentile Ranking may as GMAT Percentiles are recalculated every summer using exam data from the prior three years.

Take a look at the table (GMAT Score Chart) below to understand the relation between GMAT Test Scores and GMAT Percentiles.

GMAT Scores & percentiles :

1) Total Score sorted by Percentile Ranking:

Use this GMAT Score Chart (updated August 2024) to understand the corresponding percentile values for total GMAT scores :

2) Quantitative reasoning Score sorted by Percentile Ranking:

Use this GMAT Score Chart (updated August 2024) to understand the corresponding percentile values for GMAT Quant scores :

3) Verbal reasoning Score sorted by Percentile Ranking:

Use this GMAT Score Chart (updated August 2024) to understand the corresponding percentile values for GMAT Verbal scores :

4) Data Insights Score sorted by Percentile Ranking:

Use this GMAT Score Chart (updated August 2024) to understand the corresponding percentile values for GMAT Data Insight scores :

Data Insig

Ready to tackle the GMAT Focus Edition? e-GMAT offers a Personalized Study Planner and top-notch Free GFE mock exam to help you prepare effectively. As the most reviewed GMAT prep company on GMAT Club with 2800+ reviews we’re here to support your GMAT journey. Take advantage of our free trial with the best quality content. Start your path to success today!

Enhanced Scoring and Granularity

The GMAT features a completely revamped scoring system designed to provide a more precise and equitable assessment of candidate abilities. The composite score now ranges from 205 to 805 and integrates performance from three sections: Verbal, Quantitative, and Data Insights. Key enhancements include:

• Refined Ability Measurement:
  The updated algorithm assigns additional ability points to top-performing candidates. For example, any composite score above 735 now achieves a 100th percentile ranking, offering a clearer differentiation among high scorers.
• Granular Scoring Distribution:
  The new scoring scale features a more detailed distribution of ability levels. This means that even small differences in section scores translate into meaningful differences in percentiles. For instance, a candidate scoring 86 on the Quant section may be placed in the 91st percentile, while a one-point difference—a score of 85—could drop them to the 88th percentile. Such granularity ensures that the scoring system captures subtle differences in performance.
• Balanced Integration of Data Insights:
  With the addition of Data Insights as a contributing section, the GMAT Focus Edition now reflects modern analytical demands. This change further refines the composite score, ensuring that the test measures a broader range of skills essential for business school success.

Why do we need more granularity for high scorers?

	GMAT Focus Edition	Takeaway
90th percentile	5 levels	Better scoring in GMAT
80th percentile	3 levels	Better scoring in GMAT
70th percentile	2 levels
60th percentile	1 level
Below 60th percentile	20 levels

The table above shows the granularity of the Quant score for the new GMAT . One question that you may ask is – why we need higher granularity for high scorers when clearly it comes at the expense of lower granularity for those with lower percentile.

Let us illustrate this with an example:

Let us take a scoring paradigm in which one percentile = 1000 students. Furthermore, let us take two students, John and Jay.

1. John's actual ability is 98^th percentile. However, given the limitation of the scoring scale, he is assigned a 96th percentile score.
2. Jay’s actual ability is 72nd percentile. However, given the limitation of the scoring scale, he is assigned a 70^th percentile score.

While the overall error for both John and Jay is two percentile points, which translates to 2000 students, the overall ranking error is very different.

Here is the definition of ranking error = ABS (Assigned rank – Real Rank)/ (100-Rank)

The test tells John that there are 4,000 students who are at the same level or ahead than him. However, in reality, only 2000 students should have been ahead of him. In other words, to the outside world (B-schools), there are twice as many students who are just as good or better than John. Hence, his ranking error is (2000/2000) 100%.

However, for Jay, the test tells that there are 30,000 students who are just as good or better than Jay, whereas the real number is 28,000. In other words, the error percentage of his rank is 2000/28,000 = 1/14 = 7%

So even though the error in ability estimation for both John and Jay was 2 percentage points, the overall ranking error was 15X as high for John as for Jay, making the test much more unfair to John.

Classic (Old) GMAT vs Current GMAT - Scoring Architecture 

When looking at a new GMAT™ Official Score Report, a common question arises: how can we compare candidates with new scores to those with scores from the classic GMAT? According to GMAC, due to fundamental changes in both score scales and score distribution, direct comparison of total scores or section scores between the two exam versions is not meaningful. However, percentile information can be used to link and compare exam scores. GMAC provides a Score Concordance Table to facilitate this comparison. 

Here are some observations from the table below: 

1. The mean score for the GMAT Focus Edition is 553.35– much lower than the mean score for the classic GMAT (574.51) 

2. For scores above the 60^th percentile, the GMAT Focus Percentiles are always higher than the corresponding percentiles of the classic GMAT. For scores lower than the 60^th percentile, in pure percentile terms, students score higher on the classic GMAT than on the Focus Edition. 

GMAT Official Score Report

The GMAT includes new and improved detailed performance insights with your Official Score Report, at no additional cost! 

In addition to your total and section scores and percentile rankings, you’ll get insights by section, question type, and content domain (meaning, a specific area of knowledge), details on your time management, and data on how you performed compared to others that applied to the same program.  

Performance summary charts provide a view into your performance across the entire exam: 

• Performance by Section – provides an overview of your Total Score, section scores, and your percentile ranking for each. 

• Performance by Program & School – shows your Total Score percentile ranking compared to the percentile rankings of test takers who sent their GMAT scores to the same program within the past 5 years. 

Subsection charts provide details about how you performed on specific domains within the Verbal Reasoning, Quantitative Reasoning, and Data Insights sections. It is important to note that not all subdomains are present within each of the three sections. (Please note that if a specific chart is not relevant to a particular section, it will not be provided.) 

