Free Online GMAT Course from GMAT Ninja
Welcome to the world’s best 100% free GMAT prep course!
At GMAT Ninja, we’re passionate about helping students reduce the stress and pain of studying for admissions exams – regardless of their ability to pay for tutoring or a test prep program. Our free course has helped tens of thousands of MBA applicants improve their scores, and it represents our honest effort to provide everything you need for the latest version of the GMAT exam.
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Below, you’ll find a quick overview of what’s tested on the GMAT, followed by section-by-section guidance and resources.
What’s on this page?
Basics
Quantitative reasoning
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Critical Reasoning
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ReadinG ComprehensioN
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Data Insights
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Custom Online Tutoring
GMAT Basics
If you’re taking the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT), odds are good that you’re pursuing a business-focused graduate programs such as an MBA, MiM, and MFin programs, among others. To evaluate your skills for entry into those programs, the GMAT assesses a mix of quantitative, reading, reasoning, and data analytics skills.
For many test-takers, the biggest challenge of the GMAT is that it doesn’t simply assess how much “stuff” you know. More than anything, it tests your ability to think flexibly, maintain mental clarity under pressure, and make decisions amid time limitations and other constraints.
Many students struggle on the GMAT not because they’re fundamentally bad at reading or math, but because they misunderstand how the test works, rely on inefficient study habits, or make avoidable mistakes in timing, planning, or execution. Those issues quietly limit students’ scores long before content knowledge becomes an obstacle.
The resources in this section focus on the big-picture mechanics of the GMAT: how the exam is structured, how scoring actually works, how to study effectively, and how to avoid the most common traps students fall into before they ever reach test day.
Start Here: What’s your “big-picture” gmat problem?
If this sounds like you, the issue usually isn’t ability; it’s uncertainty. When the test feels opaque, it’s hard to study efficiently or trust your decisions on test day.
The GMAT is adaptive, heavily standardized, and designed to reward specific behaviors. Many students lose points — or waste valuable study time — simply because they misunderstand how sections are scored, how questions adapt, or what schools actually see on a score report.
If this is what’s holding you back, start here:
- How Does the GMAT Work? A clear, plain-English explanation of the adaptive algorithm and what it does (and doesn’t) reward.
- What is on the GMAT? A section-by-section breakdown of what’s tested, and what isn’t.
- How to Analyze the GMAT Score Report. What the numbers actually mean, and how schools interpret them.
If you prefer videos, check out this video for a closer look at the GMAT score report:
If this sounds like you, the problem usually isn’t effort — it’s direction. Studying without a framework often leads to spinning your wheels or over-focusing on the wrong things.
Strong GMAT prep is about sequencing: knowing when to learn, when to practice, when to review, and when to stop. Many self-studying students stall because they treat all activities as equally valuable.
If this is what’s holding you back, start here:
- How to Start Studying for the GMAT. In this video, Charles outlines a clear and efficient way to start your GMAT studies the right way. You’ll learn when to take your first official practice test; how to interpret your results and set the right GMAT score target; how choose between self-study, courses, or tutoring; and avoid burnout and test anxiety.
For a wider look at how to think about your GMAT studies:
- GMAT Test Sections Overview. How the pieces fit together, and how that should shape your study plan.
- GMAT Self-Study Prep Mistakes. Common traps that waste time or actively hurt progress.
Once you’re ready to start taking practice tests, check out this video:
- How to Get the Most Out of Official GMAT Practice Tests. How to use official tests diagnostically instead of as score vanity checks.
If this sounds like you, the issue is rarely that you’ve “hit your ceiling.” More often, it’s that your study loop isn’t generating useful feedback.
Many students keep doing more of what already isn’t working: more questions, more notes, more hours — without changing the underlying process. If you’re mindlessly “getting reps”, you’re very unlikely to improve on a reasoning-based test like the GMAT.
If this is what’s holding you back, start here:
- How to Overcome a Low GMAT Score. What low scores usually mean — and how to respond productively.
- How to NOT Get Stuck When Studying for the GMAT. How to diagnose plateaus and make targeted changes.
If this sounds like you, the problem isn’t indecision. Instead, it’s a lack of clarity about tradeoffs. Courses, tutoring, and self-study all work in the right context.
Many students choose prep options based on price or promises instead of fit, timeline, and learning style — and end up frustrated.
If this is what’s holding you back, start here:
- How to Find a Good Private GMAT Tutor. What matters — and what doesn’t — when evaluating private tutors.
- How to Choose Between a GMAT Course, Tutoring, and Self-Study. A practical comparison of what each option is actually good for.
If this sounds familiar, the issue usually isn’t preparation or ability. It’s maintaining control under pressure.
