How to beat test anxiety on the GRE

You’ve studied your hardest for months on end, sacrificing nights and weekends to test preparation and turning your life upside down to make sure that you are absolutely ready for your exam. And then on test day, nothing is as you planned it. Whether because of a chaotic morning or for no seeming reason at all, as soon as you get into the test it feels like you’ve forgotten everything from the area of a circle to the definition of “amply.” 

If that seems like something you’ve experienced in past tests, you may already be familiar with the idea of test anxiety – and you may also have some strategies on what to do in order to prevent or manage it! Regardless of whether you’ve dealt with test anxiety for years or whether you just want to make sure to put your best foot forward on test day, here are a few tips to help you conquer your test day jitters and do your very best. 

Why a little anxiety can be good

Before we jump into talking about what to do to manage your test anxiety, let’s take a minute to reframe it. It’s really easy to see anxiety as something that gets in the way, that prevents you from doing your very best. And it’s true that too much anxiety on test day is going to interfere with your performance. But all that said, anxiety exists for a reason. 

From an evolutionary psychology point of view, if you are more alert and keyed into every little sound as you are foraging for berries, then you’re more likely to hear the wild boar that threatens to charge you if you get too close. You’re not going to be running from any large feral pigs on test day (hopefully), but the same principle applies: a little tension can help you spot “threats” in GRE problems (tricky wording, “hidden” exceptions in quantitative comparisons questions) that you might miss if you were feeling a bit too comfortable. So even as you do the work to bring your test day jitters in line, remember that the goal isn’t necessarily to get rid of all of the worry around test day: it’s to turn that anxiety into something that is useful – or at the very least something that won’t interfere with doing your best!

First: Control what you can control. Don’t worry about what you can’t. 

The first step to managing test anxiety is one that you’ve probably heard before, but maybe worded a little differently. On the GRE, there are going to be two types of situations: situations you can control and situations that you can’t. The important things here are to a) control the controllables, b) let the uncontrollables go, and c) distinguish between the two. 

Here’s what you can control leading up to test day and on test day itself. 

You can control (to an extent) your preparation by making sure that you’ve made a good study plan and that you have stuck to it. If you haven’t been perfect about it, that’s okay. Nobody’s perfect! What’s important is that you stick to your study plan at least 80% of the time. It’s consistency that matters, not what you do on any given day. 

You can also control whether you are eating well, exercising, and hydrating the months, weeks, and days going into the test. All three will help make sure that your body and mind will be ready to perform your best – and to handle any stressful situations that come your way. Exercise especially can help your body and mind become better in general at learning how to deal with stressful situations . So don’t neglect your body as you strengthen your mind for test day – your mind and body are linked!

You can’t control what traffic is like on test day or if your car suddenly gets a flat on the way to the testing center. However, there are things on test day that you can control having to do with your commute! Take some time the week before your test to scope out the testing center. Figure out where to park, whether and how to pay for parking, and check out any potential road closures for the day you’ll be taking the test. Also take a look at a map app on your phone with the ability to predict traffic typical for the time of day you’ll be arriving so there’s less of an opportunity for nasty traffic surprises. 

The last big thing that you can control is how you study. Although it can be tempting to make studying a comfortable experience, there’s some benefit to studying the same way you’re going to take the exam (at least a bit!). This means ditching the cell phone (and potentially the music and snacks) while you’re studying and resisting the urge to peek at the answer before you’ve tried the problem. It also means doing longer sets of problems where you might need to struggle a little bit before you actually look at any answers. Doing longer sets of problems helps you mimic test conditions by getting you into the mindset that you can’t check your work after every problem and that you’ll just have to live with a little uncertainty. (It can also help you refine your strategies around topics like flagging!)

Second, dial in test day

We’ve already talked a little about hydration and eating well, as well as bits of test-day preparation like making sure that you have a plan for how you’re going to get to the testing center. But let’s take another moment to talk a bit more directly about food and drink the day of. 

Obviously you want to make sure that you’re hydrated going into the test (but not so hydrated that you’re going to be worried about needing to go to the bathroom in the middle of a section!). You’ll also want to pay attention to things like caffeine intake. While it may be tempting to sneak an extra cup of coffee to give yourself a bit of an edge (especially if pre-test jitters left you a little tired), avoid that temptation. Follow your normal routines around caffeine intake so that you don’t end up either giving yourself a headache if you’ve had too little caffeine compared to your normal consumption or causing your heart rate (and anxiety) to spike if you have had more than your usual intake.

The other thing to do is to make sure that you’ve had a good breakfast (regardless of whether you usually eat breakfast). Test day anxiety can make you feel like you aren’t hungry, so it’s especially important to eat even if you aren’t quite feeling hungry that morning. Just as some people experience “hanger” (hunger-induced anger), others experience hunger-induced anxiety. Even if that doesn’t feel like it describes you, eating a good breakfast before your exam is never a wrong option. 

Finally, focus on the good and follow the plan

You’ve made it. You’ve sat down and are ready to take your test. And then the first question that shows up in that Quant section is something unlike anything you’ve ever seen before and your adrenaline starts to spike. What do you do?

Well, first off, the best thing you can do is to smile. Remember the advice about controlling what you can control and not worrying about anything else? This is where that is especially true. There’s nothing you can do to control what kinds of oddball questions the tastemakers are going to throw your way on test day. If you’re struggling with a new question type, chances are other people are too. So smile! 

It’s also potentially a good thing. If you have no idea how to approach that question, chances are staring at it for another two minutes isn’t going to help. Read it, take an educated guess, and then flag it and move on. If you have time for it at the end to puzzle it out, that’s great! And if you don’t, then that’s okay. You spent your time on questions that you were more likely to get right, which is the right thing to do for you.

In long distance running, there’s a lot of talk about “trusting the training” or “trusting the process.” The idea goes that you have prepared your body for a long marathon or ultramarathon and that you need to trust that – given that you follow the plan – you can get through as long as you follow the plan you’ve set forth. The same goes for the GRE. Follow the flagging strategy that you’ve developed and trust that it’s going to get you to where you need to be. Focus on the questions that you’re getting right rather than the ones that stump you. You just need to follow the plan you set forth, remember your strategies, and do your best. 

When all else fails

Sometimes despite your best efforts, you’re going to get flustered. That’s okay. The important thing is that you have a way to bring yourself back to reality and ground yourself in the test. That’s why having a few grounding exercises at your disposal can be vital. Let’s talk about two quick grounding exercises that you can use on test day to bring your brain and body back into alignment. 

5-4-3-2-1

This is a classic grounding exercise that might be familiar to you already. Take a few seconds to find five things you can see (the computer, your notepad, your shorts, the ceiling, whatever), then four things you can feel (your shirt, the table, etc.), three things you can hear (the buzz of the computers), two things you can smell, and one thing you can taste (if you can!). 

While this technique may seem like it takes a while, taking a few extra seconds to find these things to ground you in reality can help get your emotions in check and make sure that you have a successful rest of your test.

5 breaths

Another grounding technique that can help is even simpler: just count your breaths. Sit with your eyes closed and feel the rhythm of your breathing, counting your breaths: 1 for the rise, two for the fall, 3… and so forth until you get to 10. The key here is to really focus on the exercise even if it feels foreign or silly to do so. 

Last thoughts

Test anxiety is natural, and there are as many ways to cope with it as there are people who suffer from it. Not every technique is going to work for every person, and some days the techniques that you find are really effective one day just might not be effective that day. Build up your arsenal of techniques to fight test anxiety, and you’ll be able to deal with it like a champ on test day.