Digital SAT · Math
Percentages on the Digital SAT: All Question Types
Percentages covers finding a percent of a quantity, computing a percent increase or decrease, and reversing one to recover an original amount. The reliable frame is to translate the words into a multiplication: a percent increase multiplies by one plus the rate, a decrease by one minus the rate. Reversal questions, where a price after a discount is given and the original is wanted, are the frequent trap because dividing is required rather than multiplying. This is a Problem-Solving and Data Analysis skill that appears regularly and rewards setting up the relationship before computing. The built-in Desmos calculator handles the arithmetic, so the skill lives in translating the percent language into the right operation, especially telling a forward change from a reversal.
College Board skill: Problem-Solving and Data Analysis: Percentages
How Percentages is tested
- how often it appears
- ~1 per test how often it appears
- typical difficulty
- Easy to medium typical difficulty
- practice questions in our bank
- 112 practice questions in our bank
Percent of what
Identify the base (the 'of' amount), then apply percent change as a multiplier. Successive changes multiply, not add.
Frequency and difficulty come from this skill's questions across our assembled full-length Digital SAT forms; the practice count is how many drills of these types are in our bank.
1 question type in Percentages
Common questions
How do I calculate a percent increase or decrease?
Multiply by one plus the rate for an increase, or one minus the rate for a decrease. A 20 percent increase multiplies by 1.2; a 20 percent decrease multiplies by 0.8.
How do I reverse a percent change?
Divide rather than multiply. If a price after a 20 percent discount is given, divide it by 0.8 to recover the original. Reversal questions are the most common trap in this skill.
What is the key to percent word problems?
Translate the sentence into a multiplication before computing, and decide whether the change moves forward or needs reversing. Getting that direction right matters more than the arithmetic itself.
Practice Percentages the way it is tested
Start with the free 16-question diagnostic, then drill any of these types with step-by-step reasoning.