UCAT-ANZ Quantitative Reasoning
Timing, the calculator and strategy
Quantitative Reasoning (QR) is the numbers subtest of UCAT-ANZ: 36 questions in 26 minutes, most often built on charts and graphs, with a basic on-screen calculator. It is scored 300 to 900, and the 2026 mean was 691, the highest of the three cognitive subtests. Questions are more about problem solving than hard maths. Marks come from pace, at about 43 seconds a question.
- Questions and time
- 36 in 26 minutes
- Time per question
- About 43 seconds
- Score range
- 300 to 900
- 2026 QR mean
- 691 (17,341 candidates)
- 2026 QR median
- 680
Photo: Rob Deutscher from Melbourne, Australia · CC BY 2.0 · cropped
Photo: Gary Houston (User:Ghouston) · CC0 · Photo: Calistemon · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Photo: Orderinchaos · CC BY-SA 4.0
What is UCAT-ANZ Quantitative Reasoning?
UCAT-ANZ is the admissions test a consortium of Australian and New Zealand universities uses to help select applicants to medical, dental and clinical science degrees, alongside academic results and interviews. Quantitative Reasoning is one of its four subtests. The UCAT ANZ Consortium says it assesses your ability to use numerical skills to solve problems, and that questions are less to do with numerical facility and more to do with problem solving.
Questions most often refer to charts and graphs containing data. The Consortium's tutorial says most come as sets of four connected to the same data, some stand alone, and each has five options. Use the official practice tests to confirm the current layout.
Medical and dental applicants sit the same subtest, and the Consortium explains why it matters for both. Doctors and dentists review data and apply it to their own practice. Drug calculations based on a patient's weight and age have to be correct. And clinical research comes as complex statistics they must interpret, critique and apply.
You sit UCAT-ANZ in Year 12 or later, once in each test cycle, so QR practice has to be done before your test date. One high scorer quoted by the Consortium says he improved by learning to use the on-screen calculator efficiently. Another says to round before you calculate when the answer options are spread out.
| Questions | 36, most often referring to charts and graphs containing data. |
|---|---|
| Time | 26 minutes, after a separately timed 2-minute instruction section. |
| Marks | One mark for each correct answer, with no negative marking. |
| Score | Scaled from 300 to 900, then added to your Verbal Reasoning and Decision Making scores for a total of 900 to 2700. |
| Calculator | A basic on-screen calculator. |
| Notes | An A4 laminated notebook and marker pen. Some test centres give you a laminated noteboard instead. |
| Extended versions | 30 minutes 20 seconds in SEN10 and SEN10SA, and 32 minutes 30 seconds in SEN and SENSA. |
| 2026 mean | 691, from 17,341 candidates: the highest of the three cognitive subtests. |
What is a good UCAT-ANZ Quantitative Reasoning score?
A QR score only means something next to other candidates' scores from the same year. This is where QR scores fell in the last three tests.
| Measure | 2026 | 2025 | 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mean | 691 | 679 | 667 |
| 1st decile (10th percentile) | 530 | 530 | 540 |
| 2nd decile | 580 | 570 | 580 |
| 3rd decile | 610 | 600 | 600 |
| 4th decile | 640 | 630 | 620 |
| 5th decile (median) | 680 | 660 | 650 |
| 6th decile | 710 | 690 | 690 |
| 7th decile | 760 | 730 | 720 |
| 8th decile | 820 | 820 | 760 |
| 9th decile (90th percentile) | 880 | 880 | 830 |
2026 covers 17,341 candidates, 2025 covers 16,950 and 2024 covers 15,240. The statistics stop at the 9th decile. UCAT-ANZ 2024 was the last year with Abstract Reasoning, so treat its column as background.
QR scores run higher than Verbal Reasoning and Decision Making scores. In 2026 the QR mean was 691, against 655 in Decision Making and 619 in Verbal Reasoning. So a QR score that sounds strong can be only middling: 680 was the 2026 median, and it took 820 to reach the 8th decile.
QR also spreads candidates out the most. In 2026, 350 points separated the 1st and 9th deciles (530 to 880), against 240 in Decision Making and 220 in Verbal Reasoning.
Means also shift from year to year: the QR mean was 667 in 2024, 679 in 2025 and 691 in 2026. Judge your score against the statistics for the year you sit, not against older targets.
