GED Math Practice Test
This is a free 15-question sampler in the style of the GED Mathematical Reasoning test. It covers fractions, decimals and percentages, ratios and proportions, exponents and roots, linear equations and inequalities, the coordinate plane and slope, functions, geometry and reading data, mixing multiple choice, select all that apply and fill in the blank. Answer all 15 questions, then check your score and read the explanation for every question.
A jacket normally costs $80 and is marked down by 25 percent. What is the sale price?
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All 15 questions at a glance
Prefer to read before you play? Every question in the sampler is listed below. Answers and explanations stay collapsed until you open them.
1. A jacket normally costs $80 and is marked down by 25 percent. What is the sale price?
- A. $55
- B. $60
- C. $65
- D. $75
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. $60
25 percent of 80 is 20, so the price drops from 80 to 60. A faster route is to notice that a 25 percent discount means you pay 75 percent, and 0.75 times 80 is 60 in one step.
2. What is 2/3 + 1/4?
- A. 3/7
- B. 5/12
- C. 11/12
- D. 1 1/12
Show answer and explanation
Answer: C. 11/12
Rewrite both fractions over the common denominator 12, which gives 8/12 + 3/12 = 11/12. Adding the numerators and the denominators separately gives 3/7, and that is the most common mistake with fraction addition.
3. A recipe uses 3 cups of flour for every 2 cups of sugar. If you use 12 cups of flour, how many cups of sugar do you need?
- A. 6
- B. 7
- C. 8
- D. 18
Show answer and explanation
Answer: C. 8
Set up the proportion 3/2 = 12/x and cross multiply to get 3x = 24, so x = 8. You can also see it as scaling: the flour was multiplied by 4, so the sugar has to be multiplied by 4 as well.
4. Which of the following are equal to 3/4?
Select all that apply.
- A. 0.75
- B. 75%
- C. 0.34
- D. 6/8
- E. 4/3
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. 0.75, B. 75%, D. 6/8
3 divided by 4 is 0.75, which is 75 per 100, and 6/8 reduces to 3/4 when you divide both parts by 2. 4/3 is the reciprocal and is about 1.33, while 0.34 is simply a different number that happens to use the same digits.
5. Complete the sentence.
A rectangular garden is 8 feet long and 5 feet wide, so its area is _____ square feet.
Options for blank 1: 13, 26, 40, 45
Show answer and explanation
Answer: 40
The area of a rectangle is length times width, so 8 times 5 is 40 square feet. The 26 is the perimeter, 2 times (8 + 5), so read carefully whether a question wants the space inside the shape or the distance around it.
6. Solve for x: 5x + 8 = 3x - 6
- A. -7
- B. -1
- C. 1
- D. 7
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. -7
Subtract 3x from both sides to get 2x + 8 = -6, subtract 8 to get 2x = -14, then divide by 2 to get x = -7. Checking is quick and worth it here: both sides come out to -27.
7. What is the slope of the line that passes through the points (2, 3) and (6, 11)?
- A. 1/2
- B. 2
- C. 4
- D. 8
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. 2
Slope is rise over run, so (11 - 3) divided by (6 - 2) is 8/4, which is 2. Dividing the other way around gives 1/2, so keep the y difference on top.
8. Which of these values of x make the inequality 2x + 3 is less than or equal to 11 true?
Select all that apply.
- A. x = -2
- B. x = 0
- C. x = 4
- D. x = 5
- E. x = 7
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. x = -2, B. x = 0, C. x = 4
Solve it the same way you solve an equation: subtract 3 to get 2x at most 8, then divide by 2 to get x at most 4. The words or equal to matter, because x = 4 makes both sides exactly 11 and still counts as true.
9. Simplify: (2x^3)(4x^5)
- A. 6x^8
- B. 8x^8
- C. 6x^15
- D. 8x^15
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. 8x^8
Multiply the coefficients, 2 times 4 is 8, and add the exponents when the bases are the same, 3 plus 5 is 8, which gives 8x^8. Exponents get multiplied only when a power is raised to another power, as in (x^3)^5.
10. Complete the sentence.
If f(x) = 2x + 5, then f(4) = _____.
Options for blank 1: 9, 11, 13, 26
Show answer and explanation
Answer: 13
Function notation is an instruction to substitute, so replace every x with 4: 2 times 4 is 8, plus 5 is 13. The f in f(4) is the name of the rule, not a number being multiplied by 4.
11. A right triangle has legs of 9 inches and 12 inches. How long is the hypotenuse?
- A. 15 inches
- B. 20 inches
- C. 21 inches
- D. 225 inches
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. 15 inches
By the Pythagorean theorem, 9 squared plus 12 squared is 81 plus 144, which is 225, and the square root of 225 is 15. Forgetting the last square root leaves you with 225, and simply adding the legs gives 21, which is always too long.
