Preparing for the GRE isn’t exactly an exciting prospect for many students. You have to study for months, solve hundreds of practice questions and learn a barrage of new words with the hopes that you score high enough to get into your dream school. Add to this the stress and anxiety brought on by meeting admissions deadlines, and it’s not difficult to imagine why students dread the test.

While not as strenuous as the MCAT, LSAT, or even GMAT, GRE is still difficult. However, I’d argue it’s more tricky than it is outright difficult. GRE’s reputation as a tough test, in my opinion, comes from its crafty use of the english language. ETS, the makers of GRE, are quite apt at making deceptive questions to trick you into choosing an incorrect answer.

So why is GRE verbal so hard? There are multiple factors to consider while answering this question. Let’s take a look at the major reasons why GRE verbal has a notorious reputation.

Obscure Vocabulary 

The first and foremost reason why GRE verbal tends to give students a hard time is due to the extensive vocabulary. Around half of all verbal questions directly test your grasp of English vocabulary. You will encounter questions about fill-in blanks with difficult words as options.

Since GRE’s goal is to determine your readiness for a graduate-level program, the vocabulary that comes up on the test is much more obscure than SAT or ACT. However, the good thing is that many of these words repeat, and you can find lists of the most frequent GRE words online or in book form.

Even then, the problem remains that if you memorize all such words, there is no guarantee that a good portion of them will show up. You may encounter words that you haven’t even seen in your entire life. This is the reason why it is highly recommended to read credible journals and newspapers and build your vocabulary that way instead of only relying on lists.

Tricky Use of English Language

Sadly, vocabulary is only part of the problem. An even bigger challenge is ETS’s use of devious language to form questions. These questions are deliberately designed to trick you into choosing an incorrect answer. Since reading comprehension is a primary focus of the test, this is how they distinguish between those who are good at it and those who aren’t.

The kind of written english that most people are familiar with isn’t the “academic” type. Language in pop culture and magazines is straightforward and easy to understand. Someone who has only ever communicated at that level will find GRE’s English quite difficult. Not only is the tone formal, but the use of complicated sentence structures and hidden nuances in passages make it especially harder to comprehend.

Again, I am using the words hard and difficult, but in reality, it’s all about trickery. Thankfully, anyone can learn the tricks and get familiar with the language GRE uses. If you are wondering where you can practice reading this sort of English, try The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and Long Reads.

Time Shortage 

As if the passages and the words weren’t complicated enough, guess how much time you have to answer a single question? One minute and 30 seconds is all you get to answer one verbal question on GRE. Even if you have stellar vocabulary and comprehension skills, reading a passage, making sense of it, and then choosing an answer in such little time is no easy task.

The constant realization that you have to rush every question is what puts all that pressure on you. The only way to deal with it is to do plenty of practice beforehand to understand the question types inside out.

Section Adaptive Test

We hear all the time that GRE is a Section-adaptive test, but what does this mean. There are two verbal and two quant sections on GRE. Depending on how well you do on the first section of verbal or quant determines the difficulty level of the second section. Essentially, it means that if you do a really good job and answer most if not all the questions correctly in the first section, instead of getting rewarded, you are given even more challenging questions. Add to this the preexisting time crunch, and now you have a minute and a half to answer even tougher questions.

All-or-Nothing

A good amount of GRE verbal questions have multiple answer choices, such as sentence completion questions. A sentence completion question asks you to fill in up to three blanks with the provided words. Let’s say there are three blanks, and you have to select three words from the provided list. Even if you get two of the three blanks right, you will still score a zero. There is no partial credit on GRE. Either every blank is correct or nothing is.

The only way to overcome this is to get ample amount of practice before the test day. The more questions you solve, the more words you will encounter and learn. Plus, it also helps to know the various usages of words as GRE loves to confuse test-takers with tricky usage.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the GRE verbal section is difficult mostly due to the tricky nature of the questions. GRE uses language that is deliberately designed to confuse you and add to that the extensive vocabulary you have to learn; it is no wonder that it is a challenging test.

Moreover, time is also a significant constraint as you only have a minute and a half per question in the verbal section. If you do well on the first section of either verbal or quant, the succeeding section becomes more difficult because GRE is section-adaptive. Lastly, for questions that have multiple blanks, you have to answer all of them correctly. Otherwise, you don’t get credit. All of these points combined make GRE verbal a tougher test.