Wonderlic Practice Test
This is a free 15-question sampler in the style of the Wonderlic, written by the StudyPDF team. It mixes the item types the real test uses: verbal analogies, word meaning and opposites, number series, arithmetic word problems, logical deduction, calendar reasoning and sentence matching. Answer all 15 questions, then check your score and read the explanation for every question.
THERMOMETER is to TEMPERATURE as SCALE is to:
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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. THERMOMETER is to TEMPERATURE as SCALE is to:
- A. Height
- B. Weight
- C. Balance
- D. Kitchen
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. Weight
The relationship is instrument to the quantity it measures. A thermometer measures temperature, so a scale measures weight. Balance is wrong because it is another instrument rather than a quantity, and kitchen is only a place where you might find one. On analogy items, name the relationship in words before you look at the options, because the wrong answers are usually words that are merely associated with the first pair.
2. Which word is most nearly OPPOSITE in meaning to SCARCE?
- A. Plentiful
- B. Costly
- C. Hidden
- D. Fragile
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. Plentiful
Scarce means there is very little of something available, so its opposite is plentiful. Costly is the trap, because scarce things are often expensive, but price is a consequence of scarcity rather than its meaning. Watch for that pattern on opposite items: the distractor is frequently a word that travels with the target word instead of one that reverses it.
3. What number comes next in this series? 2, 6, 12, 20, 30, ...
- A. 36
- B. 40
- C. 42
- D. 44
Show answer and explanation
Answer: C. 42
Look at the gaps rather than the numbers: 4, 6, 8, 10. The gaps grow by 2 each time, so the next gap is 12 and the next term is 30 plus 12, which is 42. Subtracting neighboring terms is the first thing to try on any series, and if the differences are not obvious, check whether each term is being multiplied or divided instead.
4. Complete the sentence.
A delivery van covers 150 miles in 3 hours, then 120 miles in the next 2 hours. Its average speed for the whole trip is _____ miles per hour.
Options for blank 1: 52, 54, 55, 60
Show answer and explanation
Answer: 54
Average speed is total distance divided by total time, so it is 270 miles over 5 hours, which is 54 miles per hour. The tempting answer is 55, from averaging the two leg speeds of 50 and 60. That shortcut only works when the two legs take the same amount of time, and here the first leg took longer, so it pulls the average toward the slower speed.
5. Assume these two statements are true: all welders at the plant wear gloves, and Ivan wears gloves. Is this third statement true, false or uncertain? Ivan is a welder.
- A. True
- B. False
- C. Uncertain, because the plant may hire welders who do not wear gloves
- D. Uncertain, because people other than welders also wear gloves
Show answer and explanation
Answer: D. Uncertain, because people other than welders also wear gloves
The first statement says every welder wears gloves. It does not say that only welders wear gloves, so a glove wearer could be a painter, a cleaner or a visitor. Concluding that Ivan is a welder runs the rule backwards, which is one of the most common errors on deduction items. The other uncertain option is wrong for a different reason: it contradicts a statement you were told to accept as true.
6. Two of these sentences mean the same thing. Select both.
Select all that apply.
- A. The meeting was canceled and will not be rescheduled.
- B. The meeting was postponed until Thursday.
- C. The meeting was moved up to Tuesday.
- D. The meeting will now be held on Thursday.
- E. Everyone agreed that Thursday was too late for a meeting.
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. The meeting was postponed until Thursday., D. The meeting will now be held on Thursday.
Postponed until Thursday and will now be held on Thursday describe the same outcome in different words. Canceled means there is no new date at all, moved up means an earlier date, and the last sentence is an opinion about Thursday rather than a statement about when the meeting happens. On these items, reduce each sentence to who did what and when, then compare those bare facts instead of the wording.
7. The 3rd of a month falls on a Friday. What day of the week is the 25th of that same month?
- A. Thursday
- B. Friday
- C. Saturday
- D. Sunday
Show answer and explanation
Answer: C. Saturday
The 25th is 22 days after the 3rd. Divide 22 by 7 and you get 3 weeks with 1 day left over, so the answer is one day past Friday, which is Saturday. Counting on your fingers works but burns time. Subtract the dates, divide by 7, and move forward by the remainder.
8. TENACIOUS most nearly means:
- A. Temporary
- B. Persistent
- C. Careless
- D. Generous
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. Persistent
Tenacious describes someone who holds on and does not let go, so persistent is the closest match. If a word is unfamiliar, look for a root you recognize before you guess. Tenacious shares its root with tenant and tenure, which are both about holding something, and that thread usually points you at the right half of the option list.
9. Complete the sentence.
In the series 1, 4, 2, 8, 3, 12, 4, the next number is _____.
Options for blank 1: 5, 13, 16, 20
Show answer and explanation
Answer: 16
This is two series woven together. The numbers in the odd positions count up 1, 2, 3, 4, and the numbers in the even positions run 4, 8, 12, so the next even position holds 16. When the differences in a series jump around wildly, try reading every other term before you try anything else, because interleaving is a favorite trick on aptitude tests.
10. Which of these numbers are divisible by both 3 and 4?
Select all that apply.
- A. 24
- B. 36
- C. 42
- D. 54
- E. 60
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. 24, B. 36, E. 60
Since 3 and 4 share no common factor, being divisible by both is the same as being divisible by 12. That gives 24, 36 and 60. Neither 42 nor 54 divides evenly by 4, even though both divide by 3. Checking one multiple of 12 is faster than running two separate division tests on every option.