Many strong test-takers perform well in practice but underperform on the real exam because anxiety alters how they read, reason, and manage time. Even if you don’t have classic signs of nervousness, test anxiety can narrow your attention, speed up decision-making in the wrong ways, and make otherwise familiar questions feel painfully foreign.
If you care about your GMAT score, you’ll inevitably feel some pressure on test day. Learning to manage your internal response to pressure — both before and during the test — is a skill in its own right, and it’s one that can be trained deliberately.
If this is what’s holding you back, start here:
- Beginner’s Guide to GMAT Test Anxiety. A practical overview of why test anxiety happens, how it affects performance, and what actually helps — before, during, and after test day.
If you prefer video explanations, these short pieces cover the most common performance breakdowns we see:
- How to Overcome Performance Anxiety on the GMAT or GRE
- What Is Happening When You Panic on GMAT or GRE Test Day?
For other videos, including:
- Introduction to Mental Performance Coaching
- How to Close the Gap Between Practice and Test Day
- How to Create a Successful GMAT or GRE Test Day Routine
- How Meditation Can Improve Your Test Score
Check out our full Text Anxiety & Mental Performance video gallery:
Next: Dig deeper into the fundamentals
If any of the issues above sound familiar, you’ll find more in-depth explanations and guidance in our GMAT Basics & Study Tips articles. These articles go deeper into how the GMAT actually works, so you can fix foundational issues before grinding through more hours of practice.
These articles go deeper into the fundamentals behind the GMAT: how the test works, how scores are calculated, and how to structure your prep effectively.
If something above felt unclear — or you’re not sure why a certain approach works — start here before hammering through more practice questions.
Free GMAT Quantitative Reasoning Course
The Quantitative Reasoning section consists of 21 questions and features just one question type: Problem Solving. After you finish the GMAT, you’ll receive a quant section score on a scale from 60 to 90. Your quant score combines with your other sections to produce your overall GMAT composite score, on a scale from 205 to 805.
NOTE: Some videos in this section include quant-based Data Sufficiency questions that appear in the Data Insights section of the GMAT.
Start Here: How to approach gmat quant
Watch this before diving into the sections below. It sets the framework for everything that follows.
This quant course is comprehensive and content-complete, covering all of the math tested on the current version of the GMAT and the Executive Assessment.
But GMAT quant isn’t a traditional math test. It’s a reasoning exam that uses math as the language. Strong test-takers succeed by choosing efficient approaches, spotting structure, and avoiding unnecessary work—not by just grinding through brute-force calculations.
Each video focuses on a core quant concept and shows you how it actually appears on GMAT questions, how strong test-takers reason with those concepts, and how to make better decisions under time pressure.
If you know the math but still find GMAT quant harder than it “should” be, this series is built for you.
If you’re not sure where to start, begin at the top. The early videos lay the foundation for everything that follows.
Episode 1: Arithmetic
Episode 2: Linear Algebra
Episode 3: Quadratics
Episode 4: Exponents
Episode 5: Inequalities & Absolute Values
Episode 6: Word Problems
Episode 7: Ratios
Episode 8: Percentages
Episode 9: Number Properties Part I
Episode 10: Number Properties Part II
Episode 11: Counting & Sequences
Episode 12: Conversions & Rates Part I
Episode 13: Rates II
Episode 14: Overlapping Sets
Episode 15: Statistics Part I
Episode 16: Statistics Part II
Episode 17: Probability
Episode 18: Combinations & Permutations
Next: Common Quant Pitfalls
Once you’ve watched the video above, use the sections below to focus on the specific issues that tend to hold students back on the GMAT Quantitative Reasoning section.
If this sounds like you, the problem usually isn’t your math background. Instead, it’s how you’re using it under test conditions.
GMAT quant isn’t a math test in the usual sense. It rewards flexible reasoning, smart shortcuts, and choosing when not to calculate. Many strong math students actually hurt themselves by defaulting to formal algebra or brute-force methods when a little bit of logic or estimation would get them there faster and more reliably.
Once you start treating quant questions as reasoning problems, with multiple possible solution paths instead of a single “correct” method, accuracy can improve quickly, often without learning any new math at all.
If this is what’s holding you back, start here:
- It’s GMAT Quantitative Reasoning, not GMAT Math. This is the best place to start if you’re consistently missing ‘easy’ quant questions. This article explains how the GMAT actually tests thinking, not formulas, and shows what high scorers do differently.
If you still need help, here’s a follow-up:
- Don’t Be a Victim of Engineer’s Disease – see the video below. A quick illustration of how rigid, overly formal approaches quietly sabotage otherwise strong quant scores.
If you’re constantly pressed for time on quant, the issue isn’t necessarily your fundamental ability to do math quickly. It’s how long you spend on the wrong parts of the test.