12. A cylinder has a radius of 3 cm and a height of 10 cm. Using 3.14 for pi, what is its volume?
- A. 94.2 cubic cm
- B. 188.4 cubic cm
- C. 282.6 cubic cm
- D. 1130.4 cubic cm
Show answer and explanation
Answer: C. 282.6 cubic cm
The volume of a cylinder is pi times the radius squared times the height, so 3.14 times 9 times 10 is 282.6 cubic cm. Squaring the diameter instead of the radius gives 1130.4, four times too big, which is the classic slip on this formula.
13. Which of these points lie in the second quadrant?
Select all that apply.
- A. (-3, 5)
- B. (2, 7)
- C. (-1, -4)
- D. (-6, 2)
- E. (4, -3)
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. (-3, 5), D. (-6, 2)
The second quadrant is the upper left of the coordinate plane, where x is negative and y is positive. That rules out (2, 7) in the first quadrant, (-1, -4) in the third and (4, -3) in the fourth.
14. Complete the sentence.
The square root of 81, plus 3 to the third power, equals _____.
Options for blank 1: 18, 27, 36, 90
Show answer and explanation
Answer: 36
The square root of 81 is 9 because 9 times 9 is 81, and 3 to the third power is 3 times 3 times 3, which is 27, so the sum is 36. Reading 3 to the third power as 3 times 3 gives 18, so remember the exponent counts how many copies of the base are multiplied.
15. A small company pays its five employees $30,000, $32,000, $34,000, $36,000 and $200,000. Which measure of center best describes a typical salary there?
- A. The mean
- B. The median
- C. The mode
- D. The range
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. The median
The one very large salary drags the mean up to $66,400, which is higher than what four of the five people actually earn, while the median sits at $34,000 and matches the group. One extreme value moves the mean far more than the median, so the median describes a lopsided set better.
What's actually on the GED Mathematical Reasoning test
Mathematical Reasoning is one of the four GED subject tests, alongside Reasoning Through Language Arts, Social Studies and Science. You take it on a computer, it runs about 115 minutes, and it holds roughly 46 questions. The content splits into two broad buckets: quantitative problem solving, which is arithmetic with fractions, decimals, percentages, ratios, exponents, roots and geometry, and algebraic problem solving, which is expressions, equations, inequalities, the coordinate plane, slope and functions. Algebra is the larger of the two, so it deserves more of your study time than the arithmetic.
The test is split into two parts by calculator access. The first part is short, only the first five questions, and you work those with no calculator at all. For the longer second part an on-screen TI-30XS calculator is available, and a physical handheld version is allowed at test centers in many places. You also get a formula sheet and a calculator reference sheet on screen for the whole test, so area, volume and slope formulas are things you look up rather than memorize. Not every question is multiple choice either: expect fill in the blank, drag and drop, drop down and hot spot items where you click a point on a graph.
Some details vary and are worth checking rather than trusting from memory. Question counts and timing get adjusted by GED Testing Service from time to time. The passing score is 145 on a 100 to 200 scale, with higher bands above that for college ready and college credit, but eligibility rules, fees, retake policies and whether you can test online instead of at a center are set by your state or province. A few states use the HiSET or another equivalency test instead of the GED, so confirm which one your state accepts before you start prepping.
How to use this sampler
These 15 questions follow the same content mix as the real section in miniature. A little over half of them are algebraic: solving equations, testing an inequality, reading slope from two points, evaluating a function. The rest are quantitative: percentages, fractions, ratios, exponents and roots, area, volume, the Pythagorean theorem and one question about what a set of numbers actually tells you. The formats are mixed too, so you get practice with select all that apply and fill in the blank, not only classic multiple choice.
Take it in one sitting, aiming for about two and a half minutes per question, which is the pace the real test asks for. Try the first few with no calculator so the no-calculator part does not surprise you, then use one for the rest. Keep a formula sheet next to you rather than working from memory, because that is what test day looks like and you want to practice finding a formula quickly.
Then read the explanation for every question, including the ones you got right. A wrong answer usually points at a habit, not a single fact. If you added the numerators and the denominators on the fraction question, that same habit will cost you points on any question with fractions in it, so fix the habit rather than memorizing the one answer.
How StudyPDF builds full practice tests from your own materials
Fifteen questions can show you which topics are shaky. They cannot get you ready on their own, and a generic question bank has no idea which chapters your prep book or your class actually covers.
StudyPDF works from your material instead. You upload your GED math prep book, your class handouts or the notes you took, and Bo, the study agent, builds full-length practice tests from those exact pages. Every question is grounded in your material, and every explanation cites where the answer comes from, so you can go back to the page when something looks off. You can regenerate fresh tests as often as you like and narrow them to one topic, such as slope or volume, until it stops costing you points.
You do not need a document to start. You can also just name a topic, say linear equations or percentages, and Bo will build practice questions and explanations for it from scratch. That is useful when you have identified a weak spot here and want more practice on it before you go looking for the right chapter. Starting is free.
Written by the StudyPDF team. Last updated 2026-08-19.