Looking for the right GRE prep course that will help you boost your score can be challenging.
You likely came across Magoosh, one of the most popular GRE courses out there, but you may be wondering if the smaller price tag comes with a big catch or not.
Well, look no further because we are here to help.
In this Magoosh GRE prep review, we will dissect Magoosh’s offering, taking a closer look at all its features, as well as its strengths and weaknesses.
Hopefully, this honest review will help you make a better-informed decision and get you closer to the grad program of your dreams.
Summary Table
Let’s start with a quick summary table that highlights everything the Magoosh GRE prep course offers.
Premium | 1 month | Premium | 6 months | Premium + Admissions | |
Price | $149 | $179 | $199 |
Access Period | 1 month | 6 months | 6 months for the GRE and 12 months for Admissions |
Practice Exams | 3 | 3 | 3 |
Practice Questions | 1,600+ questions | 1,600+ questions | 1,600+ questions |
Video Instruction | ~40 hours | ~40 hours | ~40 hours |
Live lessons | ✘ | ✘ | ✘ |
Ask an expert (email) | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Prep books | ✘ | ✘ | ✘ |
Flashcards | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Mobile App | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Free Trial | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Score-Improvement Guarantee | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Score Predictor | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Admissions Support | ✘ | ✘ | Yes |
Magoosh GRE Overview
Magoosh GRE prep product is one of the most popular GRE products out there for combining a budget-friendly offering with high-quality learning tools.
For comparison, Kaplan and Princeton Review are about 4 times more expensive.
Still, it’s only natural that the number of resources is more limited, especially when it comes to practice tests and questions.
Additionally, compared to other test prep companies that offer live classes and books, Magoosh is fully on-demand and strictly online.
Here’s an overview of the core features provided by Magoosh:
- 8 full sections worth of licensed official GRE questions
- Around 38 hours of video lessons
- Over 1600 practice questions
- Up to 3 full-length practice tests
- Study schedules and checklists available
- Email and chat support with an expert
- +5 Point Increase Guarantee
- Math and Vocabulary Flashcards
- 7-days free trial
- 7-day money-back guarantee
- GRE Blog
Magoosh GRE Review For 2024
Magoosh is an American test prep company founded in 2009 and based in California. They have now served millions of students in over 185 countries.
Besides the GRE, Magoosh also offers test prep courses for several other standardized tests, such as the SAT, GMAT, and LSAT, just to name a few.
Magoosh has optimized its content for the shorter GRE and adapted its video lessons and practice tests to reflect what you’ll see on the real GRE.
Let’s review the main features of the Magoosh GRE course more closely.
Curriculum
You can expect Magoosh to cover everything you need to know to prepare for the GRE exam.
There is comprehensive coverage of Math, Verbal, and AWA, and here are the main topics covered in your video lessons:
Magoosh Math
- General Math Strategies
- Arithmetic and Fractions
- Percents and Ratios
- Integer Properties
- Algebra, Equations, and Inequalities
- Word Problems
- Powers and Roots
- Geometry and Coordinate Geometry
- Statistics
- Counting
- Probability
- Data Interpretation
- Advanced QC Strategies
Magoosh Verbal
- Text Completion – no shifts, sentence shifts, double blanks, triple blanks
- Sentence equivalence
- Vocabulary
- Reading comprehension
- Paragraph Argument
Magoosh Writing
- AWA Basics
- Issue Task
The course is by default unstructured, so you can pick and choose whichever content you want to study from a library-style platform.
Although some other courses may have a more robust curriculum, Magoosh offers you the essentials to feel prepared for the GRE exam.
Nevertheless, Magoosh puts out a few study plans that you can follow if you prefer to have a bit more structure in your study journey.
To know exactly which study schedule fits your needs best, you can do a short quiz.
The quiz will require you to answer how far you are into your prep, if you have a particular subject (Math or Verbal) that you’d like to focus on, and for how long you plan to study.
Video Lessons
Magoosh’s GRE videos are one of the most important features of the course and a great resource to fully grasp all the GRE concepts.
Each topic in each module has a video lesson that varies in duration from 3 to around 20 minutes.
Each video is accompanied by the full video transcript, a digital notepad on the side for you to take notes, and, on some videos, related blog posts and FAQs.
These are neat little features that really elevate the learning experience. Following each module there is a quiz to test what you learned.
Compared to other test prep services, Magoosh videos have a sort of basic production value.
They are made in a PowerPoint style, accompanied only by the voiceover of the instructor.
In some videos, the instructors also do live annotations on the screen, which makes it easier to break down hard questions and practice problems.
Although the quality of the videos is not exactly the best, we have to say that the content is quite good.
The explanations are clear and the instructors do a competent job explaining the concepts of the GRE and sharing strategies and tips that help students prepare for the exam.
Practice Tests
The Magoosh prep course offers 3 full-length practice tests.
This is not a lot (Princeton offers 8 for example), but that’s the expected trade-off considering the price tag.
The questions used on the tests are actually recycled from the normal practice question bank, which some people may consider a downside.
The practice test simulates the experience you will have taking the GRE on test day.
The test-taking platform is very similar, and Magoosh also uses Computer-Adaptive Testing, meaning that the way you perform on the first section of the exam will influence the difficulty level of the next section.
Regarding how closely Magoosh GRE tests resemble the actual GRE, it appears that the difficulty level is higher in Magoosh’s practice tests, which is not necessarily a bad thing.
Nevertheless, we would still recommend that you complement your practice by doing the official ETS exams, which are thought to be more representative of the real exam.
Practice Problems
Magoosh prep courses offer around 1750 practice questions, and although it’s not as many as other competitors, the quality and presentation stand out.