GMAT quant punishes over-investment. Spending an extra minute wrestling with a question that was designed to bog you down doesn’t just cost you that question; it steals time from easier questions later. High scorers don’t solve everything efficiently; they’re ruthless about deciding where to spend effort and when to let go.
Good quant timing comes from better decisions, not faster calculations: recognizing when a question is worth finishing, when it’s not, and how the adaptive test responds to those choices.
If timing is your main issue, this is the best place to start:
- How to Manage Time on an Adaptive Test Like the GMAT. This video explains how GMAT timing actually works on a computer-adaptive exam, and why evenly pacing yourself across all questions is usually a mistake.
If you want a deeper reframe:
- How Much Math Do You Really Need for an Elite GMAT Score? This article shows how top scorers manage time by limiting what they calculate, not by rushing through questions.
If long, wordy questions tend to trigger your timing panic:
- Why Long GMAT Quant Questions Are Easier Than They Look. A short explanation of why question length is unrelated to difficulty—and how to avoid burning time before you even need to.
If quant questions regularly feel impossible, the issue usually isn’t that you’re missing some advanced topic; it’s probably that you’re misreading difficulty.
The GMAT is very good at making ordinary math look intimidating. Long word problems, unfamiliar framing, or dense information are often designed to trigger hesitation and overthinking. Many students respond by studying rarer, harder topics, while neglecting the common, high-frequency ideas that actually drive their score.
High scorers don’t panic when questions look hard. They learn to spot when a question is testing reasoning, estimation, or structure, and when it’s simply not worth a full investment of your time. Once you stop equating “this looks ugly” with “this requires advanced math,” quant becomes far more manageable.
If this sounds like your experience, start here:
- Misplaced Math Anxiety on GMAT Quant. This article explains why many test-takers spend their study time on the wrong material—and how that misallocation creates the feeling that quant is harder than it really is.
If long or wordy questions tend to intimidate you:
- Why Long GMAT Quant Questions Are Easier Than They Look. A short explanation of why question length is often the difficulty itself, and how to avoid burning time and energy before you even need to calculate.
If you want a broader perspective on how much math is actually required:
- How Much Math Do You Really Need for an Elite GMAT Score? A deeper look at how top scorers limit what they calculate and focus on reasoning instead of technical complexity.
If you’re putting in the hours but your quant score isn’t moving, the problem usually isn’t effort; it’s how you’re using your practice time.
Many GMAT test-takers spend most of their time doing questions and then reviewing official solutions. That can feel productive, but it often turns practice into passive consumption. You see a polished solution, think “that makes sense,” and move on, without ever building the decision-making skills that are at the core of the GMAT.
Score improvements come from active practice, focused on your own behavior: diagnosing why you chose the wrong approach, understanding what signals you missed, and learning how to make better decisions before you start calculating. Without that feedback loop — focused on the workings of your own brain — it’s very easy to work hard and still plateau.
If this sounds familiar, start here:
- How to Get Better at Studying for GMAT Quant This video explains why relying on official solutions can stall your progress, and how to use practice questions in a way that actually builds quantitative reasoning skills.
If you want to understand why plateaus happen more broadly:
- Why Your GMAT Score Isn’t Improving (Even When You Know the Content) A higher-level look at why knowledge alone doesn’t translate into score gains, and what usually needs to change for improvement to resume.
If you want a complementary perspective on study efficiency:
- Misplaced Math Anxiety on GMAT Quant. This article shows how focusing on the wrong material can make it feel like you’re practicing a lot—without addressing what’s really limiting your score.
PUTTING IT TOGETHER: MAKE YOUR QUANT WORK ON TEST DAY
Want to make progress even faster? Try our one-to-one tutoring focused on optimizing your execution: choosing efficient paths, managing time, and turning your skills into consistent scores on test day.
Free GMAT Verbal Video Course
The GMAT Verbal Reasoning section consists of 23 questions across two question types: Critical Reasoning (CR) and Reading Comprehension (RC). As with the quant section, you’ll receive a verbal score on a scale from 60 to 90, which combines with your other section scores to produce your overall composite score.
GMAT verbal tests a handful of specific skills: your ability to read precisely, reason carefully, and choose between subtly different answer choices under time pressure. It does not reward speed-reading, subject-matter expertise, clever tricks, or getting “close.”
The Verbal Reasoning section of this free course is organized to help you work efficiently:
- In this overview section, we’ll highlight a couple of broad issues that affect performance across both Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension.
- The individual Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension sections that follow go much deeper, with targeted explanations, examples, and resources that address common challenges student face with each question type.
The two accordion items here focus on general verbal challenges that cut across both CR and RC. Once you’ve looked through those, use the sections below to dive into Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension separately, where you’ll find much more detailed guidance for each question type.
