How much time do you need to prepare for the GMAT?

GMAT (Graduate Management Admission Test) is a computer-adaptive test in which the candidate's analytical writing, quantitative, verbal and reading skills in standard written English are tested.

This exam is for a duration of about 3-1/2 hours including some break time.

It mainly depends on the thorough practice of this type of questions that the time a student requires will depend on and it drastically changes from individual to individual.

Generally, people say that 6 month to 1 year period is sufficient for the preparation of the GMAT exam but the thing is that it depends on many other factors.

I have seen some students doing logical and reasoning questions right from their class IX and they continue doing that and go on increasing the level and by the time they are ready to appear in GMAT they have already done a practice for 3-4 years. So we can not say that only 6 months is sufficient because the background knowledge and reasoning ability developed in early stages also plays a crucial role.

If a student feels that he has not mush expertise in the field of logical, analytical and english writing then he has to go for some extra miles by referring to some question banks and model papers available in the market and devote some extra time on these preparations. In that case may be he will be able to do well in the GMAT exam.

Time is only a rough guiding factor and what counts is how much sincere efforts one can do in that time.

The GMAT exam will test your skills which are highly important to business and management programs. This will assess your analytical writing and problem-solving abilities. In addition to that, it will also test logic and critical reasoning skills. These are vital to real-world business and management success. Integrated Reasoning, is also a section in this exam to measure your ability to evaluate information presented in new formats and from multiple sources in a technologically advanced and data-rich world. Test questions are developed by international experts.
Advanced identification procedures and standardized test administration conditions are adopted.

The examination is conducted very securely and tough. Good preparation with more logical thinking and alertness are required to get a good score in the examination.

The time required for preparation depends entirely on the efforts and IQ of the individual. The time required will be a minimum of 9 months to 18 months based on your focus and concentration on the training and other issues.

There would be many exceptions in terms of about what would be the optimum ways & time that would be fit for the projected outcomes or results but for me the candidate opting for such goals & accompanying preparations are well aware of their level of maturity & therefore if the candidate feels that he or she is well equipped with the resources in order to clear the respective exams then they can go ahead in facing the levels or in slightly different scenario wherein if the candidate is not confident of the same then they can opt for some more rigorous preparations while visualizing themselves of their position so as to work more on the weaker sections.

I would request the author to pl. read the interviews of the candidates who cleared the exams in order to get a good understanding of the required resources along with the required level of preparations. In one of such interviews that I read in the past, the candidate openly admitted that she never opted for any coaching classes or tutorials but instead she tried her level best so as to keep the consistencies in the preparations. If the author can arrange for some more such interview than he can better judge his current level along with what extra that he needs to do in order to reach to the final selection.

We can easily be evident of the scenario wherein few cleared the levels in their first attempt but on the other hand many couldn't even manage to pass with the first level. May be hard work isn't the only case but the ways in which the things are taken & implemented are also carrying with the huge importance.

In addition, I wish the author best of luck with a request to pl. go through with the other views as well before concluding on this matter.