First, let’s identify all the scores that will show up on your score report and that bschools will see:

1) Quant Score (out of 51 and percentile)
2) Verbal Score (out of 51 and percentile)
3) Overall Score (out of 800 and percentile)
4) Essay (AWA) Score (out of 6.0, increments of .5 and percentile)

What is the relationship between all the different scores?

Business schools pay more attention to the first 3 scores. For example, someone might score a 650 (35V, 44M). This translates into an overal percentile score of 80% which means he/she scored better than 80% of GMAT test takers. The writing score has NO IMPACT on your overall score. It’s like a side score that is treated separately.

The “650″ is the overall score and translates into the 80th percentile.
The “35V” is the verbal raw score out of 51 that has already been weighted by difficulty of questions and # correct. A 35V is at the 75th percentile.
The “”44M” is the quant score also out of 51 and is at the 90th percentile.

Schools see all of these scores so they can assess whether you are strong/weak in a particular section.   For example, a PhD in Physics is expected to have a high quant score. Schools will probably pay more attention to this applicant’s verbal score to see how well-rounded he/she is. If you are aiming to be considered by a Top 20 business school, you should aim to be above the 80th percentile mark for both subjects (36V and 40M).

It is important to note that the “raw score” is NOT the same as the number of questions anwered correctly. In fact, there are 41 verbal questions and only 37 quantitative questions yet the raw score for both sections is out of 51. The raw score takes into account the level of difficulty of your questions as the computer adapts to your performance on the exam.

Note that this table shows that the GMAT is biased towards stronger performance in the Verbal section. Far fewer people score in the top percentile for verbal than for quant. Therefore, they are rewarded with a high score for a strong verbal performance. See my post on The Easiest Way to Raise Your Score (NOT math).

The Analytical Writing Assessment Score will NOT be given to you at the end of your exam. It is graded by both a person and a computer program, so the results will come later in the mail.