Diagnose the core verbal problems holding your score back
If this sounds like you, the problem usually isn’t effort — it’s supply.
Unfortunately, there’s a finite supply of official GMAT verbal questions. If you burn through them too quickly, you can stall your progress long before you’ve built reliable CR and RC instincts.
Third-party “GMAT-style” questions aren’t generally the best solution. In our experience, those tend to train bad habits. Instead, many strong verbal scorers supplement with LSAT Logical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension, which test the same core skills as GMAT CR and RC — often more rigorously.
LSAT questions force careful reading, punish outside assumptions, and require you to justify why answers are wrong. Those are exactly the habits that lead to success on the GMAT verbal section.
If this is what’s holding you back, start here:
- Five Reasons the LSAT Can Help Your GMAT Score. This article explains why LSAT material is often better training than non-official GMAT questions — and how to use it without confusing yourself.
If you want a quick overview before committing:
- Why LSATs Are Great Practice for GMAT Verbal. A short explanation of how LSAT CR and RC map cleanly onto GMAT verbal skills.
If this sounds like you, the issue may go deeper than test strategy.
The GMAT verbal section rewards precise reading, disciplined thinking, and the ability to stay anchored to what the text actually says. Those skills don’t develop overnight — and they aren’t built solely through GMAT-specific preparation.
For students preparing over a longer timeline, one effective way to strengthen verbal fundamentals is regular exposure to demanding reading, especially material that forces careful attention to language and structure.
Reading nonfiction can help you sharpen your reading precision and the ability to track an argument. Fiction builds sensitivity to tone, implication, and nuance, as well as greater mental flexibility. Neither replaces GMAT practice, but both can improve the underlying reading skills required for a strong GMAT verbal score.
If this feels relevant, start here:
- Reading Nonfiction to Improve GMAT Reading Comprehension. This article explains how deliberate nonfiction reading can strengthen RC and CR reasoning over time, and offers some book and magazine recommendations.
If you want to extend that habit:
- Reading Fiction to Improve GMAT Reading Comprehension. Written by two GMAT Ninja tutors who happen to be part-time novelists, this follow-up article shows how literary fiction builds verbal skills that transfer directly to GMAT passages and arguments. It also features a list of our favorite novels.
The sections below break GMAT verbal into its two question types, Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension, with targeted guidance for the specific issues that tend to limit scores in each area.
Free GMAT Critical Reasoning Course
Critical Reasoning questions assess your ability to evaluate arguments logically and precisely. While they can feel subjective at first, GMAT Critical Reasoning is highly structured: each question is built around a clear argument, and each has exactly one answer that correctly responds to that argument as written.
Our free GMAT Critical Reasoning course is designed to help you develop a reliable, repeatable approach to CR—one that improves accuracy by focusing on how arguments work, why wrong answers fail, and how strong test-takers make logical decisions under time pressure.
Start Here: How GMAT Critical Reasoning Actually Works
Watch the video below before diving into the sections that follow. It will make the explanations and examples in the accordions much easier to apply.
CR doesn’t usually go badly because you don’t “know the question types.” If you’re struggling, it’s probably because you keep making the same predictable mistakes under time pressure.
That’s why this series is titled the way it is: each video targets a specific error pattern (missing the heart of the argument, paraphrasing badly, falling in love with a tempting answer, etc.) that we often see in our students. Find the mistake that sounds like you, watch that video, and then go apply it to official CR questions right away.
If you’re not sure where to start, begin at the top — the early videos fix the “foundational” errors that worsen everything else downstream.
Episode 2: Missing the Heart of the Passage
Episode 3: Paraphrasing
Episode 4: Obsessing Over Question Types
Episode 5: Predicting the correct answer…incorrectly
Episode 6: Falling in love with an answer choice
Episode 7: Irrelevant & Out of Scope
Episode 8: Word Matching
Episode 9: Rejecting Imperfect Answer Choices
Next: Find the Critical Reasoning Mistake That’s Costing You Points
Once you’ve watched the video above, use the sections below to identify the Critical Reasoning issues that most often limit students’ verbal scores, and jump directly to the most relevant section for your situation.
If Critical Reasoning feels subjective, it’s usually because more than one answer sounds reasonable, not because the question actually allows for multiple interpretations.
GMAT Critical Reasoning is built around formal arguments: claims, evidence, assumptions, and logical consequences. Each question has exactly one answer that correctly responds to the argument as written. The other four answers may sound persuasive, tempting, or even partially relevant — but each wrong answer always contains a specific flaw.
GMAT Critical Reasoning rewards precision, not persuasion. If you approach these questions by asking “Which answer do I like best?” or “Which one feels reasonable?”, the test will feel arbitrary. Once you shift to asking “Which answer actually does what the question demands, with no extra assumptions?”, CR becomes far more predictable.
