What is The Wonderlic Test? What if we told you that there is no Wonderlic Test? Well, in fact, there is no single test officially called “The Wonderlic Test.” Instead, there are a series of different Wonderlic tests. The most common one is the Wonderlic Personnel Test, which is also called the Wonderlic Cognitive Ability test. When you hear someone talk generally about “The Wonderlic Test” (and that probably happens most during NFL draft season), this is the test they’re talking about. (If you’re a student applying to a university or graduate school, you’ll probably be taking the Wonderlic Scholastic Level Exam (SLE). You can read about that here)

The Wonderlic Cognitive Ability Test The Wonderlic Personnel Test is also called the Wonderlic Cognitive Ability Test, which is really a more accurate description. The exam is designed to measure your cognitive ability by assessing your verbal reasoning, math and logic skills. It’s kind of like a miniature IQ test. And it’s used frequently to screen job applicants or to compare interview candidates. It’s not the only factor that matters in being hired (interviews and resumes are very important) but your Wonderlic score can make a difference if you’re up against otherwise similarly qualified candidates.

There are 2 versions of the Wonderlic Personnel Test: The Wonderlic Personnel Test Quicktest (WPT-Q) The Personnel Quicktest test is a timed 8-minute test made up of 30 questions worth one point each. You will generally complete this test online, at home, rather than at a testing site or in an office. It’s often used to determine who will actually get invited to an interview, so it’s important to perform well. Do poorly on the test and you might not even get to the interview. The average test-taker scores less than 15 points (each question is worth one point, so the highest possible score is 30 points) and only a small fraction of people even finish all 30 questions. You only get 16 seconds per question, so there’s no real benefit to being at home (there’s no time to look up answers online). You need to be ready before you click to open the link to your Wonderlic Personnel Quicktest… or be prepared to live with the consequences. Take our Wonderlic practice test to see how you do.

The Wonderlic Personnel Test (WPT-R) The full version of the Wonderlic Personnel test is a timed 12-minute test made up of 50 questions. You’ll take this test on-site and under supervision. In some cases you’ll have already taken the WPT-Q to qualify yourself for the interview. Your results on the Wonderlic Personnel Test (WPT-R) will be compared to other candidates’ results during the interview process and can be the deciding factor in the hiring decision. As with the quicktest, the average test-taker answers less than 50% of the questions correctly (the average score is about 21) and only a small fraction of people even finish all 50 questions. Take our Wonderlic practice test to see how you do.

What’s On the Wonderlic Personnel Test? The 50 questions (or 30 on the WPT-Q) test your math, logic and verbal reasoning skills. There are many different question types, including: Math Averages

Algebraic Word Problems

Decimals

Percentages

Ratios & Rates Logic Spatial Reasoning

Deductive Reasoning

3D Shapes

Pattern Recognition Verbal Reasoning Proverbs

Finding Exceptions

Sentence ordering

Analogies

Vocabulary General Knowledge Finding errors/duplicates

Date recognition

Decimal number ordering

Graphs and data plotting

Vocabulary An online Wonderlic study course– like our Rapid Wonderlic Mastery course— will help you learn the right way to approach to solve each question type. Plus, the course gives you access to 5 more Wonderlic practice tests and sample Wonderlic questions with answers to perfect your skills. What else do I need to know about the Wonderlic Cognitive Ability test? This test could realistically be the deciding factor in whether or not you get hired. So take it seriously. If you want this job, don’t blow off your test. If you’ve received an email invitation to take the Wonderlic Personnel Quicktest online, prepare yourself before you click that link and start the test. There are no second chances. Multiple studies show that taking practice tests significantly improves performance on standardized tests like the Wonderlic. Practice doesn’t make perfect in this case but it does make you better. The more tests you take, the better you’ll know what kind of questions to look out for, how to solve them and where to focus your time to get the best results. (Or you could just sign up for our Wonderlic study course, and just let us guide you to a better score quickly.)