Schools use results in different ways. For 2027 entry, Adelaide gave Sections 1 to 3 equal weight for interview eligibility and UNSW offered interviews on selection rank and overall score. Western Sydney says individual sections may be weighted, so read the rules on the website of every school on your list.
UCAT-ANZ QR timing: how long you get for each question
The Consortium's tutorial says you have about 40 seconds a question. 26 minutes for 36 questions is about 43 seconds each. Working at 40 seconds leaves about 2 minutes at the end, the couple of minutes one high scorer quoted by the Consortium suggests keeping for flagged questions.
Those seconds cover three jobs: understanding what the question asks, finding the numbers you need, and working out the answer. The data is where time goes. When several questions share one table or chart, reading it with care once pays off each time.
The timer counts down in the top right of the screen and turns yellow when less than 5 minutes remain. The 2-minute instruction section before QR is timed separately, so it does not come out of your 26 minutes. You can flag any question and return to it from the review screen if time is left at the end.
| After question | Time used at 40 seconds each | Timer shows about |
|---|---|---|
| 9 | 6 minutes | 20:00 |
| 18 | 12 minutes | 14:00 |
| 27 | 18 minutes | 8:00 |
| 36 | 24 minutes | 2:00, for flagged questions |
Our arithmetic from the official 26 minutes. Sets vary in difficulty, so treat the checkpoints as a guide rather than a rule.
First pass: answer what you can
Work through in order at about 40 seconds a question. Read the question first, then go to the data for only the numbers it needs.
Stuck? Eliminate, guess, flag
If a question is heading past a minute, take the Consortium's advice: eliminate the more obvious incorrect answers, make an educated guess, then flag it.
Second pass: the flagged questions
If you finish the last question with time left, a review screen takes you back to incomplete or flagged questions. Start with the ones you were close to finishing, not the hardest ones.
Last minute: no blanks
There is no negative marking, so make sure every question has an answer before time runs out. When the Time Expired message appears, click OK straight away, or you lose time from other sections.
What maths is in UCAT-ANZ QR? The topics to revise
The Consortium's 2026 presentation says QR assumes familiarity with ratios, percentages, averages and fractions, and that questions focus on problem solving rather than mathematical ability. It lists no senior mathematics topic.
| Area | What to be able to do | How it can appear |
|---|---|---|
| Percentages | Find a percentage, a percentage change, and the original value before a change | A price after a discount, or a rise from one year to the next |
| Ratios | Split an amount in a ratio and scale a ratio up or down | A mixture, a staffing ratio, or a dose scaled to a patient |
| Averages | Work out a mean, and see how one new value changes it | The mean of a column in a table |
| Fractions | Move between fractions, decimals and percentages | A share of a total read from a chart |
| Rates and units | Work with rates, and convert units before you calculate | A drip rate in millilitres per minute, or fuel used per 100 km |
The first four areas are the Consortium's list, which ends in etc. Rates and units are our addition, because the Consortium warns that units can be crucial. The Australian Curriculum's Year 8 standard covers practical problems with ratios, percentages and rates.
Eight mental shortcuts worth learning
Build any percentage from 10%, 5% and 1%
10% moves the decimal point one place, 5% is half of that, and 1% moves it two places. So 23% of 250 is 25 + 25 + 2.5 + 2.5 + 2.5 = 57.5, with no calculator.
Use multipliers for rises and falls
An 18% rise is × 1.18 and a 15% cut is × 0.85. One multiplication gives the new value. Two rises in a row multiply rather than add: 10% and then 10% is × 1.21, a 21% rise.
Undo a percentage by dividing
If a price is $60 after a 20% rise, the original is 60 ÷ 1.2 = $50. Taking 20% off $60 gives $48, which is wrong, because the 20% was worked out on the smaller, original price.
Percentage change: divide by the old value
Change ÷ original × 100. From 40,000 to 52,000 is 12,000 ÷ 40,000 = 30%. Dividing by the new figure gives about 23%, a different and wrong answer.
Know common fractions and decimals
1/8 = 12.5%, 1/6 ≈ 16.7%, 1/3 ≈ 33.3%, 2/3 ≈ 66.7% and 5/6 ≈ 83.3%. Spotting that 0.125 is 1/8, or that 0.4 is 2/5, turns a division into a quick mental step.
Ratios: count the parts first
A 3:5 mix has 8 parts. For 800 mL, each part is 100 mL, so 300 mL is concentrate and 500 mL is water. Forgetting to add the parts together is an easy slip under time pressure.