High scorers aren’t better arguers. They’re better at identifying why wrong answers are wrong.
If this sounds like your experience, start here:
- Is GMAT Verbal Arbitrary and Subjective? This article explains why Critical Reasoning (and Reading Comprehension) only feel subjective — and how the GMAT consistently rewards careful, rule-based reasoning rather than opinions or instincts.
If you often feel “close” but still get the question wrong:
- “Close” Counts in Russian Roulette, but Not on GMAT Verbal Questions. This piece shows why narrowing answers down to a “final two” usually means you’ve missed a decisive flaw — and why being “almost right” on GMAT Verbal usually isn’t close at all.
If you prefer videos over an article, here’s a quick summary of the second article from Charles:
If you frequently narrow GMAT Critical Reasoning questions down to two answers and then miss the question, the issue usually isn’t bad luck. The issue is usually a flawed understanding of the passage or the answer choices, and the decisive flaw went unnoticed.
On GMAT verbal, getting to a “final two” doesn’t mean you’re close. In fact, it often means you’ve stopped evaluating answers critically and started comparing them to each other instead of to the question and the argument.
Every wrong answer on a Critical Reasoning question has a specific, identifiable flaw. High scorers don’t choose the answer that sounds better. They eliminate answers by pinpointing exactly why each one fails to do what the question asks. When you can’t articulate why an answer is wrong, you haven’t definitively eliminated it.
This is why CR rewards precision over intuition. The correct answer isn’t the one you like best — it’s the only one that survives careful scrutiny.
If this sounds like your experience, start here:
- “Close” Counts in Russian Roulette, but Not on GMAT Verbal Questions. This article explains why narrowing answers down to a “final two” is often misleading — and how to train yourself to spot the decisive flaw that separates the correct answer from the rest.
If you prefer videos over an article, here’s a quick summary of this article from Charles:
If you also find yourself rejecting answers for being “not perfect”:
- Don’t Be a Perfectionist on GMAT Verbal. This short video explains why the correct answer doesn’t need to be flawless. It just needs to be less flawed than the other four.
If you understand the different Critical Reasoning question types but still miss questions, the problem is usually how you’re reading, not what you know.
Many test-takers read the question stem first (“Weaken,” “Strengthen,” “Assumption,” etc.) and then dive into the passage already hunting for a specific idea. That feels efficient, but it often backfires. There are many ways to weaken or strengthen an argument, and the GMAT frequently features answers that aren’t the first thing you’d think of. Some students even misread the question stem entirely, simply because they’re too eager to toss each question into a narrow category.
When you lead too aggressively with the question type, you bias your reading and narrow your attention too early. Strong CR performance comes from first understanding the argument on its own terms — what’s being claimed, what support is offered, and what’s being taken for granted — before you worry about what the question is asking you to do with it.
Knowing the task is obviously essential. But anchoring yourself in the argument comes first.
If this sounds familiar, start here:
- CR Tip: Don’t Read the Question First This short video explains why reading the question stem first often lowers accuracy — and how anchoring yourself in the passage leads to more reliable success.
If you want a structured foundation for CR arguments:
- Beginner’s Guide to GMAT Critical Reasoning. A clear breakdown of how CR arguments are constructed and how to analyze them without relying on shortcuts or memorized tricks.
If you often miss Critical Reasoning questions and immediately think, “I knew better than that,” the problem is often how quickly you’re reacting to answer choices.
Many test-takers try to save time on CR by eliminating answers impulsively: crossing something out because it feels irrelevant, extreme, or off-topic. In practice, this habit hurts both accuracy and timing. Once you’ve accidentally eliminated the correct answer, you’re forced to spend extra time trying to justify why a wrong answer must be right.
Strong CR performance comes from disciplined evaluation. High scorers don’t just react to answer choices. Instead, they justify every elimination by identifying a specific flaw. If an answer is irrelevant, they can explain exactly why. If it’s too strong, too weak, or misaligned with the question, they can point to the precise problem.
A thorough, systematic approach to answer choices doesn’t truly cost time. It prevents the much bigger time loss that comes from chasing the wrong answer.
If this sounds like your experience, start here:
- Don’t Just REACT… Stop and THINK This short video explains why impulsive eliminations backfire on GMAT CR—and how forcing yourself to justify each elimination improves both accuracy and pacing.
If you find yourself settling for the “last answer standing”:
- Don’t Fall in Love on GMAT Critical Reasoning This short shows why answer choice (E) deserves the same level of scrutiny as the others—and why making excuses for a remaining option is a warning sign that something was missed earlier.
PUTTING IT TOGETHER: Want help applying this under test conditions?
Tutoring with our elite, lifelong instructors gets results while saving time and minimizing stress.