11. Sixteen of the 40 items in a shipment arrived damaged. What percent of the shipment was damaged?
- A. 16 percent
- B. 24 percent
- C. 36 percent
- D. 40 percent
Show answer and explanation
Answer: D. 40 percent
A percent is the part divided by the whole, so it is 16 divided by 40, which is 0.4, or 40 percent. The first option is there to catch anyone who grabs the number from the question instead of doing the division, and the second is 40 minus 16. Under time pressure, name the part and the whole out loud before you divide.
12. AUTHOR is to BOOK as COMPOSER is to:
- A. A symphony
- B. An orchestra
- C. A concert hall
- D. A violin
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. A symphony
The relationship is creator to the work created. An author writes a book, so a composer writes a symphony. An orchestra performs the work, a concert hall houses the performance and a violin is a tool used in it, so all three are related to music without matching the relationship in the first pair. Matching the relationship, not the subject area, is the whole skill on analogy items.
13. Complete both blanks.
The word concise most nearly means _____. The word most nearly opposite in meaning to concise is _____.
Options for blank 1: brief, confusing, detailed, polite
Options for blank 2: short, wordy, accurate, quiet
Show answer and explanation
Answer: brief, wordy
Concise means saying something in few words while keeping the meaning, so brief is the match and wordy is the opposite. Short is the trap in the second blank because it is a synonym rather than an opposite, and under time pressure people grab the first familiar word they see. Read what the blank is asking for, synonym or opposite, before you scan the options.
14. Assume both statements are true: every item on the top shelf is fragile, and nothing fragile is shipped by truck. Which conclusions must also be true?
Select all that apply.
- A. No item on the top shelf is shipped by truck.
- B. Everything fragile is on the top shelf.
- C. Anything shipped by truck is not on the top shelf.
- D. Some fragile items are shipped by truck.
- E. Every item that is not on the top shelf is shipped by truck.
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. No item on the top shelf is shipped by truck., C. Anything shipped by truck is not on the top shelf.
Chain the two statements: top shelf leads to fragile, and fragile leads to not shipped by truck, so top shelf leads to not shipped by truck. The second correct option is the same statement read backwards, which is always valid when you also flip both sides. The wrong options either reverse a rule without flipping it, or contradict a statement you were told to accept.
15. A coat is marked down 20 percent and now sells for 32 dollars. What was the price before the markdown?
- A. 36.00 dollars
- B. 38.40 dollars
- C. 40.00 dollars
- D. 44.00 dollars
Show answer and explanation
Answer: C. 40.00 dollars
After a 20 percent markdown the coat sells for 80 percent of the old price, so 32 is 0.8 of the answer. Divide 32 by 0.8 and you get 40. The trap is adding 20 percent to 32, which gives 38.40, and it fails because the discount was taken from the larger original price, not from the smaller sale price. Check any answer of this kind by running it forward: 20 percent of 40 is 8, and 40 minus 8 is 32.
What the Wonderlic actually measures
The Wonderlic is a short general aptitude test that employers use to screen candidates. The standard form is 50 questions in 12 minutes. That single fact matters more than anything else about it. Twelve minutes for 50 questions is about 14 seconds per question, so almost nobody reaches the end. It is a speed test at least as much as it is a reasoning test, and the questions get harder as you move through them, which means the last items are both the hardest and the ones you have the least time for.
The questions themselves are not specialized. There is no job knowledge on it and no subject you can revise the night before. You get verbal analogies, word meaning and opposites, number series, short arithmetic word problems, logical deduction, date and calendar reasoning, and items that ask which two sentences carry the same meaning. Anyone who has finished high school has met all of it before. What the test is really sampling is how fast you can switch between those kinds of thinking without losing accuracy.
Scoring is a raw number: how many of the 50 you got right. There is no penalty for a wrong answer, so a blank and a wrong guess cost the same. What counts as a good result is not something this page or any other page can tell you, because different employers set different cutoffs, and the same employer often sets different ones for different roles. If a score matters to you, ask the employer or the recruiter what they use rather than trusting a number you read online. The test became widely known because NFL teams used it at the scouting combine for many years, but the everyday use has always been ordinary hiring. Shorter forms and a version used by some schools exist too, so check which one you are actually sitting.
How to use this sampler
These 15 questions are written in the Wonderlic style but they are a little meatier than the real thing, so aim for roughly 30 seconds each rather than 14. This page is not timed. The point here is to find out which kinds of thinking slow you down, and a clock in the background makes that harder to see, not easier. Once you know your weak types, add the timer yourself: set 12 minutes, take as many mixed questions as you can, and watch what happens to your accuracy when the pressure is on.
Two habits are worth building now. The first is answering everything. Since a wrong answer costs no more than a blank one, an unanswered question is a guaranteed zero and a guess is not. The second is refusing to camp. One stubborn word problem can quietly eat a minute, which on the real test is four or five easier questions you never got to see. If a question does not resolve in a few seconds, pick your best option and move.
Read the explanation for every question when you finish, including the ones you got right, because a lucky guess and a solid answer look identical on the score screen. Pay particular attention to the arithmetic items. Percentages, averages and rates are the part of this test that responds most to plain practice, and they are also where the tempting wrong answer usually lives.
How StudyPDF builds full practice tests from your own materials
Fifteen questions can show you which item types slow you down. They cannot get you ready on their own, and a generic bank has no idea that your arithmetic is fine but number series lose you every time.
StudyPDF works from your material instead. You upload the aptitude prep book you bought, the practice packet a recruiter sent you or your own old math notes, 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 straight to the source when something looks off. You can regenerate fresh tests as often as you like, narrow them to one item type such as number series or percentage word problems, and track what you keep missing.
You do not have to upload anything to start. If you have no file at hand, name a topic instead, for example verbal analogies or averages and rates, and Bo writes a practice test from that. Starting is free.
Written by the StudyPDF team. Last updated 2026-08-19.