Multiply by 11 in your head
Add the two digits and put the sum between them: 34 × 11 = 374. If the sum passes 9, carry the 1: 47 × 11 = 517. It helps when 11% appears, or as a quick check.
Estimate, then check
Round the numbers before you touch the calculator. If three of the options are clearly the wrong size, mark the one that survives. One high scorer quoted by the Consortium worked this way when the options were spread out.
The UCAT-ANZ calculator: keys, shortcuts and when to use it
The facts here come from the Consortium's Test Tools page, which pictures the calculator. Its Tour Tutorial and practice tests let you try it before test day.
| What it is | A simple calculator for Decision Making and Quantitative Reasoning. The Consortium's picture shows a Texas Instruments TI-108, and says the calculator will look similar to it. |
|---|---|
| Keys | Digits, decimal point, add, subtract, multiply, divide, equals, percent, square root, a sign-change key, memory keys M+, M− and MRC, and ON/C. |
| Opening it | Click the calculator button in the blue toolbar above the question, or press Alt + C. |
| Typing numbers | Click the keys, or type numbers on the keyboard. If you type, Num Lock must be on. |
| Clearing | ON/C clears it. Backspace also clears every digit at once. There is no way to delete a single digit. |
| Closing | Click X, or move on to the next question. |
| If it stops responding | It opens in a separate window. Clicking the test screen, or using a shortcut such as Alt + F, stops it working until you click back on it. |
| If it covers the data | Click the part of the window that says Calculator and drag it elsewhere. |
| Keys | What they do |
|---|---|
| Alt + N | Go to the next screen or question |
| Alt + P | Go back to the previous question |
| Alt + C | Open the calculator |
| Alt + F | Flag the question for review |
| Alt + V | Open the Navigator window |
| Letter keys | Select that answer, for example B for answer B |
Wherever a letter is underlined, Alt and that letter is a shortcut. In the practice materials, Alt + F does not flag a question in Google Chrome, because Chrome uses that shortcut itself.
Do it in your head when
- The numbers are round: 15% of 200 is 30, from 10% plus 5%.
- You only need to compare sizes, or rule out options that are far apart.
- A fraction you know does the work, such as a quarter or an eighth.
- It is one short step you can check by rounding.
Open the calculator when
- The numbers are awkward and will not round neatly.
- Several steps are chained together, so one slip would carry through.
- The options are close together and an estimate cannot separate them.
- You need a percentage of an untidy number to the nearest unit.
There are no separate MR and MC keys: memory runs on M+, M− and a single MRC key, so try them in the practice materials before you rely on them. Often it is just as quick, and easier to check, to write an intermediate result in your notebook.
The 2020 Official Guide also warned that some test centre keyboards have no numeric keypad on the right, so practise with the mouse as well.
How to answer UCAT-ANZ QR questions: a method for every data set
High scorers quoted by the Consortium repeat three habits. Improve your mental arithmetic. Round the numbers when the options are spread out. Cross out the obviously wrong options first. This method builds on all three.
Read the question, not the whole chart
Start with the question, then find the one row, column or bar it needs. Studying every number first wastes time, because some of the data may not be needed.
Check units and key words
Note the unit of every number you use: litres or millilitres, per month or per year, values in thousands on an axis. The Consortium's tutorial says individual words and units may be crucial.
Estimate before you calculate
Round the numbers and work out a rough answer. Options far from it can go straight away, and sometimes only one is left.
Work only as precisely as the options need
If the options are far apart, your estimate is enough. If they are close, use the calculator or a written method, and jot intermediate results in your notebook.
Answer the question asked
Before you click, re-read the last line. Check whether it wants a difference or a total, and a monthly or a yearly figure.
Reuse the data for the rest of the set
When questions share the same data, note any value you worked out that could come up again.
Three worked examples of our own
A rural clinic's car uses 9.5 litres per 100 km. A replacement uses 7.0. The clinic drives 250 km a week for 46 weeks a year. How many litres does the replacement save each year? The options are 29, 115, 288, 1,150 and 2,875 litres.
Work with the difference straight away: 2.5 litres per 100 km. The distance is 250 × 46 = 11,500 km, which is 115 lots of 100 km, so 2.5 × 115 = 287.5, or about 288 litres. The trap is the unit: fuel use is per 100 km, so you must divide the distance by 100.
A clinic's consultation fee is $96 after a 20% rise. What was the fee before the rise? The options are $76.80, $78, $80, $84 and $115.20.
