What is GMAT?

The Graduate Management Admissions Test (GMAT) is a standardized test that is an admissions requirement for most Business schools in the World. The GMAT is owned and administered by Graduate Management Admisisons Council (GMAC).

GMAT scores are accepted by following Business schools. 

GMAT Syllabus – 

Analytical Writing Assessment

This section of the exam requires you to analyse a given argument and write a critique on it. The argument topics are mostly of general interest and may be related to business. AWA will check your ability to organize your thoughts and use of given evidence to support your viewpoint.

Integrated Reasoning

GMAT IR section has following question categories:

• Multi-source reasoning – questions will ask you to synthesize, compare, interpret or apply the information presented in written passages, tables, graphs, diagrams and other types of visual representation
• Table analysis – questions ask you to determine statistics, ratios, proportions or probabilities, etc. from given spreadsheet-like table with drop-down menu
• Graphics interpretation – fill-in-the-blanks type questions to be answered on the basis of given bar graphs, line graphs, scatterplots and bubble graphs
• Two-part analysis – questions will ask you to calculate proportion, determine trade-offs, etc. and choose answer options that will be given in tabular format.

Quantitative Reasoning

There are only two question categories for GMAT Quant: Problem Solving and Data Sufficiency. All these questions fundamentally belong from following topics.

• Arithmetic – Number systems, Exponents, Roots, Fractions, Decimals, Percentages, Ratios and proportion, Venn Diagrams, Permutations & Combinations, and Probability
• Algebra – (One/ two/ three) Variable Equations, Inequalities, Absolute value (Modulus), Functions
• Geometry – Lines and Angles, Polygons, Circles, Solid geometry, Coordinate geometry
• Word problems – Rate, Time and work, mixtures and alligations, Discounts, Profit and loss, Measurement problems and data interpretation

Verbal Reasoning

This section measures your ability to read and comprehend written content and to reason and evaluate arguments. Three types of verbal reasoning questions are:

• Reading comprehension – questions ask you to refer to a passage of up to 350 words and answer questions based on main idea, supporting ideas, inferences, context, style and tone, etc.
• Critical reasoning – questions check you on argument construction, argument evaluation and formulating/evaluating a plan of action
• Sentence correction – questions are categorised into agreement, diction, grammatical construction, idiom, logical predication, parallelism, rhetorical construction and verb form

GMAT Exam Eligibility

The only eligibility requirement for GMAT is the document required to prove your identity. In India, you’ll need a valid passport. You’ll have to get your original passport (not photocopies) which clearly shows your full name, photograph and signature.

No other documentation (like birth certificate, international driving license etc) can be used as an alternate identity proof. They are very strict about this.

Apart from this eligibility requirement, GMAC does not set any age, qualification, timing related pre-requisites. However, there will be a range of eligibility criteria set by universities that accept GMAT scores. For each of their programs, they may have minimum age, experience and qualification related filters.

GMAT Exam dates in 2019 – 2020

You can take it any time of the year by taking an appointment with the closest GMAT exam center. But with this flexibility, there’s another issue.

During the peak application season (generally around August to December), it may be difficult for you to get an appointment in your preferred exam center. You’d be forced to book a day and time at another center that may not be close to where you live.

This makes it important to plan your GMAT preparation schedule and test dates well in advance. You can take the GMAT General Test once every 16 days up to five times in a continuous rolling 12 month period.

You can find the available dates and register for GMAT test by going at this link.