Free GMAT Reading Comprehension Course
GMAT Reading Comprehension assesses your ability to read carefully, reason precisely, and stay anchored in what the passage actually says. While RC can feel overwhelming under time pressure, especially when passages are dense or unfamiliar, the skills being tested are highly specific and learnable.
The GMAT doesn’t reward speed-reading, prior knowledge, or test-prep “tricks”. It rewards disciplined, systematic reading and clear thinking under pressure. Many test-takers struggle in RC not because they can’t understand the passages, but because small process errors compound over time: reading a bit too fast, paraphrasing loosely, overreacting to familiar-sounding language, or spending too long trying to rescue a single question.
Our free GMAT Reading Comprehension course is designed to help you develop a reliable, consistent RC process, one that improves accuracy and timing by focusing on how passages are written, how questions are constructed, and how, exactly, wrong answer choices can mislead you.
Start Here: How to Read GMAT Reading Comprehension Passages
Watch the video below before diving into the sections that follow. It explains how GMAT Reading Comprehension actually works, what the test does (and does not) reward, and why many common RC instincts quietly backfire. With that framework in place, the explanations in the accordions below will be much easier to apply.
Test-takers don’t usually struggle on Reading Comprehension because passages are “too hard.” Test-takers struggle because they don’t know what to look for, what to ignore, or why each part of the passage is there.
This series is built to fix that. Each video trains you to read for structure and purpose: how the author builds each argument, how each paragraph fits into that argument, and how GMAT and EA questions exploit common reading habits under time pressure.
After the opening episode, each video focuses on a different passage style, demonstrating how the same core tools apply across various topics. Watch the video that matches the passage types that give you trouble, then practice that approach immediately using official RC questions.
If you’re not sure where to start, begin at the top. The early videos establish the reading framework that everything else depends on.
Episode 2: Point of View in Reading Comprehension
Episode 3: Science Passages
Episode 4: Humanities Passages
Episode 5: Long Passages
Episode 6: Hard Passages
next: Common REading comprehension Pitfalls
Once you’ve watched at least the first video, use the sections below to zero in on the specific RC habits that cost you points.
If RC passages feel like they go in one eye and out the other, the problem usually isn’t vocabulary or intelligence . It’s how you’re reading.
Many test-takers try to improve efficiency by forcing themselves to read faster. On GMAT Reading Comprehension, that almost always backfires. When you skim or rush, you miss structure, author intent, and nuance — which means the questions end up taking longer and your accuracy drops.
Strong RC performance comes from engaged, deliberate reading, not speed-reading. When you genuinely understand what the author is doing — arguing, evaluating, explaining, criticizing — the questions become much easier to answer, and paradoxically, you often finish faster.
If this sounds familiar, start here:
- Don’t Read Too Fast on GMAT Verbal. This short explains why trying to maximize speed hurts both accuracy and timing — and what “efficient” reading actually looks like on GMAT RC.
If you want a broader framework for how to approach RC passages from the ground up:
- Beginner’s Guide to GMAT Reading Comprehension. A clear overview of how GMAT RC is designed, what it’s really testing, and how strong readers approach passages differently from struggling test-takers.
If you’re consistently missing Primary Purpose questions, it’s usually not because you didn’t understand the passage — it’s often because you’re answering a different question than the one being asked.
Many RC answers contain true statements about the passage that aren’t the author’s main point. GMAT Primary Purpose questions don’t ask what the passage talks about (the topic); they ask why the author wrote it — to argue, evaluate, criticize, explain, compare, or challenge something.
Two other habits make this worse:
- Assuming that the main idea must appear in the first or last paragraph
- Gravitating toward answers that feel familiar or detailed, rather than big-picture
Strong RC readers keep asking a single question as they read: “What is the author doing here, and why?”
If this sounds like your issue, start here:
- Why You’re Missing Primary Purpose Questions. This video breaks down the most common mistakes test-takers make on Primary Purpose questions — and how to reliably separate topic from intent.
If you want to go deeper into why RC feels slippery or “subjective” on these questions:
- Is GMAT Verbal Arbitrary and Subjective? Why RC questions feel debatable and why, in reality, there’s almost always only one answer that fully matches the author’s intent.
This is one of the most counterintuitive lessons in GMAT Reading Comprehension:
Reading faster usually makes you slower.
Many test-takers try to boost efficiency by skimming aggressively, pushing their eyes through the passage, and hoping to “figure it out” from the questions. The problem is that this almost always backfires. When you don’t fully absorb the passage, the questions take longer, feel more confusing, and lead to more second-guessing.
Strong RC performance doesn’t come from speed-reading.
It comes from engaged reading — understanding structure, tracking the author’s intent, and noticing how ideas relate to one another.
