SAT Exam Guide — Digital SAT Format, Timing, Scoring & Registration

SAT — Exam Guide

The SAT is the College Board’s college admissions test, delivered digitally in the Bluebook testing app at test centers and, for many students, during SAT School Day administrations at their own schools. This guide explains the Digital SAT exactly as the College Board’s published specifications describe it.

Exam format

  • 98 questions and 134 minutes of testing time, in two sections.
  • Reading and Writing: 54 questions, 64 minutes, in two 32-minute modules. Each question is tied to its own short passage (25–150 words) or pair of passages, across literature, history and social studies, the humanities, and science.
  • Math: 44 questions, 70 minutes, in two 35-minute modules, with a 10-minute break between the sections. A calculator is available throughout the Math section (the testing app includes a graphing calculator), and a formula reference sheet is provided.
  • Multistage adaptive: performance in the first module of each section determines the difficulty of the second module.
  • Question mix: Reading and Writing questions are all multiple choice. In Math, roughly three quarters are multiple choice and roughly one quarter are student-produced responses, where you type the answer.
  • Pretest questions: each section includes a small number of unscored pretest questions mixed in with the scored ones; they are not identified.

Content domains

  • Reading and Writing — Craft and Structure (about 28%), Information and Ideas (about 26%), Standard English Conventions (about 26%), and Expression of Ideas (about 20%).
  • Math — Algebra (about 35%), Advanced Math (about 35%), Problem-Solving and Data Analysis (about 15%), and Geometry and Trigonometry (about 15%).

Scoring

  • Scores run from 400 to 1600 in total: each section is scored from 200 to 800 in 10-point steps.
  • There is no passing score. Colleges and scholarship programs set their own score expectations.
  • The College Board publishes College and Career Readiness Benchmarks (for grade 11, 480 in Reading and Writing and 530 in Math). Meeting a benchmark indicates readiness for entry-level college coursework — it is not a pass mark, and falling short is not a failure.
  • There is no penalty for guessing, so no question should be left blank.

Registration and fees

  • Register through the College Board. The standard registration fee is $68 for U.S. test centers (fees published through June 2027); a late registration fee of $38 applies after the regular deadline. Fee waivers are available to eligible students.
  • You will need a device that runs the Bluebook testing app; test centers can provide one if you cannot bring your own.

How PassProfessor practice fits in

Our SAT course gives you 50,000 original practice questions — the largest Digital SAT question bank — at the test’s published domain weights, 14 topic drills, and a fixed-form 98-question simulation at the real test’s 134-minute length. Because the real test is adaptive and includes typed-response Math questions, use the College Board’s own Bluebook practice tests as well to rehearse the live format. Start with the free sample questions to see how the bank is organized.

The program: SAT (Digital SAT) Exam Prep gives you the full 50,000-question practice bank for $49 — the complete 98-question timed simulation, topic drills for every content area in both sections, and a free 12-question sample to start. See the full program and enroll.