After you answer each question, you get text and video explanations, a note-taking function, and related lessons with detailed explanations of the concepts tested in the question.
You also get information about your pace and other students’ pace, so you can compare your performance and you can flag the question to review later.
We really love that you can customize the type of questions you get.
You can choose the question type, the subject, the difficulty level, the question pool (unanswered only, flagged, incorrect), the number of questions, and the time limit.
It’s a very valuable resource that can help you boost your verbal score and quant score.
Another cool feature of Magoosh is that they integrate into their platform a section for Official Questions, with licensed GRE test items from ETS.
As they put it on their website, “Official questions are the gold standard for test accuracy”, so it’s a very helpful resource.
There are several sets of questions with different difficulty levels, and once you finish each section, you will get a report of your strengths and weaknesses, along with expert explanations for each question.
Study Materials
The Magoosh prep course offers students several other great resources to prepare for the exam.
Although the amount of study material, particularly referring to practice questions, may not be as large as what other companies offer, you still get a lot of value for the price you pay.
Besides the videos and practice questions that we already discussed, Magoosh also offers
- Vocabulary and Math flashcards, so you can test your knowledge on the go and improve your scores. You can use the flashcards on your computer or mobile app.
- GRE Vocabulary builder, where you can quiz yourself on words at every level.
- Study Plans – customizable study schedules ranging from one week to six months.
- GRE Blog – in the Magoosh blog you can find a lot of valuable information, study tips, and strategies to help you ace your exam.
These are very helpful resources to assist you on your self-study journey and get you closer to the high score you want.
One downside for people who prefer a more old-school type of learning is that Magoosh doesn’t offer any GRE prep books.
User Interface & Mobile App
When it comes to the interface and user experience, Magoosh does a pretty good job by providing a clean, user-friendly platform that is easy to navigate.
With a professional appearance, the navigation is intuitive, and you can quickly jump into your lessons and practice material through the homepage.
The dashboard has a really cool tracking feature where you can see a results summary of your performance for each subject, Math, Verbal, and Writing.
They provide an estimated score (you have to answer at least 50 questions for each subject), the number of questions you answered, your pace, and other student’s pace for comparison.
The mobile app is another great resource, especially considering that other more expensive competitors like Kaplan or Princeton Review, for example, have a lot more limitations in this area.
The app is user-friendly and connected to your course.
You have questions to practice, video lessons, and study resources available on the applications. You can study anywhere at any time.
Magoosh also has a vocabulary app to improve your verbal skills.
Pricing & Money Back Guarantee
Magoosh offers one of the most cost-effective GRE courses out there.
Considering the quality of the content and all the study materials available, we have to say that the Magoosh GRE course is one of the best value-for-money options around.
The pricing is quite simple: the 1-month Premium on-demand plan costs $149 and the 6-month Premium course costs $179. Then there is the Premium + Admissions plan that costs $199.
The Admissions plan includes, apart from the 6-month GRE course:
- Ask an admissions expert
- 48 tasks in your application tracker to submit strong applications
- Step-by-step guided essay writing
- 50+ video workshops
- 40+ annotated samples of real SOPs and Personal Statements
- Resources for resumes/CVs, Letters of Recommendation, creating a school list, and more.
Magoosh has a 7-day money-back guarantee, something you don’t see with other competitors.
If you are not fully satisfied with the course, you can contact them and ask for a complete refund, no questions asked.
Score Guarantee
Magoosh guarantees a 5-point increase on your GRE if you originally scored 320 or below, and if that doesn’t happen, you’ll get your money back.
The requirement is that you must have taken the exam before studying with Magoosh, and your old score must be less than 5 years old.
To get the money back, you must have submitted your “Before” GRE score when you sign up by email.
You also have to send by email your “After” GRE score once you get the results.
Student Support
Although Magoosh doesn’t offer tutoring options, they do offer email and chat support.
If you are struggling with a question, you can send them a message about it and they will reply to you usually within 24 hours.
Their team of experts provides detailed explanations to your question, so it can be very helpful.
Magoosh GRE Pros and Cons
It’s now time to weigh in on the pros and cons of Magoosh’s GRE prep courses.
– Affordable prices, with a good benefit-cost ratio.
– Many pertinent video lessons with great content with helpful tips.
– Practicing questions with insightful video and text explanations.
– Mobile app with comprehensive course resources.
– Integration of official questions with greater real-test accuracy.
– Score-improvement guarantee.
– The default self-study approach may leave students a bit lost.
– No books available.
– The production value of the videos is a bit outdated.
Verdict
The Magoosh GRE course stands out as a great cost-effective option, offering an impressive benefit-cost ratio for students seeking quality preparation without breaking the bank.
While the default self-study approach may leave some students feeling less guided, Magoosh still excels in providing high-quality content and engaging study resources that facilitate the learning process.
The customizable practice sets and the video explanations rival the best material of other competitors.
The production value of videos and the lack of prep books may be seen as drawbacks, but Magoosh compensates for that by offering a great online platform with all the content you need to ace the GRE.
All in all, we can say that Magoosh is worth your money, and can serve as a helpful complement to the ETS official material.
We still recommend that you do your research and find out for yourself what is the best option for you.
FAQs
How accurate is the Magoosh estimated score on the GRE?
The Magoosh estimated score is considered to be quite accurate, especially when students answer a lot of questions.
Is Magoosh GRE harder?
Magoosh GRE is made to be similar to the actual GRE, however, some students report that the Magoosh exam is a bit harder.
Can I get Magoosh for free?
The Magoosh course is not free, but you can get a 7-day free trial.