If you’re prepared when you reach the questions, they often go quickly and cleanly. If you’re not, every answer choice feels plausible, and your timing can spiral.
If reading speed feels like your main bottleneck, start here:
- Don’t Read Too Fast. Why forcing speed hurts both accuracy and timing — and what to do instead if you want RC to feel calmer and more controlled.
There’s also a deeper pitfall hiding behind “fast reading”:
- Paraphrasing Will Destroy Your Verbal Performance. Why rewording passages in your own language introduces distortions, and how sticking closely to the author’s exact wording improves both accuracy and efficiency.
Related reading:
- Anatomy of a 9-Minute GMAT RC Question. A real example of how misunderstanding a passage early can turn one question into a timing disaster — and how to prevent it.
If RC answer choices often feel tempting because they repeat language from the passage, you’re running into one of the most common GMAT verbal pitfalls: word matching.
Wrong answers frequently lift words or phrases directly from the text to sound familiar and safe. At the same time, correct answers often restate ideas using different language. If you rely too heavily on matching words instead of matching meaning, you’ll consistently eliminate the right answer and keep the wrong ones.
Strong RC performance comes from engaging with what the answer choice really means, not how closely it mirrors the passage’s wording. The key question isn’t “Does this sound like the passage?” It’s “Does this actually answer the question being asked, based on the passage’s meaning?”
This is especially important when answer choices are dense or abstract. In these situations, surface-level familiarity is a very unreliable guide.
If this sounds like your experience, start here:
- Beware of Word Matching. This video explains why repeated wording is such a powerful distraction on GMAT RC — and how to train yourself to focus on meaning instead of familiar language.
If you find that answer choices feel debatable or subjective when this happens:
- Is GMAT Verbal Arbitrary and Subjective? Why verbal questions feel arguable when you focus on surface similarities — and how thinking precisely and systematically about meaning helps the correct answer stand out more clearly.
If your Reading Comprehension timing keeps blowing up, it might not be because you’re slow in general — it’s often because one question derails the entire passage.
Many students see an RC question that feels ambiguous or uncomfortable, and they respond by digging in harder: rereading lines, second-guessing interpretations, and trying to force certainty. Before they realize it, several minutes have passed, anxiety has spiked, and the remaining questions feel rushed and shaky.
The GMAT is designed to punish this kind of perfectionism. RC questions rarely reward exhaustive analysis. Strong test-takers make deliberate decisions about when to keep pushing and when to let go, even if that means moving on without full confidence.
Good RC time management isn’t about rushing — it’s about avoiding sunk-cost spirals.
If this sounds familiar, start here:
- Anatomy of a 9-Minute GMAT RC Question. A real case study showing how one RC question turned into a timing disaster on an actual exam — and the exact decision points when things went off the rails.
If you tend to get stuck because no answer feels “good enough”:
- Don’t Be a Perfectionist on GMAT Verbal. Why RC answers don’t need to feel perfect — and how insisting on certainty often costs more points than it saves.
If your spiral starts when you react too quickly and then overcorrect:
- Don’t Just REACT… Stop and THINK. How impulsive eliminations and emotional reactions create timing problems — and how a calmer evaluation process keeps RC under control.
PUTTING IT TOGETHER: MAKE YOUR READING HOLD UP UNDER PRESSURE
Our tutors help you identify the most urgent priorities for achieving a score breakthrough; we then build a focused plan that avoids wasted effort and unnecessary stress.
Free GMAT Data Insights Course
The Data Insights (DI) section consists of 20 questions, with a mix of five question types: Data Sufficiency, Graphical Interpretation, Table Analysis, Multi-Source Reasoning, and Two-Part Analysis. Like the previous sections, DI combines with quant and verbal to form your composite score on a scale of 205 to 805.
Data Insights tests your ability to make sense of messy information and reach sound conclusions under time pressure. It blends quantitative reasoning, verbal reasoning, data analysis, and logic, but in a format that often looks far more intimidating than it actually is.
What Data Insights doesn’t reward is grinding through every calculation, decoding every graph in excessive detail, or overreacting to information overload. Many strong test-takers lose points on DI by over-calculating, over-reading, or panicking when the information feels dense, “weird”, or unfamiliar.
Our free GMAT Data Insights course focuses on building a calm, structured approach to DI questions: one that emphasizes judgment, estimation, and strategic decision-making so you can identify what matters, ignore what doesn’t, and protect both accuracy and timing.
Start Here: How to Approach GMAT Data Insights
Watch the video below before diving into the sections that follow. It explains how Data Insights questions are designed, why they often look harder than they are, and how, exactly, strong test-takers stay in control when the data feels overwhelming.
Test-takers rarely struggle on Data Insights because the math is hard, or because they don’t know how to read a graph or chart. Test-takers struggle because they get overwhelmed by information, chase irrelevant details, or spend too long trying to calculate everything perfectly.
