What is the GAMSAT?

ACER numbers the sections one to three, and almost everyone shortens them to S1, S2 and S3. The full names matter because they describe what is actually being tested.

Section 1gives you passages — personal, imaginative, expository and argumentative — and asks you to interpret ideas in social and cultural contexts. Section 2 is two 30-minute writing tasks, each offering four statements on a common theme; the first deals with socio-cultural issues, the second with more personal and social ones. Section 3 tests reasoning and problem solving in a scientific context, and also examines recall and understanding of basic science concepts.

Section 3 is split 40% chemistry, 40% biology, 20% physics. That split is ACER-official and published free in the Information Booklet, despite regularly being sold as insider knowledge. The assumed level is the first year of university studies in biology and chemistry, and A-level/Leaving Certificate/Year 12 in physics.

No marks are deducted for a wrong answer, and “all questions have the same value”— marks are not weighted by how hard a question is, contrary to a claim still published by at least one large prep provider.

GAMSAT runs across two sittings approximately three weeks apart. Written Communication is remote-proctored; Sections 1 and 3 are sat at a test centre.

Written Communication is remote-proctored via ProctorU for everyone, with no application needed. Sections 1 and 3 are sat together in one test-centre session, in that order, with a 30-minute break between them.

You can only sit Sections 1 and 3 remotely if ACER approves an Alternate Delivery request — you must live more than three hours’ drive from a test centre, or in a country with no test centre, and supply notarised documentation. ACER warns that any ProctorU booking made for those sections without prior approval is automatically cancelled.

You need to sit all three components to receive any GAMSAT result. Leaving before Section 3 starts means no score at all.

ACER’s own eligibility wording, quoted rather than paraphrased:

“GAMSAT is available to any person who is applying to study a course for which GAMSAT is a prerequisite, and who is able to meet the academic entry requirements set by the universities. To be eligible, you need to have already completed, or be currently enrolled, in bachelor or an undergraduate honours degree, or you will meet the entry requirements outlined by your prospective institution at the time you are applying for entry.”

There is one published exception for non-graduates, and it is narrower than it is usually reported. ACER, verbatim:

“If you are applying to the University of Exeter Medical School and/or the University of Plymouth Faculty Of Health, you are also eligible as long as you believe you have achieved an appropriate level of intellectual maturity and subject knowledge to meet the demands of the test. The test is also available to those for whom it will be more than two full academic years from the time they completed their level 3 (A level or equivalent) studies. This includes all graduate applicants.”

Three further conditions apply to everyone:

• You must be a genuine prospective applicant to a course for which GAMSAT is a prerequisite. You agree to this in the registration declaration.
• There is no limit on the number of times you may sit GAMSAT, but only one registration per person per cycle. Duplicate registrations are cancelled.
• ACER reserves the right to refuse or cancel a registration where a conflict of interestis apparent — explicitly including affiliation with a coaching or preparation provider.

ACER does not adjudicate eligibility. Its own instruction is to contact your prospective institution or admissions body if you are unsure.

In Australia that admissions body is usually not the university at all. Domestic applicants to graduate-entry medicine apply through GEMSAS admissions— a single application carrying six ranked preferences across nine universities, and at most one interview offer between them. International applicants apply to each school directly.

You receive four scores: one for each section, plus an overall score. Each is expressed on a scale of 0 to 100. ACER states plainly that these are not percentage marks. A 60 does not mean 60% of questions correct.

The overall score is a weighted average, with Section 3 counting double:

You also get an approximate percentile ranking for the overall score. Universities set their own cut-offs and consider your section and overall scores, not your percentile.

There are no remarks and no appeals. ACER does not offer re-marking of any component, including Written Communication, and provides no additional information about how a score was calculated.

A live sitting also contains a small number of unscored trial questions, which is one reason no practice test — ours included — can convert a raw result into a scaled score.

There is a second four-year figure that causes most of the confusion in circulation: your Statement of Results stays in your ACER account for four years regardless of country. That is document retention, not score validity. A UK or Irish applicant can still download a three-year-old statement that no longer counts for admission.

Validity is set by the receiving country and institution, not by the score itself. ACER publishes the list of eligible sittings for each market each cycle, which is the safest thing to check against.

Two absences are worth knowing about, because a great deal of published GAMSAT content fills them in anyway.

• No reading-time breakdown. ACER no longer publishes a reading-time breakdown. Earlier booklets (2020–2022) itemised it; the 2026 edition does not.Every page still quoting a per-section reading-time figure — including several AI-generated summaries — is working from a withdrawn document. See how long the GAMSAT is.
• No topic syllabus. ACER publishes the Section 3 subject proportions and the assumed level, and nothing else. Every topic checklist in existence, ours included, is reverse-engineered from those two statements. See the GAMSAT syllabus.

ACER also declines to recommend any preparation provider. Asked directly which providers it recommends, its published answer is a single word: “None.” That applies to us exactly as it applies to every paid course.

Registration is A$568 in Australia, €378 in Ireland and £296in the UK, with around a dozen other fees layered on top depending on what you need — the full cost breakdown lists all of them, including the two whose amounts ACER does not publish.

GAMSAT runs twice a year, in March and September. ACER publishes dates only about one test year ahead, so at any given moment one sitting is fully specified and the next is not. Our dates page says exactly which is which and refuses to estimate the rest.

If you want to know where you actually stand before planning anything, the fastest route is a timed diagnostic. Our free GAMSAT practice test is timed, scored and needs no signup.