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Magoosh is a great website for someone starting from absolute scratch. If you are rusty on math and verbal, this is a good website to brush up on and get the basics back. Magoosh's website is definitely the most clean and user friendly. Each lesson is categorized by topic and subtopic, making it easy to navigate and focus on areas of weakness. Each section then has a quiz after to test your understanding.
The lessons are easy to grasp, extremely clear, and short - so you can really go at your own pace. Also, Magoosh covers every topic on the GMAT - including AWA and the essay. You can personalize your practice, from a pool of over 1000 questions, EACH of which have a video and text explanation. Overall, I was really happy with this site. It's organized, has great resources, and even has different study plans you can choose from. The staff is always there to help and answers emails right away. The blog is also an excellent source. Magoosh rocks!
I took the Magoosh Premium Course in preparation for a GMAT retake. I definitely chose Magoosh because of the price ($99 special) and the score guarantee (50+ pts). Even though I did not improve much, I did appreciate the Magoosh course and would easily choose it again.
Overall, I think the course is great for those aiming to score in the high 600s. But the lecture videos (particularly verbal) does not cover advanced level 700-plus concepts sufficiently. The math section was great and comprehensive, especially as it really simplified difficult concepts such as permutations and combinations. However, I was surprised by the breadth of videos available for math, while the verbal videos were less dense.
For me, the practice questions and dashboard review had the most value, as I could focus on very hard problems and accurately access my strengths and weaknesses. Another critical aspect of the course is the note taking function provided at the end of lecture videos and question explanations. Instead of re-watching videos, I could simply look at notes I took to recall key problem types.
REVIEWER IDENTITY VERIFIED by score report [?]
Magoosh is a big part in my GMAT journey. The video lectures are optimally designed so that i could save time in learning concepts and practice more. I prepared for one month (more than 200 hours) and improved from a 580 in CAT from MGMAT to 700 in actual GMAT.
Magoosh premium is also a good value for money. As to my research i couldn't find any comprehensive course that costs only $99 for 1 year subscription. The responses from instructors in case of any doubt is fast and the Magoosh blog too helps a lot in prepearation
However, one needs to look for other sources when it comes to IR sections. Magoosh material is not good enough to get a decent score in IR.
Joined: Aug 27, 2013
Posts: 0
Kudos: 5
Self-reported Score:
540 Q33 V31
610 Q33 V41
640 Q42 V35
I took the GMAT the first time after several months of sales, but I tried to "know" everything. Bombed it.
Second time I took it I used some strategy but focused almost solely on verbal. Did much better but still not where I wanted to be.
I purchased Magoosh after reading several reviews and looking at the trade offs for cost. I have found it was great in reviewing general concepts. The biggest thing for me has been the strategy review videos. I like that I can break down my performance by several criteria. To have the specific videos that deal with questions I got wrong has helped quite a bit.
The premium package of Magoosh was the best deal I could find for my online GMAT preparations. While the price was reasonable, I wish the content was a tad bit better.Not that it is insufficient, on the contrary it is a very good starting point esp. to brush up on basics.
During my preparation, I found Magoosh particularly helpful in finding my weak areas. The tests can be filtered down to difficult level , no. of questions, time, etc.
Another major plus was the email support. More often than not, my doubts would be cleared within half a day. The respondents were sincere enough to follow up till my doubts were fully cleared.
Overall, this was a great add-on for my 1-month GMAT prep, if and when I retake the test I look forward to using the new features that have been added!
I decided to go with Magoosh because I needed a low cost GMAT prep option (I had barely any money to spend on GMAT prep). I had tried self study for a few months with no discernible progress, so I knew it was time to take another route. I signed up for Magoosh premium after a friend suggested the program to me and I began my study using 2 of the three month study plans offered by Magoosh. I did a combo of the 'Version B: Math Focused' plan and the 'Version D: For Advanced Students' plan. The Advanced study plan called for use of the MGMAT complete set of strategy books and the OG 13, so I used those as well. Between these three resources, I spent a grand total of roughly $275 on my GMAT prep.
Overall, I found Magoosh to be an awesome investment. For $99, I got a full year's access to a whole tome of videos on all the subject matter covered by the GMAT, all the way down from the most basic frameworks up to the 700+ level concepts and strategies. For me this was priceless, since I came to my study very rusty on Quant and needed a refresher bootcamp type of prep. I was already very strong on Verbal, having previously taken the LSAT (basically GMAT Verbal on steriods), so I didn't use that part of the Magoosh offering too much.
