SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips

Your SAT scores are a very important part of your application, especially as the applicant pool gets bigger and more competitive every year. So how can you make sure colleges will consider your very best scores?

This article will discuss the colleges that superscore the SAT. After giving you a list of every college that superscores the SAT, I'll talk about how you can use this information strategically as you prepare to apply to college. To start, let's briefly review what "superscoring" means.

If you want a top SAT score, you need more than a desire to succeed. Determination and hard work are two vital ingredients for acing the SAT, but also you need to use effective study strategies to help you reach your goal.

I've helped hundreds of students prepare for the SAT, and I know the best methods to utilize to conquer this exam. In this article, I'll explain exactly how to ace the SAT, including how long you need to study, the best SAT prep strategies, and key test-taking tips.

You know you need to take the SAT. Maybe you’ve even registered. But what now? How do you prepare?

If you’re not sure where to begin or how to prepare for the SAT, this is the guide for you. First we’ll go over what you’ll need to do to prepare for the test. Then, we’ll discuss some methods you might use for preparing for the SAT. We’ll wrap up with some resources that you might find helpful. 

The College Board recently partnered with Khan Academy to provide free SAT prep resources. There are a lot of resources offered, and they can be a great help if you know how to use them correctly.

This guide will explain exactly what prep materials Khan Academy offers, what they’re best for, when you should rely on other prep materials, and tips for getting the most of out Khan Academy's resources.

You only have a couple days before the SAT (or maybe less than a day!), and you’re determined to ace this test! Whether you're looking for last-minute study tips, advice on how to prepare the day of the test, or test-taking strategies to maximize your scores, I've got you covered. 

Here are a bunch of handy last minute SAT tips that will help you stay focused and raise your scores.

You may have heard of a new trend in test prep: games. That’s right—studying for your SAT by playing computer (and even phone) games! 

If this sounds too good to be true, that’s because it is. Most of the SAT prep games out there are pretty bad. However, there are a few games that may genuinely help you with some aspects of your test prep experience—although they won’t do much other than supplement your more typical studying activities like taking practice tests and doing practice problems.

In this article I’ll break down the SAT prep game trend, explain why most prep games won’t help you, describe what makes a good prep game, offer some recommendations for games that will help you, and offer some advice on how to use them.

The SAT can be mysterious and nerve-inducing; your score on this never-before-seen test will play a huge role in your college applications. When I took the SAT for the first time, I didn’t do any preparation and wasn't sure I could reach my target score.

The best way to lessen your fear is to try to predict your SAT score. How can you estimate your SAT score? What are the effective methods? Do the SAT score predictor quizzes really work? This guide will walk you through the different methods of estimating your SAT score and will tell you how to use that prediction.

In planning your SAT prep, you probably want to know how long you need to study. Is it weeks or months? Is it dozens of hours or hundreds?

The answer to these questions depends on a variety of factors, including the scores you are hoping to get and how comfortable you already are with the test material from your general experiences in school and life. There’s no reason to torture yourself with endless SAT studying if your scores are already in the target range for your top choice schools. On the other hand, if you are still pretty far away from the scores you are looking for, you may have to work harder than you think.

In this guide, I'll show you how to figure out how much you need to improve on the SAT, how many hours you need to spend to get there, and how you should build a study schedule before your next real test. Below are the six steps you need to follow to figure out your SAT study plan.

You don't have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great. — Zig Ziglar

It can be hard to decide when to take the SAT for the first time. Should you wait until junior year? Is the fall better than the spring? Should you only take it if you've studied geometry or read the top 100 classics in English literature?

Since everyone's different, there's no blanket answer to the question, "When should I take the SAT for the first time?" Let's consider the most important factors in this decision so you can determine when to sign up for your initial test. First, what do most students do?

Before you start thinking about which colleges to apply to or what you want to study in college, you need to take the right steps to get there. For many students, this means taking the SAT.

You may be wondering when to start studying for the SAT. If you start too late, you won't get the highest score you're capable of. But if you start too early, you might struggle because you haven’t learned all the necessary content yet, plus you could forget things by the time the test rolls around.

Studying SAT vocab is a confusing topic for most students. It's unclear how many words you should memorize, which words to learn, and how to actually memorize these words without wasting time. If you think you need to memorize a list of 2,000 SAT vocab words you found on the internet, stop right there. We're about to save you a lot of time while delivering the same results.

In this guide, we'll discuss which words you should memorize and go over a reliable way to commit these words to memory.

You might have heard over the last year that a new version of the SAT is coming out in spring of 2016. You might have a choice between taking the current old SAT or the new SAT -- depending on when you time your test. You're probably wondering, "when should I take the SAT?"  Well, here's our definitive guide.

Note: The old SAT is no longer available. If you took the previous version and aren't sure whether to take the new one, check out our guides to deciding, depending on whether you got a high score or a low one. 

Preparing for the SAT a second or third time is common. Back when I studied for the SAT, the first couple of strategies and study approaches I tried didn't actually work. It took me a few times before I finally found the method that bumped up my SAT score 200 points—to a perfect score.

If you're retaking the SAT and want to ensure you improve this time around, this guide will show you how to do just that!

The reading sections of the SAT and ACT can be intimidating at first glance if you’re more inclined towards math and science than the humanities. All those passages! The horror!

Fear not, my number-loving friend. The reading sections of these tests are actually more logic and evidence-based than you might expect. In some cases, your science and math skills can even help you find the correct answers.

This article details three strategies for approaching SAT and ACT Reading if you consider yourself a more math and science-oriented student.

Can taking official SAT practice tests improve your SAT score dramatically? It can if you do it right. Most students practice the SAT incorrectly and are then surprised when their scores don’t increase. I myself essentially practiced my way to a perfect SAT score, and I’m convinced you can do it, too!

I've developed an SAT practice method that has worked for thousands of students—and I'll describe it right here.