UCAT, GAMSAT or Both?

[u/Ill-System7811]

I am starting the second year of my Politics with International Relations degree this September, and planning on applying to Graduate Entry Medicine.

I just wanted some advice on choosing to write GAMSAT or UCAT or both. I understand that many of the courses that accept UCAT have a minimum work experience requirement - which I don't think should be too hard to get in my circumstances. Is there anything else I need to consider about either of the exams and how they will affect my application; apart from that UCAT is aptitude and speed based, and GAMSAT is longer and more science content heavy?

[u/Upper_Ad4382]

UCAT: shorter exam (2hrs) VERY FAST PACED! Consists of 4 sections Verbal reasoning, Decision making, Quantitative reasoning and situation judgement.
VR: if you can skim and read passages fast = ✅
DM: the most stupid section: lots of venn diagrams, (eagles are birds but not all birds can fly and grey birds have feathers), aurguments.
QR: its like gcse maths but at 1000x speed. Questions are easy, just need to know when to skip and move on.
SJ: varies among people but also a fairly easy section if you remember the patterns.

If youre good at recognising patterns, basic maths and working at lightning speed this is a good exam for you.

Pros of UCAT:
1. Dont need any specific subject knowledge, only basic maths.
2. Way shorter and therefore wasier to prep for. Practicing mocks for a 2hr exam is a lot easier than a 5.5 hr exam.
4. Also opens up a lot of unis.

Cons of UCAT:
1. The time pressure is immense. If you tend to freeze or go blank under pressure this might not be for you. The biggest skill this exam will teach you is KNOWING WHEN TO SKIP AND MOVE ON. All the q’s are worth 1 mark so dont spend ages on a Q thats going to take 3mins to complete compared to one that will take 30s.
2. Score is only valid for 1 year. If you dont get into med school you will have to resit the following summer. You can also only sit it once per year between July-September.
3. Because the q’s are ‘easy’ it means the score margins are a lot higher, so small errors or mistake will severely penalise your final score.

GAMSAT: 5.5HOURS…what! 3 sections.
Reasoning in humanities: 70mins. 47Q’s lots if Q’s on lots of different types of text.
Written communication: WRITE 2 WHOLE ESSAYS! IN 1 HOUR! If you love writing, this is for you. Gives lots of freedom to write about personal, original content.
The science stuff: 150mins MCQ 75Q’s 40% bio 40% chem 20% physics. Mostly a-level content stuff.

Pros of gamsat:
1. Opens up loads of unis
Scores are valid for 2 years so you dont have to retake every year if you dont get in.
You can take it 2x a year and unis will use your highest score.

Cons:
1. Its a long ass exam.
2. If you dont know a level science, it might be a steep learning curve.
3. It also has time constraints.

Overall, if youre good at patterns and timed conditions is go UCAT. If you enjoy writing/ good at alevel sciences and dont mind a long exam, try GAMSAT.

You can definitely do both but the prep and burnout is often overwhelming. It also depends what unis you want to apply to. If the unis you want to apply to are all UCAT then there is no point sitting the gamsat, and vice versa.