This free video course is designed to fix that. Each video focuses on how to interpret data efficiently under time pressure by understanding what matters, what doesn’t, and how GMAT and EA questions quietly push you toward time-wasting spirals.
Rather than memorizing formulas, you’ll learn how to read charts, tables, and multi-source prompts with judgment and flexibility, so you can reach sound conclusions quickly and move on to the next question.
If you’re not sure where to start, begin at the top. The early videos establish the core decision-making framework that everything else in Data Insights depends on.
Episode 1: Graphical Interpretation — Just read the bleeping graph!
Episode 2: Graphical Interpretation — Fun with unusual graphs.
Episode 3: Key quant skills for Graphical Interpretation
Episode 4: Table Analysis — This is pretty much Excel
Episode 5: Two-Part Analysis: Verbal based questions
Episode 6: Two-Part Analysis: Quant based questions
Episode 7: Intro to Multi-Source Reasoning
Episode 8: Key reminders for Multi-Source Reasoning
Episode 9: How to Approach Data Sufficiency
next: Common Data Insights Pitfalls
Once you’ve watched the video, use the sections below to zero in on the specific DI habits that are holding you back.
If this sounds familiar, the problem usually isn’t your math skills or your reasoning. It’s the intimidation factor. Data Insights questions are deliberately information-dense, and many test-takers feel overwhelmed before they even read the question carefully.
When that happens, test-takers often rush through the graph, sloppily skim the text, or start calculating without a clear plan — which leads to mistakes or time blow-ups. In reality, DI questions often ask something simpler than you might expect.
If this sounds familiar, start here:
- Don’t Get Intimidated by Data Insights. This video explains why DI questions often “look scarier than they are,” and how slowing down at the right moment actually improves both accuracy and timing.
You’re not wrong. Many GMAT Data Insights graphs are genuinely awkward, cluttered, or unintuitive. But that’s not an accident — it’s part of what the test is measuring.
The GMAT isn’t testing whether you like the graph. It’s testing whether you can extract relevant information from a poorly presented data source without getting distracted by noise.
If this sounds like your issue, start here:
- Yes, Sometimes GMAT DI Graphs Are Terrible. This explains why the GMAT uses messy graphs, and how to stop fighting the format and start working with it.
On Data Insights, calculation is often the slowest — and least important — part of the problem. Many DI questions can be answered through smart estimation, visual comparison, or elimination before doing any precise math.
The key skill is knowing when estimation is safe, and when the answer choices are too close together to allow it. (It also helps to remember that you have a calculator for DI when you really need it.)
If this feels like your main bottleneck, start here:
- Data Insights: When Should I Estimate? This video walks through when estimation saves time, and how to avoid the situations when it backfires.
Timing problems in DI usually aren’t caused by one slow question — they’re caused by trying to treat every question equally. Some questions are worth grinding through. Others are not.
In particular, Multi-Source Reasoning sets can quietly consume huge chunks of time if you’re not careful.
If this sounds like your experience, start here:
- Skip an Entire Multi-Source Reasoning Set? This explains when skipping (or semi-guessing) a full MSR set might actually be the correct strategic decision — and when it isn’t.
Data Sufficiency errors often come from mental carryover. Test-takers accidentally reuse information from Statement 1 when evaluating Statement 2, or rush straight to combining the statements without fully testing them individually.
Strong DI performance requires disciplined mental resets between statements.
If this sounds familiar, start here:
- Don’t Forget to Wash Your Brain on Data Sufficiency. This video introduces a simple habit that dramatically reduces careless DS errors.
PUTTING IT TOGETHER: MAKE DECISIONS YOU CAN TRUST
If practice goes well but test day doesn’t, tutoring helps bridge the gap so that your hard work shows up when it counts.
Custom Online Tutoring
Everything on this page exists for one reason: to help you understand what actually moves the needle on the GMAT, and to avoid wasting time, energy, and confidence on things that don’t.
GMAT Ninja was built by lifelong teachers who have spent thousands of hours in the trenches with real students. Our goal has never been to make prep gimmicky or complicated. Our goal has always been to make studying as efficient and low-stress as possible, so that candidates can reach their target scores without burning out.
For many students, the free resources here are enough to unlock progress.
For others, the challenge isn’t effort or intelligence. Instead, it’s figuring out where to focus, what to trust, and how to adapt when things don’t go to plan. That’s where tutoring comes in.
Our tutoring is built around:
- Identifying the specific habits and decisions holding your score back
- Designing a focused plan that respects your time and mental energy
- Helping you perform consistently under real test conditions, not just in practice
If you want a calm, teacher-led approach to GMAT prep, focused on efficiency, clarity, and real test-day performance, we’d be glad to help.