Are Barron's and Princeton Review Practice Tests harder than the real SAT?

Test Preparation SAT Preparation
1

When I do the real college board SAT practice tests I get a score of 1500, but when I do Barrons and Princeton Review practice tests I get low 1400-1450. Are Barron’s and Princeton Review Practice Tests harder than the real SAT?

2

This has been widely reported, yes. Or, at least the scoring is reported to be lower.

Only official practice test and QAS test scores are meaningful/aligned to actual SAT scoring.

3

do you or anyone else know the score margin for Barrons and Princeton Review tests? What I mean by score margin is for example if you get a 1450 on the Barrons tests, then you get estimated +60 points on the actual test. (I just made those numbers up)

4

I’ve seen no valid compilations, but my attempt to recall anecdotal data says about 100-120 points in the SAT 1450 range.

5

dang that’s a lot. So I’ll get a 1550 or something most likely?

6

There are lots of released official tests. Many people recommend doing as many of them as possible for practice rather than non-official tests from private companies.

7

I suggest taking official practice tests to get a much more “most likely” score than something based on “anecdotal data” for a different scoring range.

8

Difficulty is relative to each student, but I do think the Barron’s prep test books, in particular, are objectively more difficult than any College Board released tests.

9

The important part is that they return lower scores for the same level of performance.

Barron’s do seem to be more difficult, which would be fine if the raw score conversion tables accounted for it. But they don’t appear to.

10

So glad to see this thread. I just posted about a similar situation with my son- he took the August 2021 SAT and scored 690 RW, 790 Math.

In preparation for his retake on March 12, he took a couple of CB practice tests last month and scored 730-740 on RW. Then he switched to Princeton Review and his score has consistently dropped to 680, which is lower than his actual SAT.
No matter what he does, it’s 680.
Sometimes he scores higher on reading but then loses ground on writing; other times writing goes well but then reading goes south. Totally inconsistent and unpredictable, so looks like the tests and scoring tables are badly designed.