Undo the rise by dividing: 96 ÷ 1.2 = $80. Taking 20% off $96 gives $76.80, which is wrong, because the 20% was worked out on the smaller, original fee. Check by going forward: 20% of $80 is $16, and 80 + 16 = 96.
A table shows a hospital's emergency presentations: 2,400 in March, 3,000 in April and 2,700 in May. What is the percentage rise from March to April? The options are 5%, 12.5%, 20%, 25% and 30%.
Read only the two cells you need. The rise is 600, and 600 ÷ 2,400 = 25%. Dividing by the new figure gives 20%, which is also an option. The May figure is not needed, so leave it alone.
UCAT-ANZ QR practice questions with worked answers
Six questions on the core skills: a percentage, a ratio, average speed, unit conversion, percentage change and growth. Choose an answer, check it, then read the working. The official questions give five options and shared data; these give four to keep them quick.
A drug dose of 350 mg is increased by 18%. What is the new dose?
A solution is mixed in the ratio 3:5 (concentrate:water). To make 800 ml of solution, how much concentrate is needed?
A train travels 240 km at 80 km/h, then 180 km at 60 km/h. What is the average speed for the whole journey?
A patient drinks 1.5 L of water spread evenly over 6 hours. What is the average rate in mL per minute?
A clinic’s monthly bookings were 40,000 last quarter and 52,000 this quarter. What is the percentage increase?
A bacterial colony doubles every 2 hours. Starting with 50 cells, how many after 8 hours?
Timed UCAT-ANZ QR practice: data sets at test pace
Each set has two data sets with four questions on each and one standalone question, all with five options, as in the test. The clock gives you 6 minutes 30 seconds, the live pace of about 43 seconds a question, and the calculator works by click or keyboard.
Quantitative Reasoning practice sets
Pick a set and work through it as you would in the test: read each data set once, flag anything slow, use the calculator by click or keyboard, and check the review screen before you finish.
- 2 data sets with 4 questions each, plus 1 standalone question
- 6 min 30 s: about 43 seconds a question, as in the test
- Five options per question, on-screen calculator
Original questions written for practice in the real format. They are not taken from the UCAT.
If you finished in time but dropped marks, slow down on units and on the last line of each question. If you ran out of time, look at where it went: the first question on a data set takes longest, so note any value you work out that a later question can reuse.
Liked the quiz? Our UCAT app is coming to iPhone.
Five-minute rounds across all four sections, launching in March 2027. Sign up for early access and a free trial.
Common UCAT-ANZ QR mistakes and how to avoid them
How to prepare for UCAT-ANZ QR with the free official materials
The Consortium's materials are free, and it says its practice questions and tests are representative of the live test. It recommends working through them in this order.
Tour Tutorial
Learn the test software: the calculator, moving between screens and flagging. The Consortium says knowing these tools may save you valuable time on test day.
Quantitative Reasoning Question Tutorial
The Consortium's tutorials give tips and strategies for each question type. Work through this one before the question banks, on a desktop computer.
Four QR question banks
Official questions to work through over several practice sessions. Your progress is not retained, so keep a note of which questions you have done. Use a desktop, not a phone, to reflect the live test.
Practice Tests A to D
Full tests with standard timing, SEN timing or no timing. They give no score, but the final review screen shows which answers were right and the Explain Answer button shows why. Keep them for nearer your test date.
Track your marks and target your errors
Count your QR marks in every timed set. Note why you lost each one, then drill the question types you get wrong, not the ones you already find easy.
The Consortium's 2026 presentation says to allow around 25 to 30 hours for the whole test and to start at least 6 weeks before your test. Fit a few minutes of mental arithmetic into most days. There are only four practice tests in each timing, so use the question banks to learn and keep the full tests for checking your pace.
Year 12 is busy, so build up gradually. One high scorer quoted by the Consortium started slowly and practised for over an hour a day in the last month. She did more in the holidays so that term time could go to schoolwork.
Are you ready for QR? Tick off what you can already do
UCAT-ANZ Quantitative Reasoning: your questions answered
Where this guide's facts come from
Checked against these sources on 7 November 2026. Rules change between cycles, so confirm anything that decides your application on the official page for your entry year.
Want a second pair of eyes on your QR?
A UCAT tutor can go through your timed QR practice with you, from how you read the data to how you use the calculator. For a week-by-week schedule, try the revision planner.