• Performance by Content Domain - shows your percentile ranking based on the most recent 5 years of data for each content domain within the individual section. 

• Performance by Question Type - shows your percentile ranking based on the most recent 5 years of data for each question type within the individual section. 

• Performance by Fundamental Skills - shows your percentile ranking based on the most recent 5 years of data for each fundamental skill within the individual section. 

• Time Management & Performance - shows your response time in minutes, including any review time, for each question within the individual section. 

• Summary of Question Review & Changes - shows your review activity for that section, including how much time you spent reviewing and editing questions in the section. 

Accessing Your Official Score Report 

Your Official Score Report is available via your mba.com account typically within 3-5 business days*. You will be notified via email once your Official Score Report is available in your mba.com account (if you do not see the email, check your "junk mail" or "spam" folder). It includes your exam appointment details, some personal data that was provided at registration, individual section scores, Total Score, and percentile rankings. It will also include previous scores from other GMAT exams taken within the past five years (if applicable).  

There is no need to cancel your score for the GMAT Focus Edition. 

Since you are not required to select which business school programs receive your Official Score Report before you take the GMAT Focus Edition, there will never be a need to cancel your score. You only send the scores you want to, and if you do not send your Official Score Report to schools after the exam, they will not be able to see it. It will only remain accessible via your mba.com account for you to view. 

Please note that once you send your score to a program, GMAC cannot undo that action or disable the school's ability to view your score. 

Overall Summary | GMAT Score Chart & Percentile

The GMAT Focus Edition, which replaced the classic GMAT in January 2024, represents a significant evolution in graduate management testing. Three key developments stand out: 

1. Enhanced Score Differentiation: The Focus Edition has fundamentally improved the scoring system, particularly for high performers. By fixing the quant scoring architecture and introducing more granular ability levels at higher percentiles, it provides a more precise assessment of candidate abilities. This is especially evident in the distribution of 20 ability points for the top 25 percentile, compared to the classic GMAT's 14 points. 

2. Scoring Stability: The August 2024 percentile updates, representing the first major data refresh since the test's launch, have demonstrated remarkable stability in the scoring system. Minor shifts, such as the 86Q moving from 91st to 92nd percentile, validate the initial scoring framework while showing expected refinements based on larger sample sizes. 

3. Balanced Section Weighting: By equally weighing all three sections - Data Insights, Quant, and Verbal - the Focus Edition ensures that candidates strong in any area have similar opportunities to achieve high scores, provided they put in the necessary preparation. 

While the Focus Edition's scoring architecture is more complex than its predecessor's, it offers a fairer and more comprehensive assessment of candidates' abilities. The stability observed in the August 2024 updates suggests that this new system effectively serves its intended purpose: providing business schools with more accurate and detailed insights into candidate capabilities while offering test-takers a more equitable assessment of their skills. 

The enhanced Score Report, with its detailed performance insights and comparative analytics, further supports both candidates and admissions committees in making informed decisions. As the test continues to evolve, the foundation laid by this scoring system appears robust and well-suited to meet the needs of today's diverse applicant pool. 

GMAT official prep materials

Official GMAT prep resources, including the Official Guide for GMAT Focus (Official Guide 2023) and full-length practice tests, became available on mba.com on June 6, 2023. In addition, every e-GMATer can access an industry-leading GMAT Focus Course with 1000+ questions and free mock test , and it will help you understand the GMAT focus syllabus better through practice.

Read this article to understand about the GMAT Official Prep content – What is it & How to use it.

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FAQs

Q1: What is a GMAT score and how is it calculated?
A: The GMAT score is a composite number that reflects your performance across three sections—Quantitative, Verbal, and Data Insights—each of which is assigned a scaled score between 60 and 90. These scaled scores are then combined and converted using a proprietary algorithm to yield a total score ranging from 205 to 805.

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Q2: What are scaled scores and why are they used on the GMAT?
A: Scaled scores are standardized scores that transform your raw score (the number of correct answers) into a consistent range (60–90) for each section. This conversion adjusts for differences in question difficulty across various test forms, ensuring fairness and comparability among all test-takers.

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Q3: How do GMAT percentiles work, and what do they mean?
A: Percentiles indicate how your score compares to other test-takers. For example, if you score in the 90th percentile, it means you performed better than 90% of candidates. Percentiles provide context for your performance and can help you understand where you stand in the competitive landscape.

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Q4: How can I use the GMAT Score Calculator provided in this guide?
A: The GMAT Score Calculator is an interactive tool that allows you to input your scaled section scores (ranging from 60 to 90) for Quantitative, Verbal, and Data Insights. Once you click “Calculate,” the tool estimates your total GMAT score and corresponding percentile, helping you gauge your potential performance and set realistic goals.

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Q5: How accurate are the estimated scores and percentiles in the chart?
A: The estimates provided in the GMAT Score Chart are based on historical data and common scoring patterns. While they offer a useful benchmark, keep in mind that the actual GMAT scoring process is adaptive and proprietary, so your final score may vary slightly.

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Q6: Can I rely solely on the GMAT Score Calculator to predict my exam results?
A: While the calculator is a valuable tool for estimating your potential performance, it should be used as part of a broader study strategy. Incorporate practice tests and additional prep materials to get a more comprehensive understanding of your strengths and areas for improvement.

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Q7: What strategies can help improve my GMAT score?
A: Focus on identifying and strengthening your weak areas, practice consistently using official GMAT prep materials, and simulate real test conditions with full-length practice exams. Reviewing your performance using tools like the GMAT Score Calculator and Chart can also help tailor your study plan for better results.