In any case, to improve on Quant, I watched all of the math videos, per the Magoosh study plan, and was able to re-acquaint myself with these math concepts that I have not seen since high school. Magoosh was helpful for me personally as someone with a short attention span and a busy schedule because the videos are short and to the point. No long drawn out explanations; instead, the material is practical and concise. Just the way I need it. What is more, Magoosh has an iPad app. This allowed me to conveniently study on the go. No need to lug heavy books around all the time; I could just use my iPad on the train or whenever I had a quick moment (the other advantage of having short videos).
I must say, I spent a lot of time studying, usually about 4 hours per day for about 8 weeks, over 200 hours total. This was in part because I was using two study plans at once. It was a lot of work but it was what I needed to excel. Magoosh was great because, again, the material is super digestible, so I rarely felt lost (which was one of my concerns when deciding whether to do an online course--what if I have question or get lost, who will answer my concerns?) Even if I did get lost or fail to understand something, the Magoosh response team is AMAZING. They reply straight away, usually within a few hours of submitting a question and they answer in a way that really makes sense. Most of the time when I had a question, even if it was a complex inquiry, someone from the Magoosh team would respond in a way where I didn't need to do a lot of back and forth follow up to understand the response provided.
If you are like me, someone who does not have thousands to spend on GMAT prep, but who is motivated to achieve a 700+ score, I would definitely recommend the Magoosh offering. It is HIGHLY ECONOMICAL (1 year access for $99!!!) and user friendly. Simply put, it is well worth the investment.
I had finished up the OG13 and was looking for fresh questions. I had taken Magoosh GRE and found it pretty good so decided to go for Magoosh Premium (99 for both quanty and verbal). I think I'm happy with the content. I got a 750 on my GMAT and I can definitely attribute some of this sucess to the Magoosh software.
Magoosh QUANT- The quality of quant questions are pretty good. At one point I found myself addicted to
them. One area where I think Magoosh has an edge is the online platform to practice questions. The video lessons were excellent, especially the ones on Probability and Counting (permutation/combination). There are plenty of DS questions so people having trouble with DS questions should definitely benifit with this section. I finished all practice questions in Math.
Magoosh Verbal- Also good. The SC questions are especially of good quality and their video explanations are good too. I wont score their RC sections too high. I found a good number of their answers as arbitary, OG answers made sense and related to the paragraphs. But it could be because I lacked an understanding of the passages. I finished about 60% of the questions. I liked the fact that the SC questions specifically tackle some of the oftern tested concepts and idioms on GMAT.
Prior to signing up for Magoosh, I had taken the GMAT twice before and done respectably, 710 and 690. However, with a quantitative background and seeking admission to top 10 programs, I recognized that my quant sub-score needed help (only a 44 both times) to achieve the "80%" threshold. This is where Magoosh came in. I was struggling to understand the shortcuts and precise methodologies required for these quirky GMAT problems and the breadth of video solutions was something I didnt find in any other programs and is what truly put me over the edge. While I didn't improve my overall score too drastically, I did improve my quant sub-score to a 49 and the critical 81%. Thanks for the help, Magoosh!
Magoosh offers a great product at an affordable price. I knew virtually nothing about the GMAT or the GMAT material, and Magoosh's helpful videos showed me everything. Here is what I really liked about Magoosh:
Visual Dashboard:
This dashboard helped me really keep track of my progress, and allowed me to see all tools at once. Even though the dashboard is a small part of the Magoosh product, to me it was vitally important.
Video Tutorials:
Because I have not been in school for awhile, I really struggled with a lot of the GMAT material. However, Magoosh has extremely helpful videos that walk you through the test, testing strategies, sections, concepts, and practice questions. The tutorials were very short (allowing me to focus on what I needed and also feel like I was "progressing" quickly by watching six 5-minute videos, as opposed to one 30-minute video), and also very comfortable to listen to.
Question Bank:
Magoosh has A LOT of questions (over a 1,000) and they all have a written explanation and video explanation. This was critical in my learning HOW to solve questions. They also offer many different ways to practice, even simulating the "adaptive" nature of the GMAT (as you get questions correct, harder questions get asked).
Customer Service:
This was what made this company. I got great customer service, before and after my test. They offer a lot of great deals, and even send a friendly email right before the exam to encourage/help you.
Overall, I truly believe I couldn't achieve my 710 without Magoosh!
Overall I'm satisfied, but I think trusting in Magoosh as your only source for prep is going to take you as far as the mid 600s.
The quant part was good, so was SC. Mike McGarry videos were awesome.
The videos are dynamic and engaging, but there could be some notes to make easier to review concepts later.
They really need to work on CR and RC videos and questions.
There is a new feature, the score predictor that works fine - although it needs some work to perfect it.
The question bank is good, though small. If you're serious, you'll finish all the questions fast.