Hi there! I'm a lil bit stressed about the SAT and I'm wondering, how is the score typically distributed? Like, is there high competition for those top scores and do a lot of people get lower scores, or is it more spread out?
The SAT score distribution does tend to form somewhat of a bell-curve shape, which means a lot of students score around the middle and fewer score on the low and high ends.
To give you a rough idea:
- Around the center of the curve, you'll find that a large number of students typically score somewhere in the range of 1050-1100.
- On the higher end, a score of 1200 places you above about 74% of all test takers. The scores continue to spread out more and more as you move higher. A score of 1300 puts you in approximately the top 14%, 1400 in the top 6% and a perfect score of 1600 is so rare that it places you in the top 0.02%.
- In contrast, on the lower end, roughly 25% of test-takers score below 1050.
Remember that while getting a high SAT score is beneficial, it's also just one piece of the college admissions puzzle. Admissions officers look at a variety of factors, including your course rigor, grades, extracurriculars, letters of recommendation, essays, and more. So, give it your best on the SAT, but remember it's not the only thing that matters in your applications.
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