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SAT Prep / Problem-Solving & Data Analysis / Percentages
SAT Math · Problem-Solving & Data Analysis

PercentagesHow the SAT tests it — and how to beat it

Percent change, percent of a quantity, reverse-percentage problems, and multi-step percent scenarios like tax-plus-discount.

Practice Percentages FreeAll of Problem-Solving & Data Analysis

Percentages in Our Question Bank

42

Total questions

18

Easy

15

Medium

9

Hard

What the SAT Actually Tests

Percent questions span simple ("what is 15% of 80") to genuinely tricky: successive percent changes, reverse percentages ("after a 20% discount the price was $60 — what was the original?"), and percent-of-a-percent comparisons between groups in a table.

Convert every percent operation to a multiplier: +15% is ×1.15, −20% is ×0.80. This makes successive changes a single multiplication and makes reverse problems a division (60 ÷ 0.80), not a subtraction. For comparison questions, be precise about the base — "A is 25% more than B" means A = 1.25B, and B is not 25% less than A.

Real Percentages Practice Questions

Straight from the Grind1600 question bank — try each one before revealing the answer.

Question 1easy
A store sells a jacket for $80. If the jacket is on sale for 25% off, what is the sale price, in dollars, of the jacket?
  • A)
  • B)
  • C)
  • D)
Show answer & explanation

Correct answer: 60

The correct answer is 60. A 25% discount on $80 is 0.25 × 80 = $20. The sale price is $80 - $20 = $60.

Question 2medium
In January, the price of a vintage record was $85. In February, the price of the vintage record was $102. The price of the vintage record in February was w% of the price of the vintage record in January. What is the value of w?
  • A)17
  • B)83
  • C)120
  • D)185
Show answer & explanation

Correct answer: C

Choice C is correct. The February price ($102) is w% of the January price ($85): 102 = (w/100)(85). Solving: w = (102 × 100)/85 = 10200/85 = 120.

Choice A is incorrect. 17 is the dollar increase, not the percentage.

Choice B is incorrect and may result from subtracting 17 from 100.

Choice D is incorrect and may result from adding 85 + 100.

Traps to Avoid

  • Solving reverse-percentage problems by taking the percent of the final value instead of dividing by the multiplier.
  • Adding successive percent changes (+10%, +10% is not +20% — it's ×1.21).
  • Using the wrong base in comparisons: 'X% more than' and 'X% of' produce different equations.

More Problem-Solving & Data Analysis Skills

Ratios, Rates & Units

Setting up proportions, converting units, and reasoning with rates — the most common word-problem machinery on the SAT Math section.

Data Distributions & Measures of Center

Mean, median, mode, range, and standard deviation — and how outliers or skew change them — read from lists, tables, and frequency plots.

Scatterplots & Two-Variable Data

Reading scatterplots, lines of best fit, interpreting slope in context, and distinguishing linear from exponential association.

Probability

One-event and conditional probability, usually read out of two-way frequency tables — the key is identifying the correct restricted group.

Inference & Margin of Error

What sample results let you conclude about a population, how margin of error works, and why sample size changes confidence.

Evaluating Statistical Claims

Judging what a study design supports: random sampling vs. random assignment, causation vs. correlation, and generalizability.

Master Percentages With Adaptive Practice

42 Percentages questions with step-by-step explanations, woven into a day-by-day study plan built for your test date.

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