Hi everyone! Super nervous to post on here, but I read a lot of these when first figuring out how to study for this exam so I thought I should make one too c:
Some background about me: 3.7 gpa, took 2 gap years to figure what I wanted to do with my degree, is planning to apply next cycle so fingers crossed.
I studied for about 3 months (10 week study plan by DATBooster, but did my own thing after 6-7 weeks of this). The main sources I used for the tests were DATBooster, Chad's Prep videos, and lots of Anki
Biology (26): DATBooster and Anki. I looked over most if not all of DATBooster's biology videos and question banks. The biology videos do not cover all of the material, so reading the study notes along with the videos and banks helped immensely with review. However, and I can't stress this enough, use Anki throughout your reviews! The videos and question banks help you review everything but not memorize! If you start from the beginning, there are less cards you will have to go through at the end. I know from experience because I slacked on this part and had to grind through thousands of cards in 5-6 weeks, not very fun. Compared to DATBooster's practice test, I honestly thought that the questions on the actual exam were much easier, but that was probably because I spent most of my time in the last month looking and reviewing biology.
General Chemistry (27): DATBooster. To study for this section, I watched most of the DATBooster videos because they included practice questions that were very representative of the actual questions on the exam. I would do the DATBooster practice tests, note down what I got wrong, reviewed either the videos or study notes and did some questions from the banks, and go back into doing more practice tests. I went from a 20 in my first practice test to getting scores between 25-27 by the end.
Organic Chemistry (22): Chad's Prep and DATBooster. In hindsight, I definitely should've taken more time to study this subject. I took these classes before my gap years (and got Bs in the classes) and I knew my foundation coming into studying probably wasn't the greatest so before I bought DATBooster, I watched all of Chad's Prep Organic Chemistry videos, noting down all the reactions and mechanisms, everything. After I bought DATBooster, I used it to make sure the notes I made covered everything the DAT had. After I thought I had properly reviewed everything, I followed the same process for general chemistry review.
Perceptual Ability (23): DATBooster. For this section, DATBooster is a godsend. As someone who loves puzzle solving, I love doing these questions but not in a time crunch and I was spending too long on these questions. I watched all of the videos just to get an idea of what the questions were asking us and then threw myself into the question banks. Most days, I would try to do a couple of each question type under 45 seconds and if I thought I needed more practice, I would keep going. DATBooster includes generators for Angle Ranking, Cube Counting, and Hole Punching so there was no worry of running out of questions to practice on. There's really no other way of getting better other than just doing more practice problems. The actual exam was pretty hard though and I honestly thought I did worse than I did. I prioritized doing the Angle Ranking, Hole Punching, and Cube Counting sections first because those were the easiest to save time for me, then continued with the Pattern Folding and went back to Keyholes and Top-Front-End.
Reading Comprehension (23): DATBooster. Similarly to PAT, the only way of getting better at reading is to keep practicing. In the beginning, I was using the method of reading half of the passage then going through the questions and answering what I could, then going back in. I am not a fast reader, so this method worked but took too much time. Then I started using a combination of just reading the first line of each paragraph, getting a feel of the passage and then the search and destroy method. By the end, I was getting most of the questions right and switched to focusing mainly on Bio, GC, and OC.
Quantitative Reasoning (21): Honestly, I think I fumbled the bag on this section. I have a math minor(!) so I thought my foundation for math was pretty strong and didn't bother spending too much time reviewing. I did 3 practice tests (24, 25, 26), did well, and never looked at it again. I think it was a combination of nerves (it's the very last section of the DAT, and I think the PAT fried my brain by then) and not enough proper review before the exam. I overthought too many questions and was left feeling very unsure about everything at the end of the exam. Definitely don't be overconfident like me and review everything, please.
In the end, I'm pretty happy with my score and definitely not looking to retake. I'm not a great standardized test taker but if you give yourself enough time to study, you'll be fine. Good luck everybody!
Some background about me: 3.7 gpa, took 2 gap years to figure what I wanted to do with my degree, is planning to apply next cycle so fingers crossed.
I studied for about 3 months (10 week study plan by DATBooster, but did my own thing after 6-7 weeks of this). The main sources I used for the tests were DATBooster, Chad's Prep videos, and lots of Anki
Biology (26): DATBooster and Anki. I looked over most if not all of DATBooster's biology videos and question banks. The biology videos do not cover all of the material, so reading the study notes along with the videos and banks helped immensely with review. However, and I can't stress this enough, use Anki throughout your reviews! The videos and question banks help you review everything but not memorize! If you start from the beginning, there are less cards you will have to go through at the end. I know from experience because I slacked on this part and had to grind through thousands of cards in 5-6 weeks, not very fun. Compared to DATBooster's practice test, I honestly thought that the questions on the actual exam were much easier, but that was probably because I spent most of my time in the last month looking and reviewing biology.
General Chemistry (27): DATBooster. To study for this section, I watched most of the DATBooster videos because they included practice questions that were very representative of the actual questions on the exam. I would do the DATBooster practice tests, note down what I got wrong, reviewed either the videos or study notes and did some questions from the banks, and go back into doing more practice tests. I went from a 20 in my first practice test to getting scores between 25-27 by the end.
Organic Chemistry (22): Chad's Prep and DATBooster. In hindsight, I definitely should've taken more time to study this subject. I took these classes before my gap years (and got Bs in the classes) and I knew my foundation coming into studying probably wasn't the greatest so before I bought DATBooster, I watched all of Chad's Prep Organic Chemistry videos, noting down all the reactions and mechanisms, everything. After I bought DATBooster, I used it to make sure the notes I made covered everything the DAT had. After I thought I had properly reviewed everything, I followed the same process for general chemistry review.
Perceptual Ability (23): DATBooster. For this section, DATBooster is a godsend. As someone who loves puzzle solving, I love doing these questions but not in a time crunch and I was spending too long on these questions. I watched all of the videos just to get an idea of what the questions were asking us and then threw myself into the question banks. Most days, I would try to do a couple of each question type under 45 seconds and if I thought I needed more practice, I would keep going. DATBooster includes generators for Angle Ranking, Cube Counting, and Hole Punching so there was no worry of running out of questions to practice on. There's really no other way of getting better other than just doing more practice problems. The actual exam was pretty hard though and I honestly thought I did worse than I did. I prioritized doing the Angle Ranking, Hole Punching, and Cube Counting sections first because those were the easiest to save time for me, then continued with the Pattern Folding and went back to Keyholes and Top-Front-End.
Reading Comprehension (23): DATBooster. Similarly to PAT, the only way of getting better at reading is to keep practicing. In the beginning, I was using the method of reading half of the passage then going through the questions and answering what I could, then going back in. I am not a fast reader, so this method worked but took too much time. Then I started using a combination of just reading the first line of each paragraph, getting a feel of the passage and then the search and destroy method. By the end, I was getting most of the questions right and switched to focusing mainly on Bio, GC, and OC.
Quantitative Reasoning (21): Honestly, I think I fumbled the bag on this section. I have a math minor(!) so I thought my foundation for math was pretty strong and didn't bother spending too much time reviewing. I did 3 practice tests (24, 25, 26), did well, and never looked at it again. I think it was a combination of nerves (it's the very last section of the DAT, and I think the PAT fried my brain by then) and not enough proper review before the exam. I overthought too many questions and was left feeling very unsure about everything at the end of the exam. Definitely don't be overconfident like me and review everything, please.
In the end, I'm pretty happy with my score and definitely not looking to retake. I'm not a great standardized test taker but if you give yourself enough time to study, you'll be fine. Good luck everybody!
Last edited:
